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Jennings +</TITLE> + +<STYLE TYPE="text/css"> +BODY { color: Black; + background: White; + margin-right: 10%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; + text-align: justify } + +P {text-indent: 4% } + +P.noindent {text-indent: 0% } + +P.poem {text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 10%; + font-size: small } + +P.letter {text-indent: 0%; + font-size: small ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.transnote {font-size: 80% ; + text-indent: 0%; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + +P.footnote {font-size: 80%; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 10% ; + margin-right: 10% } + +P.finis { font-size: larger ; + text-align: center ; + text-indent: 0% ; + margin-left: 0% ; + margin-right: 0% } + + +</STYLE> + +</HEAD> + +<BODY> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Old Groans and New Songs, by F. C. Jennings + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Old Groans and New Songs + Being Meditations on the Book of Ecclesiastes + +Author: F. C. Jennings + +Release Date: September 13, 2009 [EBook #29971] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK OLD GROANS AND NEW SONGS *** + + + + +Produced by Al Haines + + + + + +</pre> + + +<BR><BR> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +OLD GROANS +</H1> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +AND +</H4> + +<H1 ALIGN="center"> +NEW SONGS +</H1> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +BEING +</H4> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +Meditations on the Book of Ecclesiastes +</H4> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +by +</H4> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +F. C. JENNINGS, +</H3> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +NEW YORK. +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +Glasgow: +<BR> +PICKERING & INGLIS, PRINTERS & PUBLISHERS, +<BR> +The Publishing Office, 73 Bothwell Street. +<BR> +LONDON: +<BR> +S. BAGSTER & SONS, LTD., 15 Paternoster Row, E.C +<BR><BR> +1920 +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<A HREF="#chap01">CHAPTER I</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap02">CHAPTER II</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap03">CHAPTER III</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap04">CHAPTER IV</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap05">CHAPTER V</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap06">CHAPTER VI</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap07">CHAPTER VII</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap08">CHAPTER VIII</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap09">CHAPTER IX</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap10">CHAPTER X</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap11">CHAPTER XI</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap12">CHAPTER XII</A><BR> +<A HREF="#chap13">"ABOVE THE SUN"</A><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="transnote"> +[Transcriber's note: Above list of chapters added to HTML +version for readers' convenience.] +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap00b"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +PREFACE. +</H3> + +<P> +The chief object of a word of preface to the following notes is that +the reader may not expect from them more, or other, than is intended. +They are the result of meditations—not so much of a critical as a +devotional character—on the book, in the regular course of private +morning readings of the Scriptures—meditations which were jotted down +at the time, and the refreshment and blessing derived from which, I +desired to share with my fellow-believers. Some salient point of each +chapter has been taken and used as illustrative of what is conceived as +the purpose of the book. As month by month passed, however, the +subject opened up to such a degree that at the end, one felt as if +there were a distinct need entirely to re-write the earlier chapters. +It is, however, sent forth in the same shape as originally written; the +reader then may accompany the writer, and share with him the delight at +the ever-new beauties in the landscape that each turn of the road, as +it were, unexpectedly laid out before him. +</P> + +<P> +There is one point, however, that it may be well to look at here a +little more closely and carefully than has been done in the body of the +book, both on account of its importance and of the strong attack that +the ecclesiastical infidelity of the day has made upon it: I refer to +its authorship. +</P> + +<P> +To commence with the strongest position of the attack on the Solomon +authorship—necessarily the strongest, for it is directly in the field +of verbal criticism—it is argued that because a large number of words +are found in this book, found elsewhere alone in the post-exilian +writers, (as Daniel or Nehemiah,) therefore the author of the book must +surely be post-exilian too. It would be unedifying, and is happily +unnecessary, to review this in detail—with a literature so very +limited as are the Hebrew writings cotemporary with Solomon: these few, +dealing with other subjects, other ideas, necessitating therefore +another character of words, it takes no scholar to see that any +argument derived from this must necessarily be taken with the greatest +caution. Nay, like all arguments of infidelity, it is a sword easily +turned against the user. As surely as the valleys lie hid in shadow +long after the mountain-tops are shining in the morning sun, so surely +must we expect evidences of so elevated a personality as the wise king +of Israel, to show a fuller acquaintance with the language of his +neighbors; and employ, when they best suited him, words from such +vocabularies—words which would not come into general use for many a +long day; indeed until sorrow, captivity, and shame, had done the same +work for the mass, under the chastening Hand of God, as abundant +natural gifts had done for our wise and glorious author. +</P> + +<P> +Thus the argument of Zöckler—"the numerous Aramaisms (words of Syriac +origin) in the book are among the surest signs of its post-exile +origin"—is really turned against himself. Were such Aramaisms +altogether lacking, we might well question whether the writer were +indeed that widely-read, eminently literary, gloriously intellectual +individual of whom it is said, "his wisdom excelled the children of the +East country and all the wisdom of Egypt, for he was wiser than all +men." Surely, that Solomon shows he was acquainted with words other +than his own Hebrew, and made use of such words when they best suited +his purpose, is only what common-sense would naturally look for. There +is no proof whatever that the <I>words themselves</I> were of late date. +Christian scholars have examined them one by one as carefully, and +certainly at least as conscientiously, as their opponents; and show us, +in result, that the words, although not familiar in the Hebrew +vernacular, were in widely-current use either in the neighboring +Persian or in that family of languages—Syriac and Chaldaic—of which +Hebrew was but a member. +</P> + +<P> +The verdict of impartiality must certainly be "not proven," if indeed +it be not stronger than that, to the attempt to deny to Solomon the +authorship of Ecclesiastes based on the <I>words</I> used. +</P> + +<P> +The next method of argument is one in which we shall feel ourselves +more at home, inasmuch as it is not so much a question of scholarship, +but ordinary intelligent discernment. Time and space forbid that I +attempt here a full or detailed exhibit of the sentences, thoughts, +ideas in the book itself which are taken as being quite impossible to +King Solomon. I will, however, attempt to give a representative few +that may stand for all. In the body of the book I have touched, in +passing, on the argument deduced from the words in the first chapter, +"<I>I was king;</I>" so need only to ask my readers' attention to it there. +</P> + +<P> +That "he says of himself that he was wiser and richer than all before +him in Jerusalem points, under enlightened exposition, clearly to an +author different to the historical Solomon." Indeed! If my readers +can appreciate the force of such an argument, they do more than can I. +That the writer should seek that his words should have the full force, +his experiences have the full weight that could only attach to one in +every way gifted to test all things to their uttermost, is taken as +clear proof, "under unbiased exposition," that the only one who was +<I>exactly thus gifted was not the author</I>! The claim to freedom from +bias is in almost ludicrous harmony with such reasoning. +</P> + +<P> +Again, "that also which is said—chap. vii. 10—of the depravity of the +times accords little with the age of Solomon, the most brilliant and +prosperous of Israelitish history." Another lovely example of +rationalistic "freedom from bias"! For what is this that is said of +the "depravity of the times" so inconsistent with the glory of +Solomon's reign in chap. vii. 10? "Say not thou, What is the cause +that the former days were better than these? For thou dost not inquire +wisely concerning this." And this is proof of the "depravity of the +times"!—not proof, mark, of just that very thing that is the heart and +soul of the book: the weary, unsatisfied, empty heart of poor man +looking backward or forward for the satisfaction that the present +always fails to give "under the sun," and which he, who was wiser than +all who came before him, Solomon, warns his readers <I>against</I>! Oh, +poor blind rationalism! missing all the beauties of God's Word in its +own exceeding cleverness, or—folly! How would the present application +of such reasoning sound! The Victorian era is certainly one of the +most "brilliant and prosperous of" English "history"; hence no one can +ever speak now of "the good old times." Such language is simply +impossible; we never hear it! So if some astute reasoner of the future +comes across such allusion in any writings, it will be clear proof that +the author was <I>post-Victorian</I>! Far more so if, as here, such writer +<I>rebukes</I> this tendency! +</P> + +<P> +"Altogether unkingly sound the complaints in chap. iii. 17 ('I said in +my heart God shall judge the righteous and the wicked; for there is a +time there for every purpose and for every work'); iv.; x. 5-7 (let my +reader refer for himself to these), concerning unjust judges," etc. +"These are all lamentations and complaints natural enough in a +suffering and oppressed subject; but not in a monarch called and +authorized to abolish evil." It is most difficult to deal seriously +with what, if the writer were not so very learned, we should call +nonsense unworthy of a child. Look at the verse to which he refers, +and which I have quoted in full; and extract from it, if your "biased" +judgment will permit, an "unkingly complaint" in any word of it! And +it is at such formidable arguments as this that some of us have been +trembling, fearing lest the very foundations must give way under the +attack! A little familiarity is all that is needed to beget a +wholesome contempt. +</P> + +<P> +Here is one more interesting illustration of the "unbiased," +"scientific" reasoning of rationalism. The object is, you know, to +"determine exactly the epoch and writer of the book;" and this is how +it must be done. "According to chaps, v. 1, and ix. 2, the temple +worship was assiduously practised, but without a living piety of heart, +and in a hypocritical and self-justifying manner; the complaints in +this regard remind us vividly of similar ones of the prophet +Malachi—chap. i. 6, etc." What then is the basis for all this +verbiage about the temple worship? Here it is: "Keep thy foot when +thou goest to the house of God, and be more ready to hear than to give +the sacrifice of fools: for they consider not that they do evil." This +sentence shows that it is impossible that Solomon wrote the book: there +were no "fools" in <I>his</I> time, who were more ready to give a careless +sacrifice than to hearken: all fools only come into existence <I>after +the exile</I>, in the days of Malachi! And this is "higher criticism"! +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Enough as to this line. We will now ask our learned friends, since +Solomon has been so conclusively proved not to have written it, Who +did? And when was it written? Ah, now we may listen to a very medley +of answers!