1 Samuel 20:3

And David, whose experience with Saul had taught him to estimate the true state of affairs more correctly, sware moreover, in addition to what he had said to Jonathan, and said, Thy father certainly knoweth that I have found grace in thine eyes, the kindly feeling of his son for David could not have escaped his observation; and he saith, Let not Jonathan know this lest he be grieved; but truly, as the Lord liveth, and as thy soul liveth, the double oath expressing the gravity of the situation as he saw it, there is but a step, hardly as much as a step, between me and death. "The picture is of a precipice, from which he is only a step removed, over which he may any moment be plunged. " (Lange.)