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Observe here, 1. Our apostle informs us what is the proper use of the tongue: namely, to bless and praise God; speech being the most excellent faculty, is to be consecrated to divine uses: it is both a good man's work and his recreation to bless and praise God.
Observe, 2. The sinful use which some men put the tongue unto, and that is, to curse with it, to curse men that have the natural image of God upon them, yea, holy and good men, that have the divine image of God instamped upon them; this is the abuse of some men's tongues, their mouth is full of cursing and bitterness.
Observe, 3. The same tongue cannot, should not bless God and curse men; to pray and brawl with the same tongue, is shameful hypocrisy; to go from worshipping to railing and reviling, to speak to the God of heaven with a tongue set on fire of hell, is a monstrous impiety.
Observe, 4. How the apostle discovers the mighty absurdity of blessing and cursing with one and the same tongue, and of putting the best member to the worst use; the good aggravates the evil, and the evil disparageth, yea, disproveth the good; to suppose that the same tongue should acceptably bless God, and at the same time sinfully curse men, is as irrational and absurd as to imagine that the same fountain should send forth salt water and fresh, sweet water and bitter; and, as if a fig tree should bring forth olives, or a vine bear figs: our apostle argues and reasons from what is impossible in nature, to what is absurd in manners; contrary effects from the same cause is against the order of nature; in like manner grace is uniform, and always acts like itself; to bless and curse, to pray and revile, is wholly inconsistent with grace: nature abhors contradictions, and so does the grace of God: though a Christian has a double principle in him, the flesh and the spirit, yet he has not a double heart; his spirit is single and sincere in what he does, in all he does both for God and man.