Psalmus David. Adversus Goliath.

(Of David.)

A psalm of David against Goliath.

Benedictus Dominus Deus meus, qui docet manus meas ad prælium, et digitos meos ad bellum.

Blessed be the Lord, my refuge, who makes these hands strong for battle, these fingers skilled in fight;

Blessed be the Lord my God, who teacheth my hands to fight, and my fingers to war.

Misericordia mea et refugium meum; susceptor meus et liberator meus; protector meus, et in ipso speravi, qui subdit populum meum sub me.

the Lord who pities me and grants me safety, who shelters me and sets me at liberty, who protects me and gives me confidence, bowing down nations to my will.

My mercy, and my refuge: my support, and my deliverer: My protector, and I have hoped in him: who subdueth my people under me.

Domine, quid est homo, quia innotuisti ei? aut filius hominis, quia reputas eum?

Lord, what is Adam’s race, that thou givest heed to it, what is man, that thou carest for him?

Lord, what is man, that thou art made known to him? or the son of man, that thou makest account of him?

Homo vanitati similis factus est; dies ejus sicut umbra prætereunt.

Like the wind he goes, like a shadow his days pass.

Man is like to vanity: his days pass away like a shadow.

Domine, inclina cælos tuos, et descende; tange montes, et fumigabunt.

Bid heaven stoop, Lord, and come down to earth; at thy touch, the mountains will be wreathed in smoke.

Lord, bow down thy heavens and descend: touch the mountains, and they shall smoke.

Fulgura coruscationem, et dissipabis eos; emitte sagittas tuas, et conturbabis eos.

Brandish thy lightnings, to rout my enemies; shoot thy arrows, and throw them into confusion!

Send forth lightning, and thou shalt scatter them: shoot out thy arrows, and thou shalt trouble them.

Emitte manum tuam de alto: eripe me, et libera me de aquis multis, de manu filiorum alienorum:

With heavenly aid, from yonder flood deliver me; rescue me from the power of alien foes,

Put forth thy hand from on high, take me out, and deliver me from many waters: from the hand of strange children:

quorum os locutum est vanitatem, et dextera eorum dextera iniquitatis.

who make treacherous promises, and lift their hands in perjury.

Whose mouth hath spoken vanity: and their right hand is the right hand of iniquity.

Deus, canticum novum cantabo tibi; in psalterio decachordo psallam tibi.

Then, O my God, I will sing thee a new song, on a ten-stringed harp I will sound thy praise;

To thee, O God, I will sing a new canticle: on the psaltery and an instrument of ten strings I will sing praises to thee.

Qui das salutem regibus, qui redemisti David servum tuum de gladio maligno,

the God to whom kings must look for victory, the God who has brought his servant David rescue.

Who givest salvation to kings: who hast redeemed thy servant David from the malicious sword:

eripe me, et erue me de manu filiorum alienorum, quorum os locutum est vanitatem, et dextera eorum dextera iniquitatis.

Save me from the cruel sword, deliver me from the power of alien foes, who make treacherous promises, and lift their hands in perjury.

Deliver me, And rescue me out of the hand of strange children; whose mouth hath spoken vanity: and their right hand is the right hand of iniquity:

Quorum filii sicut novellæ plantationes in juventute sua; filiæ eorum compositæ, circumornatæ ut similitudo templi.

So may our sons grow to manhood, tall as the saplings, our daughters shapely as some column at the turn of a building, it may be, the temple itself.

Whose sons are as new plants in their youth: Their daughters decked out, adorned round about after the similitude of a temple:

Promptuaria eorum plena, eructantia ex hoc in illud; oves eorum fœtosæ, abundantes in egressibus suis;

Our garners full, well stored with every kind of plenty, our sheep bearing a thousand-fold, thronging the pasture in their tens of thousands,

Their storehouses full, flowing out of this into that. Their sheep fruitful in young, abounding in their goings forth:

boves eorum crassæ. Non est ruina maceriæ, neque transitus, neque clamor in plateis eorum.

our oxen straining at the load; no ruined walls, no exile, no lamenting in our streets.

their oxen fat. There is no breach of wall, nor passage, nor crying out in their streets.

Beatum dixerunt populum cui hæc sunt; beatus populus cujus Dominus Deus ejus.

Happy men call such a people as this; and is not the people happy, that has the Lord for its God?

They have called the people happy, that hath these things: but happy is that people whose God is the Lord.