—for opinions here are almost as numerous as the critics +themselves. United in the one assurance that Solomon could not have +written it, they are united in nothing else. One is assured it was +Hezekiah, another is confident it was Zerubbabel, a third is convinced +it was Jesus the son of Joiada—and so on. "All opinions," as Dr. +Lewis says, "are held with equal confidence, and yet in every way are +opposed to each other. Once set it loose from the Solomon time, and +there is no other place where it can be securely anchored." +</P> + +<P> +This brings us then to the positive assertion that from the evident +purpose of the book, the <I>divine</I> purpose, no other than Solomon could +be its author. He must be of a nation taken out of the darkness and +abominations of heathendom;—there was only one such nation,—he must +then be an <I>Israelite</I>. He must live at an epoch when that nation is +at the summit of its prosperity;—it never regained that epoch,—he +must then have lived <I>when</I> Solomon lived. He must, in his own person, +by his riches, honor, wisdom, learning, freedom from external political +fears, perfect capacity to drink of whatever cup this world can put +into his hand to the full—represent the very top-stone of that +glorious time; and not one amongst all the sons of men answers to all +this but <I>Solomon the son of David, king in Jerusalem</I>. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +To Him who is "greater than Solomon"—to Him who is "above the sun"—to +Him whom it is the divine purpose of the book to highly exalt above +all—would I commit this feeblest effort to show that purpose, and, as +His condescending grace permits, further it. F. C. J. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap01"></A> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +OLD GROANS AND NEW SONGS; +</H2> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +OR, +</H4> + +<H2 ALIGN="center"> +<I>MEDITATIONS ON ECCLESIASTES.</I> +</H2> + +<BR> + +<P> +Perhaps there is no book within the whole canon of Scripture so +perplexing and anomalous, at first sight, as that entitled +"Ecclesiastes." Its terrible hopelessness, its bold expression of +those difficulties with which man is surrounded on every side, the +apparent fruitlessness of its quest after good, the unsatisfactory +character, from a Christian standpoint, of its conclusion: all these +points have made it, at one and the same time, an enigma to the +superficial student of the Word, and the arsenal whence a far more +superficial infidelity has sought to draw weapons for its warfare +against clear revelation. And yet here it is, embedded in the very +heart of those Scriptures which we are told were "given by inspiration +of God, and which are profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for +correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may +be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works." Then with this +precious assurance of its "profitableness" deeply fixed in our hearts +by a living faith, and in absolute dependence on that blessed One who +is the one perfect Teacher, let us consider the book. +</P> + +<P> +First, then, let us seek to get all the light we can from all the +exterior marks it bears before seeking to interpret its contents. For +our primary care with regard to this, as indeed with regard to every +book in the Bible, must be to discover, if possible, what is the object +of the book,—from what standpoint does the writer approach his subject. +</P> + +<P> +And first we find it in that group of books through which the voice of +man is prominent—Job, Psalms, Proverbs, Canticles. In these is heard +the music of man's soul; often—nay, mostly—giving sorrowful and +striking evidence of discord, in wail and groan, in tear and sigh; and +yet again, in response evidently to the touch of some Master hand, that +knows it well,—a tender, gracious, compassionate touch,—rising into a +song of sweetest harmony that speaks eloquently of its possibilities, +and bears along on its chords the promise and hope of a complete +restoration. But we shall search our book in vain for any such +expression of joy. No song brightens its pages; no praise is heard +amid its exercises. And yet perfectly assured we may be that, listened +to aright, it shall speak forth the praise of God's beloved Son; looked +at in a right light, it shall set off His beauty. If "He turns the +wrath of man to praise Him," surely we may expect no less from man's +sorrows and ignorance. This, then, we may take it, is the object of +the book, to show forth by its dark background the glory of the Lord, +to bring into glorious relief against the black cloud of man's need and +ignorance the bright light of a perfect, holy, revelation; to let man +tell out, in the person of his greatest and wisest, when he, too, is at +the summit of his greatness, with the full advantage of his matured +wisdom, the solemn questions of his inmost being; and show that +greatness to be of no avail in solving them,—that wisdom foiled in the +search for their answers. +</P> + +<P> +This, then, we will conclude, is the purpose of the book and the +standpoint from which the writer speaks, and we shall find its contents +confirm this in every particular. +</P> + +<P> +It has been well said that as regards each book in holy writ the "key +hangs by the door,"—that is, that the first few sentences will give +the gist of the whole. And, indeed, pre-eminently is such the case +here. The first verse gives us who the writer is; the second, the +beginning and ending of his search. And therein lies the key of the +whole; for the writer is the son of David, the man exalted by Jehovah +to highest earthly glory. Through rejection and flight, through battle +and conflict, had the Lord brought David to this excellence of glory +and power. All this his "son" entered into in its perfection and at +once. For it is that one of his sons who speaks who is <I>king</I>, and in +<I>Jerusalem</I>, the city of God's choice, the beautiful for situation, the +joy of the whole earth. Such is the story of verse 1. Nothing could +possibly go beyond the glory that is compassed by these few words. For +consider them, and you will see that they ascribe "<I>wisdom</I>, and +<I>honor</I>, and <I>riches</I>, and <I>power</I>" to him of whom they are spoken; but +it is human wisdom and earthly power, all "under the sun." And now +listen to the "song" that should surely accompany this ascription; note +the joy of a heart fully and completely satisfied now that the pinnacle +of human greatness is attained. Here it is: "Vanity of vanities," +saith the Preacher, "vanity of vanities; all is vanity!" The word +<I>hahvehl</I> is always translated, as here, "vanity." It is sometimes +applied to "idols," as Deut. xxxii. 21, and would give the idea of +emptiness—nothingness. What a striking contrast! Man has here all +that Nature can possibly give; and his poor heart, far from singing, is +<I>empty</I> still, and utters its sad bitter groan of disappointment. Now +turn and contemplate that other scene, where the true Son of David, +only now a "<I>Lamb as it had been slain</I>," is the center of every +circle, the object of every heart. Tears are dried at the mention of +His name, and song after song bursts forth, till the whole universe of +bliss pours forth its joy, relieves its surcharged heart in praise. +"Vanity of vanities," saith the Preacher. That is the <I>old</I> groan. +"Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof, for +Thou wast slain, and hast redeemed to God by Thy blood, out of every +kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation, and hast made them kings +and priests, and they shall reign over the earth." That is the <I>new</I> +song. Oh, blessed contrast! Does it not make Him who Himself has +replaced the groan by the song precious? Has it, then, no value? +</P> + +<P> +And this is just the purpose of the whole book, to furnish such +striking contrasts whereby the "new" is set off in its glories against +the dark background of the "old,"—rest against labor, hope against +despair, song against groan; and so the third verse puts this very +explicitly,—"What profit hath a man of all his labor which he taketh +under the sun?" +</P> + +<P> +The wisest and the greatest of men is seeking for an answer to this +question. And this verse is too important in its bearing on the whole +book to permit our passing it without looking at that significant word +"profit" a little closer. And here one feels the advantage of those +helps that a gracious God has put into our hands in these days of +special attack upon His revelation, whereby even the unlearned may, by +a little diligence, arrive at the exact shade of the meaning of a word. +The word "profit," then, is, in the Hebrew, <I>yithrohn</I>, and is found in +this exact form only in this book, where it is translated "profit," as +here, or "excellency," as in chap. ii. 13. The Septuagint translates +it into a Greek one, meaning "advantage," or perhaps more literally, +"that which remains over and above." In Eph. iii. 20 it is rendered +"exceeding abundantly above." Hence we gather that our word intends to +convey to us the question, "After life is over, after man has given his +labor, his time, his powers, and his talents, what has he received in +exchange that shall satisfy him for all that he has lost? Do the +pleasures obtained during life fully compensate for what is spent in +obtaining them? Do they satisfy? and do they remain to him as "profit" +over and above that expenditure? In a word, what "under the sun" can +satisfy the longing, thirsting, hungering heart of man, so that he can +say, "My heart is filled to overflowing, its restless longings are +stilled, I have found a food that satisfies its hunger, a water that +quenches its thirst"? A question all-important, surely, and it will be +well worth listening to the experience of this seeker, who is fitted +far above his fellows for finding this satisfactory good, if it can be +found "under the sun." +</P> + +<P> +First, then, the Preacher, like a good workman, takes account of what +material he has to work with. "Have I," he says, "any thing that +others have not had, or can I hope to find any thing that has not been +before?" At once he is struck with that "law of circuit" that is +stamped on every thing: generation follows generation; but no new +earth, <I>that</I> remains ever the same; the sun wheels ceaselessly in its +one course; the winds circle from point to point, but whirl about to +their starting-place; the waters, too, follow the same law, and keep up +one unbroken circuit. Where can rest be found in such a scene? Whilst +there is unceasing change, nothing is <I>new</I>; it is but a repetition of +what has been before, and which again soon passes, leaving the heart +empty and hungry still. Again, then, let us use this dark background +to throw forward another scene. See, even now, "above the sun" Him who +is the Head and perfect Exponent of the creation called the <I>new</I>. Is +there any law of constant unsatisfying circuit in Him? Nay, indeed, +every sight we get of Him is <I>new</I>; each revelation of Himself +perfectly satisfies, and yet awakens appetite for further views. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"No pause, no change those pleasures<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Shall ever seek to know;</SPAN><BR> +The draught that lulls our thirsting<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">But wakes that thirst anew."