The rest of chapter 4 has been called “Nephi’s Psalm” or “Nephi’s Soliloquy,” and has been set to poetry or music by several people. His love for the scriptures, for his children, and for the Lord is obvious. The feelings from his heart is one of the best, if not the best, illustrations of a sanctified man found anywhere in the scriptures. A few observations from these verses will sustain the premise of his sanctification. A fuller analysis of this beautiful rendition is not needed. It should be read and reread by all who want to attain this state of sanctification, the requirements for those “who were made pure and entered into the rest of the Lord their God” (Alma 13:12), thus gaining eternal life.
Nephi’s temptations and sins will be enumerated in the second part of our analysis. His being supported by God in the wilderness, his enemies being confounded, the knowledge given him by vision, angels, and the wings of the Spirit carrying him upon exceedingly high mountains have been told us in limited detail in the book of First Nephi. The things he was forbidden to write because they were “even too great for man” (v. 25) would include, but not be limited to, “concerning the end of the world” which he was shown. He wrote “but a small part of the things that [he] saw” (1 Nephi 14:22, 24, 28).