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Or, again, look at that blessed "law of circuit" spoken of in another +way by one who has indeed been enlightened by a light "above the sun" +in every sense of the word, in 2 Cor. ix. It is not the circling of +winds or waters, but of "grace" direct from the blessed God Himself. +Mark the perfection stamped upon it both by its being a complete +circle—never ending, but returning again to its Source,—and by the +numerical stamp of perfection upon it in its seven distinct parts (or +movements) as shown by the sevenfold recurrence of the word "all," or +"every," both coming from the same Greek word. +</P> + +<P> +1. "God is able to make <I>all</I> grace abound unto you." There is an +inexhaustible <I>source</I>. We may come and come and come again, and never +find <I>that</I> fountain lowered by all our drafts upon it. Sooner, far +sooner, should the ocean be emptied by a teacup than infinite "power" +and "love" be impoverished by all that His saints could draw from Him. +<I>All</I> grace. +</P> + +<P> +2. "That ye <I>always</I>." There is no moment when this circle of +blessing need stop flowing. It is ever available. No moment—by day +or night, in the quiet of the closet or in the activities of the day's +duties, when in communion with friends or in the company of foes,—when +that grace is not available. At <I>all</I> times. +</P> + +<P> +3. "Having <I>all</I> sufficiency"—perfect competence to meet just the +present emergency. A sufficiency, let us mark, absolutely independent +of Nature's resources,—a sufficiency beautifully illustrated by +"unlearned and ignorant" Peter and John in the presence of the learned +Sanhedrim. Let us rejoice and praise God as we trace these three +glorious links in this endless chain of blessing. <I>All</I> sufficiency. +</P> + +<P> +4. "In <I>all</I> things" (or "in every way"). It is no matter from what +side the demand may come, this precious grace is there to meet it. Is +it to deal with another troubled anxious soul, where human wisdom +avails nothing? Divine wisdom and tact shall be supplied. Courage if +danger presents itself, or "all long-suffering with joyfulness" if +afflictions tear the heart. In <I>all</I> things. +</P> + +<P> +5. "May abound to <I>every</I> good work." Now filled to the brim, and +still connected with an inexhaustible supply, the vessel <I>must</I> +overflow, and that on every side. No effort, no toil, no weariness, no +drawing by mechanical means from a deep well; but the grace-filled +heart, abiding (and that is the only condition) in complete dependence +upon its God, naturally overflows on every side—to <I>all</I> good work. +</P> + +<P> +6. "Being enriched in <I>every thing</I>" (we omit the parenthesis, +although full of its own divine beauty), (or, "in every way"). This is +in some sort a repetition of No. 5, but goes as far beyond it as the +word "enriched" is fuller than the word "sufficient." The latter fills +the vessel, as we have said, up to the brim; the former adds another +drop, and over it flows. In view of these "exceeding great and +precious promises," we may say,— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Oh wherefore should we do ourselves this wrong,<BR> +Or others, that we are not always strong?"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +since we may be enriched in <I>all</I> things. +</P> + +<P> +7. "To <I>all</I> bountifulness." This stream of grace is never to +stagnate, or it will lose all its character of blessing, as the manna +hoarded for a second day "bred worms, and stank." Thus every single +Christian becomes a living channel of blessing to all around, and the +circle is now completed, by once more returning to the point whence it +started, "Which causeth through us thanksgiving to God," and closes +with no weary wail of "All things are full of labor," but joyful songs +resound on every side, and at every motion of this circle of blessing +ascends "thanksgiving to God." For just exactly the same full measure +is seen in the thanksgiving ascending at the end as in the grace +descending in the beginning. There it "abounded," filling the vessel +full till it overflowed in the same measure, "abounding" in blessings +to others who needed, and these forthwith pass on the stream in +"abounding" thanksgiving to God. The apostle himself, as if he could +not suffer himself to be excluded from the circle of blessing, adds his +own note at the close with "Thanks be unto God for His unspeakable +gift." And shall we not, too, dear brother or sister now reading these +lines, let our feeble voice be heard in this sweet harmony of praise? +Has not this contrast between the new song and the old groan, again we +may ask, great value? +</P> + +<P> +Having, then, seen in these first few verses the purpose of the book +and the standpoint of the writer, we may accompany him in the details +of his search. First he repeats, what is of the greatest importance +for us to remember (v. 12), "I, the Preacher, was king over Israel in +Jerusalem." He would not have us forget that, should he fail in his +search for perfect satisfaction, it will not be because he is not fully +qualified both by his abilities and his position to succeed. But +Infidelity, and its kinsman Rationalism, raise a joyful shout over this +verse; for to disconnect the books of the Bible from the writers whose +name they bear is a long step toward overthrowing the authority of +those books altogether. If the believer's long-settled confidence can +be proved vain in one point, and that so important a point, there is +good "hope" of eventually overthrowing it altogether. So, with +extravagant protestations of loyalty to the Scriptures, they, Joablike, +"kiss" and "stab" simultaneously, wonderfully manifesting in word and +work that dual form of the evil one, who, our Lord tells us, was both +"liar and murderer from the beginning." And many thousand professing +Christians are like Amasa of old, their ear is well pleased with the +fair sound of "Art thou in health, my brother?" and they, too, take "no +heed to the sword" in the inquirer's hand. Judas, too, in his day, +illustrates strongly that same diabolical compound of "deceit and +violence," only the enemy finds no unwary Amasa in Jesus the Lord. +"Betrayest thou the Son of man with a kiss" tears the vail from him at +once; and in the same way the feeblest believer who abides in Him, is +led of that same spirit; and "good words and fair speeches" do not +deceive, nor can betrayal be hidden behind the warmest protestations of +affection. +</P> + +<P> +But to return: "How could," cries this sapient infidelity, which today +has given itself the modest name of "Higher Criticism,"—"how could +Solomon say, 'I <I>was</I> king,' when he never ceased to be that?" Ah! one +fears if that same Lord were to speak once more as of old, He would +again say, "O fools and blind!" For is it not meet that the writer who +is about to give recital of his experiences should first tell us what +his position <I>was</I> at the very time of those experiences? That at the +very time of all these exercises, disappointments, and groanings, he +<I>was</I> still the highest monarch on earth, king over an undivided +Israel, in Jerusalem, with all the resources and glories that accompany +this high station, pre-eminently fitting <I>him</I> to speak with authority, +and compelling <I>us</I> to listen with the profoundest respect and +attention. +</P> + +<P> +Yes, this glorious monarch "gives his heart"—that is, applies himself +with singleness of purpose "to seek and search out by wisdom concerning +all things that are done under heaven." No path that gives the +slightest promise of leading to happiness shall be untrodden; no +pleasure shall be denied, no toil be shirked that shall give any hope +of satisfaction or rest. "This sore travail hath God given to the sons +of men to be exercised therewith." That is, the heart of man hungers +and thirsts, and he <I>must</I> search till he does find something to +satisfy; and if, alas! he fail to find it in "time," if he only drinks +here of waters whereof he "that drinks shall thirst again," eternity +shall find him thirsting still, and crying for one drop of water to +cool his tongue. But then with what bitter despair Ecclesiastes +records all these searchings! "I have seen all the works that are done +under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit," or +rather, "pursuit of the wind." Exactly seven times he uses this term, +"pursuit of the wind," expressing perfect, complete, despairing failure +in his quest. He finds things all wrong, but he has no power of +righting them; "that which is crooked cannot be made straight, and that +which is wanting cannot be numbered." But perhaps we may get the +secret of his failure in his next words. He takes a companion or +counselor in his search. Again exactly seven times he takes counsel +with this companion, "<I>his own heart</I>,"—"I communed with my own +heart." That is the level of the book; the writer's resources are all +within himself; no light from without save that which nature gives; no +taking hold on another; no hand clasped by another. He and his heart +are alone. Ah! that is dangerous as well as dreary work to take +counsel with one's own heart. "Fool" and "lawless one" come to their +foolish and wicked conclusions there (Ps. xiv. 1); and what else than +"folly" could be expected in hearkening to that which is "deceitful +above all things"—what else than lawlessness in taking counsel with +that which is "desperately wicked"? +</P> + +<P> +Take not, then, for thy counselor "thine own heart," when divine love +has placed infinite wisdom and knowledge at the disposal of lowly faith +in the Lord Jesus Christ, "who of God is made unto us wisdom," and "in +whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." +</P> + +<P> +But does our Preacher find the rest he desires in the path of his own +wisdom? Not at all. "For in much wisdom is much grief, and he that +increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow." "Grief and sorrow" ever +growing, ever increasing, the further he treads that attractive and +comparatively elevated path of human wisdom. Nor has Solomon been a +lonely traveler along that road. Thousands of the more refined of +Adam's sons have chosen it; but none have gone beyond "the king," and +none have discovered anything in it, but added "grief and +sorrow"—sorrowful groan! But the youngest of God's family has his +feet, too, on a path of "knowledge," and he may press along that path +without the slightest fear of "grief or sorrow" resulting from added +knowledge. Nay, a new song shall be in his mouth, "<I>Grace</I> and <I>peace</I> +shall be multiplied <I>through the knowledge of God and Jesus our Lord</I>." +(2 Pet. i. 2). Blessed contrast! "Sorrow and grief" multiplied +through growth in human wisdom: "Grace and peace" multiplied through +growth in the knowledge of God and of Jesus our Lord! +</P> + +<P> +My beloved reader, I pray you meditate a little on this striking and +precious contrast. Here is Solomon in all his glory, with a brighter +halo of human wisdom round his head than ever had any of the children +of men. Turn to 1 Kings iv. 29:— +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +"And God gave Solomon wisdom and understanding exceeding much, and +largeness of heart, even as the sand that is on the sea shore. +</P> + +<P> +And Solomon's wisdom excelled the wisdom of all the children of the +east country, and all the wisdom of Egypt. +</P> + +<P> +For he was wiser than all men; than Ethan the Ezrahite, and Heman, and +Chalcol, and Darda, the sons of Mahol: and his fame was in all nations +round about. +</P> + +<P> +And he spake three thousand proverbs: and his songs were a thousand and +five. +</P> + +<P> +And he spake of trees, from the cedar tree that is in Lebanon even unto +the hyssop that springeth out of the wall: he spake also of beasts, and +of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes. +</P> + +<P> +And there came of all people to hear the wisdom of Solomon, from all +kings of the earth, which had heard of his wisdom." +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Is it not a magnificent ascription of abounding wisdom? What field has +it not capacity to explore? Philosophy in its depths—poetry in its +beauties—botany and zoology in their wonders. Do we envy him? Then +listen to what his poor heart was groaning all that time: "In much +wisdom is much grief, and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth +sorrow"! Now turn to <I>our</I> portion above the sun—"the knowledge of +God and of Jesus our Lord": infinitely higher, deeper, lovelier, and +more wondrous than the fields explored by Solomon, in constant +unfoldings of riches of wisdom; and each new unfolding bringing its own +sweet measure of "grace and peace." Have not the lines fallen to us in +pleasant places? Have we not a goodly heritage? Take the feeblest of +the saints of God of today, and had Solomon in all his glory a lot like +one of these? +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap02"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER II. +</H3> + +<P> +The wise man, having found that wisdom brought with it but increased +sorrow, turns to the other side—to all those pleasures that the flesh, +as we speak, enjoys. Still, he gives us, as in chap. i., the result of +his search before he describes it: "I said in my heart, 'Go to now; I +will prove thee [that is, I will see if I cannot satisfy thee,] with +mirth; therefore enjoy pleasure:' and behold, this also is vanity. I +said of laughter, 'it is mad;' and of mirth, 'what doeth it?'" For he +now has tried wine, the occupation of laying out of vinyards, gardens, +parks, the forming of lakes, and the building of houses, all filled +without stint, with every thing that sense could crave, or the soul of +man could enjoy. The resources at his command are practically +limitless, and so he works on and rejoices in the labor, apparently +with the idea that now the craving within can be satisfied, now he is +on the road to rest. Soon he will look round on the result of all his +work, and be able to say, "All is very good; I can now rest in the full +enjoyment of my labor and be satisfied." But when he does reach the +end, when every pleasure tried, every beauty of surrounding created, +and he expects to eat the fruit of his work, instantly his mouth is +filled with rottenness and decay. "Then I looked on all the works that +my hands had wrought, and on the labor that I had labored to do; and, +behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit; and there was no profit +under the sun." Thus he groans again,—a groan that has been echoed +and re-echoed all down the ages from every heart that has tried to fill +the same void by the same means. +</P> + +<P> +Ah! wise and glorious Preacher, it is a large place thou art seeking to +fill. "Free and boundless its desires." Deeper, wider, broader than +the whole world, which is at thy disposal to fill it. And thou mayest +well say, "What can the man do that cometh after the king?" for thou +hadst the whole world and the glory of it at thy command in thy day, +and did it enable thee to fill those "free and boundless desires"? No, +indeed. After all is cast into that hungry pit, yawning and empty it +is still. Look well on this picture, my soul; ponder it in the secret +place of God's presence, and ask Him to write it indelibly on thy heart +that thou forget it not. Then turn and listen to this sweet voice: "If +any man thirst" (and what man does not?) "let him come unto Me, and +drink. He that believeth on Me, as the Scripture hath said, out of his +belly shall flow rivers of living water." Thirst not only quenched, +but water to spare for other thirsting ones,—the void not only filled, +but running over with a constant flow of blessing. Who can express the +glories of that contrast? +</P> + +<P> +Pause, beloved reader: turn your eyes from the page, and dwell on it in +thy spirit a little. What a difference between "no profit under the +sun" and "never thirst"!—a difference entirely due simply to coming to +Him—Jesus. Not a coming once and then departing from Him once more to +try again the muddy, stagnant pools of this world: no, but to pitch our +tents by the palm-trees and the springing wells of Christ's presence, +and so to drink and drink and drink again of Him, the Rock that follows +His people. But is this possible? Is this not mere imaginative +ecstasy, whilst practically such a state is not possible? No, indeed; +for see that man, with all the same hungry longings of Solomon or any +other child of Adam; having no wealth, outcast, and a wanderer without +a home, but who has found something that has enabled him to say, "I +have learned, in whatsoever state I am, to be content. I know both how +to be abased, and I know how to abound: everywhere, and in all things, +I am instructed both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to +suffer need. I can do all things through Christ, who strengtheneth +me." (Phil. iv. 11-13.) +</P> + +<P> +What, then, is the necessary logical deduction from two such pictures +but this: The Lord Jesus infinitely surpasses all the world in filling +the hungry heart of man. +</P> + +<P> +Look, oh my reader, whether thou be sinner or saint, to Him—to Him +alone. +</P> + +<P> +This, then, brings us to the twelfth verse of chapter two, which +already, thus early in the book, seems to be a summing up of his +experiences. "I turned myself to behold wisdom, and madness, and +folly:" that is I looked "full face," or carefully considered, these +three things that I had now tested; and whilst each gave me only +disappointment and bitterness as to meeting my deepest needs, yet "I +saw that there was a profit in wisdom over folly, as light is +profitable over darkness." This then is within the power of human +reason to determine. The philosophy of the best of the heathen brought +them to exactly the same conclusion. Socrates and Solomon, with many +another worthy name, are here in perfect accord, and testify together +that "the wise man's eyes are in his head, but the fool walketh in +darkness." Not that men <I>prefer</I> wisdom to folly; on the contrary; +still even human reason gives this judgment: for the wise man walks at +least as a <I>man</I>, intelligently; the spirit, the intelligence, having +its place. But how much further can reason discern as to the +comparative worth of wisdom or folly? The former certainly morally +elevates a man <I>now</I>; but here comes an awful shadow across reason's +path: "but I myself perceived also that one event happeneth to them +all. Then said I in my heart, as it happeneth to the fool, so it +happeneth even to me: and why was I then more wise? Then I said in my +heart, that this also is vanity." Ah! in this book in which poor man +at his highest is allowed to give voice to his deepest questions, in +which all the chaos, and darkness, the "without form and void" state of +his poor, distracted, disjointed being is seen; death is indeed the +King of Terrors, upsetting all his reasonings, and bringing the wisdom +and folly, between which he had so carefully discriminated, to one +level in a moment. But here, death is looked upon in relation to the +"works" of which he has been speaking. Wisdom cannot guarantee its +possessor the enjoyment of the fruits of his labors. Death comes to +him as swiftly and as surely as to the fool, and a common oblivion +shall, after a little, swallow the memory of each, with their works. +This thought the Preacher dwells upon, and as he regards it on every +side, again and again he groans, "This also is vanity." (<I>vv.</I> 19, 21, +23.) "Therefore I hated life, yea, all my labor which I took under the +sun," and "therefore I went about to cause my heart to despair of all +my labor which I took under the sun." For what is there in the labor +itself? Nothing that satisfies by itself. It is only the anticipation +of final satisfaction and enjoyment that can make up for the loss of +quiet and ease now; prove <I>that</I> to be a vain hope, and the mere labor +and planning night and day are indeed "empty vanity." +</P> + +<P> +Thus much for labor "under the sun," with self for its object, and +death for its limit. Now for the contrast again in its refreshing +beauty of the "new" as against the "old" "Therefore, my beloved +brethren, be ye steadfast, unmovable, always abounding in the work of +the Lord, forasmuch as ye know your labor is not in vain in the Lord." +(1 Cor. xv. 58.) "All my labor vanity" is the "groan" of the old, "for +death with its terrors cuts me off from my labor and I leave it to a +fool." "No labor in vain" is the song of victory of the new, for +resurrection with its glories but introduces me to the precious fruit +of those labors, to be enjoyed forever. +</P> + +<P> +Oh my brethren, let us cherish this precious word, "not in vain;" let +us be indeed "persuaded" of it, and "embrace" it, not giving up our +glorious heritage, and going back, as the Christian world largely is in +this day, to the mere human wisdom that Solomon the king possessed +above all, and which only led then, as it must now and ever, to the +groan of "vanity!" But "<I>not</I> in vain" is ours. No little one +refreshed with even a cup of cold water but that soon the fruit of even +that little labor of love shall meet its sweetest recompense in the +smile, the approval, the praise of our Lord Jesus; and that shall make +our hearts full to overflowing with bliss; as we there echo and re-echo +our own word: it was indeed, "not in vain." +</P> + +<P> +The chapter closes with the recognition that, apart from God, it is not +in the power of man to get any enjoyment from his labor. Our +translation of verse 24 seems quite out of harmony with the Preacher's +previous experiences, and the verse would better read (as in Dr. Taylor +Lewis' metrical version): +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"The good is not in man that he should eat and drink<BR> +And find his soul's enjoyment in his toil;<BR> +This, too, I saw, is only from the hands of God."<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap03"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER III. +</H3> + +<P> +Chapter three may be paraphrased, I think, somewhat in this way: Yes, +life itself emphasizes the truth that nothing is at one stay here;—all +<I>moves</I>. There is naught abiding, like the winds and waters that he +has noted in chapter one; man's life is but a wheel that turns: death +follows birth, and all the experiences between are but ever varying +shades of good and evil, evil and good. (Let us bear in mind this is +not faith's view, but simply that of human wisdom. Faith sings a song +amidst the whirl of life: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"With mercy and with judgment,<BR> +My web of time He wove;<BR> +And aye the dews of sorrow<BR> +Were lustred with His love.")<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +But then if nothing thus rests as it is, it becomes a necessary +deduction that, if wisdom has collected, and labored, and built, folly +will follow to possess and scatter, what profit then in toiling? For +he sees that this constant travail is of God who, in wisdom +inscrutable, and not to be penetrated by human reasoning, would have +men exercised by these constant changes, whilst their hearts can be +really satisfied with no one of these things, beautiful as each may be +in its time. So boundless are its desires that he says, "Eternity" has +been placed in that heart of man, and naught in all these +"time-changes" can fill it. Still he can see nothing better for man, +than that he should make the best of the present, for he cannot alter +or change what God does or purposes, and everything he sees, speaks of +His purpose to a constant "round," a recurrence of that which is past +(as verse 15 should probably read.) +</P> + +<P> +But still man's reason can make one more step now, one further +deduction from the <I>law of circuit</I>, as soon as God, even though He be +known only by nature's light, is introduced; and that is, the present +wrong and injustice so evident here, must in some "time" in God's +purposes, be righted; God Himself being the Judge. This seems to be a +gleam of real light, similar to the conclusion of the whole book. Yes, +further, this constant change—is there no reason for it? Has God no +purpose in it? Surely to teach men the very lesson of their own +mortality: that there is naught abiding—men and beasts are, as far as +unaided human wisdom can see, on one level exactly as to that awful +exit from this scene. It is true there may be—and there are strong +grounds for inferring that there <I>is</I>—a wide difference between the +spirit of man, and the spirit of beasts, although the bodies of each +are formed of, and return to the dust; but who can tell this +absolutely? Who has seen and told what is on the other side of that +dread portal? None. So then, again says the wise Preacher, my wisdom +sees only good in enjoying the present, for the future is shrouded in +an impenetrable cloud, and none can pierce it. +</P> + +<P> +Precious beyond expression becomes the glorious bright beam of divine +revelation, as against this dense and awful darkness of man's ignorance +on such a question. How deep and terrible the groan here, "For all is +vanity." Yet the pitch-dark background shall serve to throw into +glorious relief, the glory of that light that is not from reason, or +nature; but from Him who is the Father of Lights. Yes, He bids us look +on this picture of the wisest of men, tracing man and beast to one end +and standing before that awful door through which each has disappeared, +confessing his absolute inability to determine if there be any +difference between them. Death surely triumphs here. It is true that +there may be a possible distinction between the "breath," or vital +principle of each; but this uncertainty only adds to the mystery, and +increases a thousand fold the agonizing need for light. God be thanked +that He has given it. The darkest problem that has faced mankind all +through the weary ages, has been triumphantly solved; and the sweetest +songs of faith ever resound about the empty tomb of the Lord Jesus—nay +rather, about the glorious person of that risen Christ Himself, for He +is Himself the leader of the Joy. "In the midst of the congregation +will I praise Thee." +</P> + +<P> +So then, in sharp and blessed contrast to the wise man and his +groaning, let us lift our eyes up and ever up, past the tombs and +graves of earth; yea, past thrones and principalities, and powers in +the heavens; up and still up, even to the "<I>throne of the Majesty on +High</I>" itself; and look on One sitting even there, a <I>Man</I>—oh mark it +well, for He has been of woman born—a <I>Man</I>,—for of that very One it +was once said, "Is not this the carpenter?"—now crowned with glory and +honor; and listen, for He speaks: "I am He that liveth, and was dead, +and behold I am alive for evermore." Consider Him! And whilst we look +and listen, how does that word of the Preacher sound, "A man hath no +pre-eminence above a beast!" And this is our portion, beloved reader. +He might indeed have had all the glory of that place, without the agony +of the garden, without the suffering and shame of the cross, had He +been content to enjoy it alone. But no—He must have His own with Him; +and now death has been abolished as to its terror and power, so that +the groan of old is replaced by the triumphant challenge: "O death, +where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?" (1 Cor. xv. 55.) +</P> + +<P> +The resurrection of Jesus not only makes possible—not only makes +probable—but absolutely assures the glorious triumphant resurrection +of His own who have fallen asleep: "Christ the firstfruits, afterward +they are Christ's at His coming." But further, is this "falling +asleep" of the saint to separate him, for a time, from the conscious +enjoyment of his Saviour's love? Is the trysting of the saved one with +his Saviour to be interrupted for awhile by death? Is his song +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Not all things else are half so dear<BR> +As is His blissful presence here"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +to be silenced by death? Then were he a strangely conquered foe, and +not stingless, if for one hour he could separate us from the enjoyed +love of Christ. But no, "blessed be the Victor's name," not for a +moment. "Death is ours" and "absent from the body" is only "present +with the Lord." So that we may answer the Preacher's word, "A man hath +no pre-eminence above a beast," with the challenge, To which of the +<I>beasts</I> said He at any time, "This day shalt thou be with Me in +paradise"? +</P> + +<P> +Let the Preacher groan, "all is vanity;" the groan is in perfect—if +sorrowful—harmony with the darkness and ignorance of human reason; but +"<I>singing</I>" alone accords with <I>light</I>; "Joy cometh <I>in the morning</I>," +and if we but receive it, we have in "Jesus Risen" light enough for +perpetual, unending, song. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap04"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IV. +</H3> + +<P> +But we must follow our Preacher, who can only turn away with bitterness +from this closed door of Death, once more to take note of what is +"under the sun." And sad and sorrowful it is to him to mark that the +world is filled with oppression. He has already, in the previous +chapter, noted that "wickedness was there in the place of judgment and +iniquity in the place of righteousness," and the natural consequence of +this is oppression. Wherever men have <I>power</I> they use it to bring +forth <I>tears</I>; therefore far better, cries Solomon, to be out of such a +scene altogether; yea, better still, never to have come into it at all. +Have we no sympathy with the Preacher here? Does he not give +expression to one sad "touch of nature that makes the whole world kin"? +Do we not recognize that he, too, was traveling through exactly the +same scene as we find ourselves to be in? That tears were raining on +this crust of earth in that far-off time, exactly as they are to-day? +Yes, indeed, it was a tear-soaked earth he trod, as well as we. But +then that other man was also in the same scene exactly, who said, too, +that it was certainly "far better" to be out of it; but—precious +contrast! <I>that</I> was because of the loveliness and sweet attraction of +One known outside of it; whilst the very needs of others in the +scene—those "tears," in a way, of which the wise man speaks, and which +he knew no way of stopping—alone kept him in it, and made him consent +to stay. For Paul had "heard a sweeter story" than Solomon had ever in +his wisdom conceived; had "found a truer gain" than all Solomon's +wealth could give him; and his most blessed business it was to proclaim +a glad tidings that should dry the tears of the oppressed, give them a +peace that no oppressor could take away, a liberty outside all the +chains of earth—a spring of joy that tyranny was powerless to affect. +</P> + +<P> +Now let us, by the grace and loving kindness of our God, consider this +a little closer, my readers. We have concluded that we find this book +included in the inspired volume for this very purpose, to exalt all +"the new" by its blessed contrast with "the old." We may too, if we +will, look around on all the sorrows and tears of this sad earth, and +groan "better would it be to be dead and out of it; yea, better never +to have been born at all." And a wise groan, according to human +wisdom, this would be. +</P> + +<P> +But when such wisdom has attained to its full, it finds itself far +short of the very "foolishness of God"; for, on the other hand we may, +if we will, praise God with joyful heart that we are at least <I>in the +only place in the whole universe, where tears can be dried, and +gladness be made to take their place</I>. For is there oppression, and +consequent weeping, in heaven? Surely not. Tears there are, in +plenty, in hell; for did not He who is Love say, "there shall be +weeping and gnashing of teeth"? But, alas! those tears can be +dried—<I>never</I>. But here Love can have its own way, and mourning ones +may learn a secret that shall surely gild their tears with a rainbow +glory of light, and the oppressed and distressed, the persecuted and +afflicted, may triumphantly sing, "Who shall separate us from the love +of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, +or nakedness, or peril, or sword? Nay, in all these things we are +<I>more than conquerors</I>, through Him that loved us." Ah, is there not, +too, a peculiar beauty in those words "more than conquerors"? What can +be more than a conqueror? A ship driven out of its course by the +tempest, with anchor dragging or cable parted, is no "conqueror" at +all, but the reverse. That ship riding out the gale, holding fast to +its anchorage, is truly a conqueror; but that is all. But the vessel +being driven by the very tempest to the haven where it would be, is +better off still, and thus "more than conqueror." So it is with the +saint now; the tempest drives him the closer to Him who is indeed his +desired haven, and thus he is more than conqueror. Is not, then, this +earth a unique place?—this life a wonderful time? A few years +(possibly a few hours) more, and we shall be out of the scene of sorrow +and evil forever; nor can we then prove the power of the love of Christ +to lift above the sorrow either ourselves or others. O my soul, art +thou redeeming the time—"ransoming from loss" (as it might literally +be worded) the precious opportunities that are around thee on every +side, "because the days are evil"? The very fact that the days are +evil—that thou art in the place of tears—gives thee the +"opportunities." When the days cease to be evil, those special +opportunities, whatever may be the service of the redeemed, will be +gone forever. +</P> + +<P> +But the Preacher still continues his search "under the sun," and turns +from oppression and tears to regard what is, on the surface at least, a +comparatively happy lot—"right work," by which a man has attained to +prosperity and pre-eminence. But as he looks closer at a case which, +at first sight, seems to promise real satisfaction, he sees that there +is a bitter sting connected with it,—a sting that at once robs it of +all its attraction, and makes void all its promise of true rest,—for +"for this a man is envied of his neighbor." His success is only cause +of bitter jealousy, and makes him the object not of love, but of envy, +to all about him. Success, then, and a position of pre-eminence above +one's competitors, gained by skillful toil, is rather to be avoided as +vanity and pursuit of the wind,—a grasping at an empty nothingness. +</P> + +<P> +Is the opposite extreme of perfect idleness any better? No; for +plainly the idler is a fool who "eateth his own flesh"; that is, +necessarily brings ruin upon himself. So human wisdom here closes the +meditation with—what human wisdom always does take refuge in—the +"golden mean," as it is called, "better a single handful with quiet +rest, than both hands filled only by wearying toil and vexation of +spirit." And true enough this is, as every man who has tested things +at all in this world will confirm. Accumulation brings with it only +disappointment and added care,—everything is permeated with a common +poison; and here the wisdom of the old is, in one sense, in full +harmony with the higher wisdom of the new, which says "godliness, with +contentment, is great gain," and "having food and raiment, let us be +therewith content." +</P> + +<P> +If we look "above the sun," however, there is a scene where no sting +lurks in all that attracts, as here. Where God Himself approves the +desires of His people for more of their own, and says to them with +gracious encouragement, "covet earnestly the best gifts." Yes; but +mark the root-difference between the two: the skillful, or right labor, +that appears at first so desirable to the Preacher, is only for the +worker's own advantage,—it exalts him above his fellows, where he +becomes a mark for their bitter envy; but these "gifts" that are to be +coveted are as far removed from this as the poles. In that higher +scene, the more a gift exalts "self," the less is that gift. The +"best"—those which God calls "best"—are those that awake no envy in +others; but bring their happy owner lower and ever lower to the feet of +his brethren to serve them, to build <I>them</I> up. The Corinthians +themselves had the lesser gifts in the more showy "tongues," and +"knowledge"; but one family amongst them had the <I>greater</I>,—"the +household of Stephanas," for it had addicted itself to the <I>service</I> of +the saints. +</P> + +<P> +But let us not leave this theme till we have sought to set our hearts +a-singing by a sight of Him who is, and ever shall be, the source as +well as the theme of all our songs. We but recently traced Him in His +glorious upward path till we found Him resting on the throne of the +Majesty on high. But "he that ascended, what is it but that he also +descended?" So, beloved readers, though it may be a happily familiar +theme to many, it will be none the less refreshing to look at that +"right work" of our blessed Lord Jesus, "who, being in the form of God, +thought it not robbery to be equal with God." That is the glorious +platform—as we might, in our human way of speaking, say—upon which He +had abode all through the ages of the past. He looks above—there is +none, there is nothing higher. He looks on the same plane as +Himself—He is equal with God. There is His blessed, glorious place, +at the highest pinnacle of infinite glory, nothing to be desired, +nothing to be grasped at. +</P> + +<P> +He moves; and every heart that belongs to that new creation awakens +into praise (oh, how different to the "envy" of the old!) as He takes +His first step and makes Himself of no reputation. And as in our +previous paper we followed Him in His glorious upward path, so here we +may trace His no less glorious and most blessed path down and ever +lower down, past Godhead to "<I>no reputation</I>"; past authority to +<I>service</I>; past angels, who are servants, to <I>men</I>; past all the +thrones and dignities of men to the manger at <I>Bethlehem and the lowest +walk of poverty</I>, till He who, but now, was indeed rich is become poor; +nay, says of Himself that He has not where to lay His head. No "golden +mean" of the "handful with quietness" here! Yes, and far lower still, +past that portion of the righteous man, endless life,—down, down to +the humiliation of <I>death</I>; and then one more step to a death—not of +honor, and respect, and the peace, that we are told marks the perfect +man and the upright, but the death of lowest shame, the criminal +slave's death, the <I>cross</I>! Seven distinct steps of perfect +humiliation! Oh, consider Him there, beloved! Mocked of all His foes, +forsaken of all His friends! The very refuse of the earth, the thieves +that earth says are too vile for her, heaping their indignities upon +Him. "Behold the man," spat upon, stricken, and numbered with +transgressors; and, as we gaze, let us together listen to that divine +voice, "Let this mind be in you which was also in Christ Jesus," for +that is <I>our</I> "right work," and there is no fear of a man being "envied +of his neighbor" for right work of that kind. +</P> + +<P> +But time and space would fail us to take up in detail all these +precious contrasts. All Solomon's searches "under the sun" tell but +one story: There is nought in all the world that can satisfy the heart +of man. The next verse furnishes another striking illustration of +this. He sees a solitary one, absolutely alone, without kith or kin +dependent on him, and yet he toils on, "bereaving his soul of good" as +unceasingly as when he first started in life. Every energy is still +strained in the race for those riches that satisfy not at all. +"Vanity" is the Preacher's commentary on the scene. This naturally +leads to the conclusion that solitude, at least, is no blessing; for +man was made for companionship and mutual dependence, and in this is +safety. (Verses 9 to 12.) +</P> + +<P> +Verses 13 to the end are difficult, as they stand in our authorized +version; but they speak, I think, of the striking and extraordinary +vicissitudes that are so constant "under the sun." There is no lot +abiding. The king on his throne, "old and foolish," changes places +with the youth who may even step from the humiliation of prison and +chains to the highest dignity: then "better is the poor and wise youth +than the old and foolish king." But wider still the Preacher looks, +and marks the stately march of the present generation with the next +that shall follow it; yea, there is no end of the succession of surging +generations, each boastful of itself, and taking no joy in—that is, +making little account of—that which has gone before. Each, in its +turn, like a broken wave, making way for its successor. Boastful +pride, broken in death, but still followed by another equally boastful, +or more so, which, in its turn, is humbled also in the silence of the +grave. It is the same story of human changes as "the youth" and "the +king," only a wider range is taken; but "vanity" is the appropriate +groan that accompanies the whole meditation. In this I follow Dr. +Lewis's version:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Better the child, though he be poor, if wise,<BR> +Than an old and foolish king, who heeds no longer warning;<BR> +For out of bondage came the one to reign—<BR> +The other, in a kingdom born, yet suffers poverty.<BR> +I saw the living all, that walked in pride beneath the sun,<BR> +I saw the second birth that in their place shall stand.<BR> +No end to all the people that have gone before;<BR> +And they who still succeed, in them shall find no joy.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">This, too, is vanity,—a chasing of the wind.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap05"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER V. +</H3> + +<P> +With the opening of this chapter we come to quite a different theme. +Like a fever-tossed patient, Ecclesiastes has turned from side to side +for relief and rest; but each new change of posture has only brought +him face to face with some other evil "under the sun" that has again +and again pressed from him the bitter groan of "Vanity." But now, for +a moment, he takes his eyes from the disappointments, the evil +workings, and the sorrows, that everywhere prevail in that scene, and +lifts them up to see how near his wisdom, or human reason, can bring +him to <I>God</I>. Ah, poor bruised and wounded spirit! Everywhere it has +met with rebuff; but now, like a caged bird which has long beaten its +wings against its bars, at length turns to the open door, so now +Ecclesiastes seems at least to have his face in the right +direction,—God and approach to Him is his theme,—how far will his +natural reason permit his walking in it? Will it carry him on to the +highest rest and freedom at last? +</P> + +<P> +This, it strikes me, is just the point of view of these first seven +verses. Their meaning is, as a whole, quite clear and simple. "Keep +thy foot,"—that is, permit no hasty step telling of slight realization +of the majesty of Him who is approached. Nor let spirit be less +reverently checked than body. "Be more ready to hear, than to give the +sacrifice of fools." Few be thy words, and none uttered thoughtlessly, +for "God is in heaven and thou upon earth," and many words, under such +an infinite discrepancy in position, bespeak a fool as surely as a +dream bespeaks overcrowded waking hours. Oh fear, then, to utter one +syllable thoughtlessly or without meaning, for One listens to whom a +vow once uttered must be paid, for not lightly canst thou retract the +spoken vow with the excuse "It was unintentional,—it was not seriously +meant." His Messenger or Angel is not so deceived; and quickly wilt +thou find, in thy wrecked work and purposes astray, that it is <I>God</I> +thou hast angered by thy light speech. Then avoid the many words +which, as idle dreams, are but vanity; but rather "fear thou God." +</P> + +<P> +After weighing the many conflicting views as to verses 6 and 7, the +context has led me to the above as the sense of the words. Nor can +there be the slightest question as to the general bearing of the +speaker's argument. Its central thought, both in position and +importance, is found in "God is in heaven and thou upon earth, +therefore let thy words be few,"—its weighty conclusion, "Fear thou +God." +</P> + +<P> +Now, my beloved readers, there is a picture here well worth looking at +attentively. Regard him: noble in every sense of the word,—with +clearest intellect, with the loftiest elevation of thought, with an +absolutely true conception of the existence of God. Who amongst men, +let thought sweep as wide as it will amongst the children of Adam, can +go or has gone, beyond him? What can man's mind conceive, he may ask, +as well as man's hand do, that cometh after the King? Yea, let our +minds go over all the combined wisdom of all the ages amongst the wise +of the world, and where will you find a loftier, purer, truer +conception of God, and the becoming attitude of the creature in +approaching Him than here? For he is not a heathen, as we speak, this +Solomon. He has all that man, as man, could possibly have; and that +surely includes the knowledge of the existence of God,—His power +eternal, and His Godhead, as Romans i. clearly shows. The heathen +themselves have lapsed from that knowledge. "<I>When they knew God</I>" is +the intensely significant word of Scripture. This is, indeed, +diametrically contrary to the teaching of modern science—that the +barbarous and debased tribes of earth are only in a less developed +condition—are on the way <I>upward</I> from the lowest forms of life, from +the protoplasm whence all sprang, and have already passed in their +upward course the ape, whose likeness they still, however, more closely +bear! Oh, the folly of earth's wisdom! The pitiful meanness and +littleness of the greatest of modern scientific minds that have "come +after the King" contrasted even with the grand simple sublimity of the +knowledge of Ecclesiastes. For this Preacher would not be a proper +representative <I>man</I> were he in debased heathen ignorance. He could +not show us faithfully and truly how far even unaided human reason +could go in its recognition of, and approach to, God, if he had lost +the knowledge of God. Low, indeed, is the level of man's highest, when +in this state, as the Greeks show us; for whilst they, as distinct from +the Jews, made wisdom the very object of their search, downward ever do +they sink in their struggles, like a drowning man, till they reach a +foul, impure, diabolical mythology. Their gods are as the stars for +multitude. Nor are they able to conceive of these except as influenced +by the same passions as themselves. Is there any reverence in approach +to such? Not at all. Low, sensual, earthly depravity marked ever that +approach. That is the level of the lapsed fallen wisdom of earth's +wise. How does it compare with Solomon's? We may almost say as earth +to heaven,—hardly that,—rather as hell to earth. Solomon, then, +clearly shows us the <I>highest possible conception of the creature's +approach to his Creator</I>. This is as far as man could have attained, +let him be at the summit of real wisdom. His reason would have given +him nothing beyond this. It tells him that man is a creature, and it +is but the most simple and necessary consequence of this that his +approach to his Creator should be with all the reverence and humility +that is alone consistent with such a relationship. +</P> + +<P> +But high indeed as, in one point of view, this is, yet how low in +another, for is one heart-throb stilled? One tormenting doubt removed? +One fear quieted? One deep question answered? One sin-shackle +loosened? <I>Not one</I>. The distance between them is still the distance +between earth and heaven. "God is in heaven, and thou upon earth." +Nor can the highest, purest, best of human reason, as in this wise and +glorious king, bridge over that distance one span! "Fear thou God" is +the sweetest comfort he can give,—the clearest counsel he can offer. +Consider him again, I say, my brethren, in all his nobility, in all his +elevation, in all his bitter disappointment and incompetency. +</P> + +<P> +And now, my heart, prepare for joy, as thou turnest to thy own blessed +portion. For how rich, how precious, how closely to be cherished is +that which has gone so far beyond all possible human conception,—that +wondrous revelation by which this long, long distance 'twixt earth and +heaven has been spanned completely. And in whom? JESUS, The Greater +than Solomon. We have well considered the less,—let us turn to the +Greater. And where is that second Man to be found? Afar off on earth, +with God in heaven? No, indeed. "For when He had by Himself purged +our sins He sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high"; and +"seeing, then, that we have a great high priest, that is passed +<I>through the heavens</I>, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast our +confession." Oh, let us consider Him together, my brethren. In +holiest Light our Representative sits. He who but now was weighted +with our guilt, and made sin for us, is in that Light ineffable, +unapproachable. Where, then, are the sins? Where, then, the sin? +Gone for all eternity! Nor does His position vary at all with all the +varying states, failings, coldness, worldliness, of His people here. +With holy calm, His work that has perfected them forever perfectly +finished, He <I>sits</I>, and their position is thus maintained unchanging. +Clearly, and without the shadow of the faintest mist to dim, the +infinite searching Light of God falls on Him, but sees nought there +that is not in completest harmony with Itself. Oh, wondrous +conception! Oh, grandeur of thought beyond all the possibility of +man's highest mind! No longer can it be said at least to one Man, +woman-born though He be, "God is in heaven, and thou upon earth"; for +He, of the Seed of Abraham, of the house of David, is Himself in +highest heaven. +</P> + +<P> +But one step further with me, my brethren. We are in Him, there; and +that is our place, too. The earthward trend of thought—the letting +slip our own precious truth—has introduced a "tongue" into Christendom +that ought to be foreign to the Saint of heaven. No "place of worship" +should the Christian know—nay, <I>can</I> he really know—short of heaven +itself. For, listen: "Having, therefore, brethren, boldness to enter +<I>into the holiest</I> by the blood of Jesus, by the new and living way +which He hath consecrated for us through the vail,—that is to say, His +flesh,—and having a High Priest over the house of God, let us draw +near," etc. We too, then, beloved, are not upon earth as to our +worship, (let it be mixed with faith in us that hear). Israel's "place +of worship" was where her high priest stood, and our place of worship +is where our great High Priest sits. Jesus our Lord sowed the seed of +this precious truth when he answered the poor sinful woman of Samaria, +"The hour cometh when ye shall neither in this mountain, nor yet at +Jerusalem, worship the Father. But the hour cometh, and now is, when +the true worshippers shall worship the Father in spirit and in truth, +for the Father seeketh such to worship Him." +</P> + +<P> +But, then, are not "words to be few"? Good and wise it was for Solomon +so to speak; "few words" become the far-off place of the creature on +earth before the glorious Majesty of the Creator in heaven. But if +infinite wisdom and love have rent the vail and made a new and living +way into the Holiest, does He now say "few words"? Better, far better, +than that; for with the changed position all is changed, and not too +often can His gracious ear "hear the voice of His beloved"; and, lest +shrinking unbelief should still hesitate and doubt, He says plainly "In +<I>everything</I>, by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving let your +requests be made known unto God." For He has shown Himself fully, now +that vail is down,—all that He is, is revealed to faith; and a Heart +we find—with reverence and adoring love be it spoken—filled with +tenderest solicitude for His people. Letting them have cares only that +they may have His sympathy in a way that would not otherwise be +possible; and thus again He invites "casting all your care upon Him, +for He careth for you." Nor is there a hint in the holiest, of +weariness on God's part in listening to His people, nor once does He +say "enough; now cease thy prayers and supplications." How could He so +speak who says "<I>Pray without ceasing</I>"? Then if, as assuredly we have +seen, Solomon shows us the highest limit of human thought, reason, or +conception, if we go even one step beyond, we have <I>exceeded</I> human +thought, reason, or conception; (and in these New Testament truths how +far beyond have we gone?) And what does that mean but that we are on +holy ground indeed, listening to a voice that is distinctly the voice +of God,—the God who speaks to us, as He says, in order "<I>that our joy +may be full</I>." +</P> + +<P> +But the Preacher continues to give, in verses 8 and 9, such counsel as +he can to meet the discordant state of things everywhere apparent. +"When thou seest violent oppression exercised by those in authority," +he says, "marvel not; think it not strange, as though some strange +thing were happening; thou art only looking on a weed-plant that +everywhere flourishes 'under the sun,' and still thou mayest remember +that these oppressors themselves, high though they be, have superiors +above them: yea in the ever-ascending scale of ranks and orders thou +mayest have to go to the Highest—God Himself; but the same truth hold +good, and He shall yet call powers and governors to answer for the +exercise of their authorities. This for thy comfort, if thou lookest +<I>up</I>; but, on the other hand, look <I>down</I>, and thou shalt see that +which goes far to humble the highest; for even the king himself is as +dependent as any on the field whence man's food comes." +</P> + +<P> +True, indeed, all this; but cold is the comfort, small cause for +singing it gives. Our own dear apostle seems to have dropped for a +moment from his higher vantage-ground to the level of Solomon's wisdom +when smarting under "oppression and the violent perverting of +judgment," he cried to the high priest, "God [the higher than the +highest] shall smite thee, thou whited wall." But we hear no joyful +singing from him in connection with that indignant protest. On the +contrary, the beloved and faithful servant regrets it the next moment, +with "I wist not, brethren." Not so in the silent suffering of +"violent oppression" at Philippi. There he and his companion have +surely comfort beyond any that Solomon can offer, and the overflowing +joy of their hearts comes from no spring that rises in this sad desert +scene. Never before had prisoners in that dismal jail heard aught but +groans of suffering coming from that inner prison, from the bruised and +wounded prisoners whose feet were made fast in the stocks; but the +Spirit of God notes, with sweet and simple pathos, "the prisoners heard +them"; and oh, how mighty the testimony to that which is "above the +sun" was that singing! It came from the Christian's proper +portion,—your portion and mine, dear fellow-redeemed one,—for Jesus, +our Lord Jesus, our Saviour Jesus, is the alone fountain of a joy that +can fill a human heart until it gives forth "songs in the night," even +in one of earth's foul abodes of suffering and oppression. He is the +portion of the youngest, feeblest believer. Rich treasure! Let us +beware lest any spoil us of that treasure, for we can only "sing" as we +enjoy it. +</P> + +<P> +But once more let us listen to what the highest, purest attainment of +the wisdom of man can give. And now he speaks of wealth and the +abundance of earthly prosperity which he, of all men, had so fully +tested. "He that loveth silver shall not be satisfied with silver, nor +he that loveth abundance, with increase"; and again there is the +sorrowful groan, "This is also vanity." "If goods increase," he +continues, "the household necessary to care for them increases +proportionately, and the owner gets no further satisfaction from them +than their sight affords. Nay, he who toils has a distinct advantage +over the wealthy, who is denied the quiet repose the former enjoys." +Carefully the Preacher has watched the miser heaping up ever, and +robbing himself of all natural enjoyment, until some disaster—"evil +travail"—sweeps away in a moment his accumulations, and his son is +left a pauper. And such, at least, is every man he marks, be he never +so wealthy, when the end comes. Inexorable Death is, sooner or later, +the "evil travail" that strips him as naked as he came; and then, +though he has spent his life in selfish self-denial, filling his dark +days with vexation, sickness, and irritation, he is snatched from all, +and, poor indeed, departs. Such the sad story of Solomon's experience; +but not more sad than true, nor confined by any means to Scripture. +World-wide it is. Nor is divine revelation necessary to tell poor man +that silver, nor gold, nor abundance of any kind, can satisfy the +heart. Hear the very heathen cry "<I>semper avarus eget</I>"—"the miser +ever <I>needs</I>"; or "<I>Avarum irritat non satiat pecunia</I>"—"the wealth of +the miser satisfies not, but irritates." But more weighty and +far-reaching is the word of revelation going far beyond the negation of +the king. "They that desire to be rich fall into temptation and a +snare and many foolish and hurtful lusts, such as drown men in +destruction and perdition, for the love of money is the root of all +kinds of evil, which some reaching after have been led astray from the +faith, and have pierced themselves through with many sorrows." +</P> + +<P> +But let us pass to the last three verses of the chapter. The Preacher +here says, in effect, "Now attend carefully to what I tell thee of the +result of all my experience in this way. I have discerned a good that +I can really call comely or fair. It is for a man to have the means at +his command for enjoyment, and the power to enjoy those means. This +combination is distinctly the 'gift of God.' From such an one all the +evils that make up life pass off without eating deep into his being. A +cheerful spirit takes him off from the present evil as soon as it is +past. He does not think on it much; for the joy of heart within, <I>to +which God responds</I>, enables him to meet and over-ride those waves of +life and forget them." +</P> + +<P> +This is in perfect conformity with the whole scope of our book: and it +is surely a mistake that the evangelical doctors and commentators make +when they seek to extract truth from Solomon's writings that is never +to be attained apart from God's revelation. On the other hand, a large +school of German rationalists see here nothing beyond the teaching of +the Epicure: "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die." Rather does +it show the high-water mark of human reason, wisdom, and +experience,—having much in common with the philosophy of the world, +but going far beyond it; and then, at its highest, uttering some wail +of dissatisfaction and disappointment, whilst the majestic height of +divine revelation towers above it into the very heavens, taking him who +receives it far above the clouds and mists of earth's speculations and +questionings into the clear sunlight of eternal divine truth. +</P> + +<P> +So here Solomon—and let us not forget none have ever gone, or can ever +go, beyond him—gives us the result of his searchings along the special +line of the power of riches to give enjoyment. His whole experience +again and again has contradicted this. Look at the 12th verse of this +very chapter. "The sleep of the laboring man is sweet, <I>but the +abundance of the rich will not suffer him to sleep</I>." No, no. In some +way to get <I>joy</I>, he confesses he must have <I>God</I>. He combines in +these verses these two ideas—"Joy" and "God." Look at them. See how +they recur: four times the name of God, thrice a word for joy. Now +this raises Solomon far far above the malarial swamps of mere +epicureanism, which excluded God entirely. It shows how perfect the +harmony throughout the whole book. It is again, let us recall it, the +high-water mark of human reason, intelligence, and experience. He +reasons thus: (1) I have proved the vanity and unsatisfactory character +of all created things in themselves, and yet can see no good beyond +getting enjoyment from them. (2) The power, therefore, for enjoyment +cannot be from the things themselves. It must be from God. He must +give it. (3) This assumes that there must be some kind of accord +between God and the heart, for God is the spring, and not the +circumstances without. So far the power of human reason. High it is, +indeed; but how unsatisfactory, at its highest. Consider all that it +leaves unsaid. Suppose this were where you and I were, my reader, what +should we learn of the way of attaining to this "good that is fair"? +Shall we ask Ecclesiastes one single question that surely needs clear +answer in order to attain it? +</P> + +<P> +I am a sinner: conscience, with more or less power, constantly accuses. +How can this awful matter of my guilt in the sight of that God, the +confessed and only source of thy "good," be settled? Surely this is +absolutely necessary to know ere I can enjoy thy "good that is fair." +Nay, more: were a voice to speak from heaven, telling me that all the +past were blotted out up to this moment, I am well assured that I could +not maintain this condition for the next moment. Sin would well up +from the nature within, and leave me as hopeless as ever. I carry +<I>it</I>—that awful defiling thing—with me, in me. How is this to be +answered, Ecclesiastes?—or what help to its answer dost thou give?... +</P> + +<P> +And there is silence alone for a reply. +</P> + +<P> +Once and only once was such a state possible. Adam, as he walked in +his undefiled Eden, eating its fruit, rejoicing in the result of his +labor, with no accusing conscience, God visiting him in the cool of the +day and responding to all his joy,—there is the picture of +Ecclesiastes' "good that is fair." Where else in the old creation, and +how long did that last? No; whilst it is refreshing and inspiring to +mark the beautiful intelligence and exalted reasoning of Ecclesiastes, +recognizing the true place of man in creation, dependent, and +consciously dependent, on God for "life and breath and all things," as +Paul spoke long afterwards, appealing to that in the heathen Athenians +which even they were <I>capable</I> of responding to affirmatively; yet how +he leaves us looking at a "good that is fair," but without a word as to +how it is to be attained, in view of, and in spite of, sin. That one +short word raises an impassable barrier between us and that fair good, +and the more fair the good, the more cruel the pain at being so utterly +separated from it; but then, too, the more sweet and precious the love +that removes the barrier entirely, and introduces us to a good that is +as far fairer than Solomon's as Solomon's is above the beasts. +</P> + +<P> +For we, too, my dear readers, have our "good that is fair." Nor need +we fear comparison with that of this wisest of men. +</P> + +<P> +Survey with me a fairer scene than any lighted by this old creation sun +can show, and harken to God's own voice, in striking contrast to poor +Solomon's portraying its lovely and entrancing beauties for our +enjoyment. +</P> + +<P> +"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath +blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ, +according as He hath chosen us in Him before the foundation of the +world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love, +having predestinated us unto the adoption of children by Jesus Christ +to Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will to the praise of +the glory of His grace wherein He hath made us accepted in the Beloved: +in whom we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins +according to the riches of His grace." +</P> + +<P> +Dwell a little on this our own fair good; mark its sevenfold +perfection; go up and down the land with me. Let us press these grapes +of Eshcol, and taste their excellence together. +</P> + +<P> +<I>First: Chosen in Him before the foundation of the world</I>.—A threefold +cord, that is, indeed, not soon broken. "Chosen," God's own love and +wisdom is the fount and spring whence all flows. And that in blessed +connection with the dearest object of His love—"in Him." "Before the +foundation of the world." In the stability and changelessness of +Eternity,—before that scene that is, and ever was, characterized by +change, began,—with its mirth and sorrow, sunshine and shadow, life +and death. Blessed solid rock-foundation for all in God and Eternity. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Second: To be Holy</I>.—Separated from all the defilement that should +afterwards come in. Thus His electing love is always marked first by +separation from all evil. It can never allow its object to be +connected with the slightest defilement. The evil was allowed only +that He might reveal Himself as Love and Light in dealing with it. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Third: without blame</I>.—So thoroughly is all connected with past +defilement met that not a memory of it remains to mar the present joy. +The defilement of the old creation with which we were connected has +left never a spot nor a stain on the person that could offend infinite +holiness. Clean, every whit. Bless the Lord, oh my soul! +</P> + +<P> +<I>Fourth: In love</I>.—Thus separated and cleansed from all defilement not +mere complacency regards us. Not merely for his own pleasure, as men +make a beautiful garden, and remove everything that would offend their +taste, but active love in all its divine warmth encircles us. My +reader, do you enjoy this fair good? If you be but the feeblest +believer it is your own. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Fifth: Adoption of Children</I>.—Closest kind of love, and that so +implanted in the heart as to put that responsive home-cry of "Abba, +Father," there, and on our lips. Yet nothing short of this was the +"good pleasure of His will. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Sixth.—Taken into favor in the Beloved</I>: the wondrous measure of +acceptance "in the Beloved One." Look at Him again. All the glory He +had in eternity He has now, and more added to it. Infinite complacency +regards him. That, too, is the measure of our acceptance. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Seventh</I>.—But no shirking that awful word,—no overlooking the awful +fact of sin's existence. No; the foundation of our enjoyment of our +own fair good is well laid "in whom we have redemption through His +blood, <I>even the forgiveness of sins</I>." +</P> + +<P> +Sin, looked at in infinite holy Light,—thoroughly looked at,—and +Blood, precious Blood, poured out in atonement for it, and thus put +away forever in perfect righteousness. +</P> + +<P> +Now may the Lord grant us to realize more fully, as we progress in our +book, the awful hopelessness that weighs on man's sad being, apart from +the blessed and infinitely gracious revelation of God. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap06"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VI. +</H3> + +<P> +Remembering how far the writer of our book excels all who have ever +come after him, in ability, wisdom, or riches, his groans of +disappointment shall have their true weight with us, and act as +lighthouse beacons, warning us from danger, or from spending the one +short fleeting life we have in treading the same profitless pathway of +groaning. +</P> + +<P> +So chapter six opens, still on the same subject of wealth and its power +to bless. A sore evil, and one that weighs heavily on man, has Solomon +seen: riches, wealth, and honor, clustering thick on the head of one +person, and yet God has withheld from him the power of enjoying it all. +As our own poet, Browning, writes that apt illustration of King Saul: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 7em">"A people is thine,</SPAN><BR> +And all gifts, which the world offers singly, on one head combine!<BR> +High ambition, and deeds which surpass it, fame crowning them all,<BR> +Brought to blaze on the head of one creature—King Saul."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +So sorrowful is this in our preacher's eyes, and so thoroughly does it +bespeak a state of affairs under the sun in confusion, that Solomon +ventures the strongest possible assertion. Better, he says, an +untimely birth, that never saw light, than a thousand years twice told, +thus spent in vanity, without real good having been found. How bitter +life must show itself to lead to such an estimate! Better never to +have been born than pass through life without finding something that +can satisfy. But this is not looking at life simply in itself, for +life in itself is good, as the same poet sings: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Oh, our manhood's prime vigor! No spirit feels waste,<BR> +Not a muscle is stopped in its playing nor sinew unbraced.<BR> +Oh, the wild joys of living! the leaping from rock up to rock,<BR> +The strong rending of boughs from the fir-tree, the cool silver shock<BR> +Of the plunge in a pool's living water!<BR> +How good is man's life—the mere living! how fit to employ<BR> +All the heart and the soul and the senses forever in joy!"<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +It is because man has, of all the creation of God, an awful shadow +hanging over him—"death and darkness and the tomb," with the solemn, +silent, unknown "beyond" lying before him, robbing him of rest. Angels +have present pure delight, with no such shadow possible—they die not. +The beast may enjoy his pasture, for no thought of a coming death +disturbs him. Life may be full of a kind of enjoyment to such; but +man, poor man, when awake to the possibilities of his own being, as it +surely becomes man to be (and that is just the point of this book—we +are not looking upon man as a mere animal, but as a reasoning creature, +and as such he), is robbed of present rest and enjoyment by an +inevitable fate to which he is hastening, and from which there is no +possible escape. Do not all go to one place?—that vague "Sheol," +speaking of the grave, and yet the grave, not as the <I>end</I>, but an +indefinite shadowy existence beyond? All, all go there; and with no +light on <I>that</I>, better, indeed, "the untimely birth which came in +vanity and departs in darkness;" for this, at least, has the more rest. +Bitter groan this, indeed! +</P> + +<P> +For the Preacher continues: "Does man's labor satisfy him? Can he get +what is really 'good' from it?" No. For never is his appetite filled +so that it desires nothing more. The constant return of its thirst +demands constant toil; and fool and wise must alike obey its call. +This is not confined to bodily food, but covers that bitter hunger and +thirst of the heart, as the use of the word soul (margin) shows. The +longings of the wise may be for a higher food. He may aim above the +mere sensual, and seek to fill his soul with the refined, but he +<I>fails</I>, as indeed do all, even "the poor man who knows to walk before +the living;" that is, even the poor man who, with all the disadvantages +of poverty, has wisdom enough to know how to live so as to command the +respect of his fellows. Wise indeed must such be; but he, no more than +the fool, has found the "good" that forever satisfies hunger and +thirst, and calms to rest the wandering of the soul, which, like the +restless swallow, is ever on the wing. Man is made up of desire, and +one glimpse with the eyes, something seen, is at least something +secured, and it is better than all mere longing, which is vanity and +the pursuit of the wind. For everything has long ago been named <I>from +its own nature</I>; and in this way its name shows what it is. Thus man, +too, (Adam,) is, and ever has been, known from his name, from "adamah," +earth; his name so showing his mortality. If thus he has been made by +his Creator, how vain for him to hope to escape his fate, for with Him +no contention is possible. What use, then, in many words (not things) +since they afford no relief as against that end? they only increase +vanity. Then the last sad wail of this subject: "Who knoweth what is +really <I>good</I>—satisfying for man—during the few fleeting years of his +vain life here, which he passes as a shadow; and when he is gone, who +can tell him what shall be after him under the sun"? +</P> + +<P> +Let that wail sink down deep into our ears. It is the cry that has +been passed, in ever increasing volume, from heart to heart—every +empty hollow heart of man echoing and re-echoing, "Who will show us any +good?" Now turn and listen to One who came to answer that fully, and +in His word to Mary, the sister of Lazarus, He does distinctly, in +words, answer it. She had chosen the portion that He could call +"good." And was that travail and toil, even in service for Himself? +No, that was rather her sister's portion; but a seat—expressive of +rest—(consider it), a listening ear, whilst the Lord ministered to +her;—and that is all that is needful! What a contrast between this +poor rich king, communing with his own heart to find out what is that +good portion for man; and the rich poor saint in blessed communion with +infinite Love, infinite Wisdom, infinite Power, and resting satisfied! +Surely, Solomon in all his glory had no throne to be compared to hers, +as she sat lowly "at His feet." And mark carefully, for thy soul's +good, that word of tender grace that the Lord said, This is "needful." +He who had listened to the groan of man's heart through those long four +thousand years, and knew its need fully and exactly, says that this +good portion must not be regarded as any high attainment for the few, +but as the very breath of life—for all. If He knows that it is +needful for thee, then, my soul, fear not but that He will approve thy +taking the same place and claiming Mary's portion on the ground of thy +<I>need alone</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Yes, but does this really answer the root cause of the groan in our +chapter? Is the shadow of death dispelled by sitting at His feet! Is +death no longer the dark unknown? Shall we learn lessons there that +shall rob it of all its terrors, and replace the groan with song? Yes, +truly, for look at the few significant foot-prints of that dear Mary's +walk after this. See her at that supper made for the Lord at Bethany. +Here Martha is serving with perfect acceptance—no word of rebuke to +her now; she has learned the lesson of that day spoken of in the tenth +of Luke. But Mary still excels her, for, whilst sitting at His feet in +that same day of tenth of Luke, she has heard some story that makes her +come with precious spikenard to anoint His body for the burial! +Strange act! And how could that affectionate heart force itself calmly +to anoint the object of its love for burial? Ah! still a far sweeter +story must she have heard "at His feet," and a bright light must have +pierced the shadow of the tomb. For, look at that little company of +devoted women around His cross, and you will find no trace of the no +less devoted Mary, the sister of Lazarus, there. The other Marys may +come, in tender affection, but in the dark ignorance of unbelief, to +search for Him, in His empty tomb on the third day. She, with no less +tender affection surely, is not there. Is this silence of Scripture +without significance, or are we to see the reason for it in that "good +portion" she had chosen "at His feet"?—and there did she hear, not +only the solemn story of His cross leading her to anoint His body for +the burial, but the joyful story of His resurrection, so that there was +no need for <I>her</I> to seek "the living amongst the dead;"—she <I>knew</I> +that He was risen, and she, as long before, "<I>sat still in the house</I>"! +Oh, blessed calm! Oh, holy peace! What is the secret of it? Wouldst +thou learn it! Sit, then, too, "at His feet," in simple conscious +emptiness and need. Give Him the still more blessed part of +ministering to thee. So all shall be in order. Thou shalt have the +good portion that shall dispel all clouds of death, and pour over thy +being heaven's pure sunlight of resurrection; and, with that Light, +song shall displace groan, whilst thy Lord shall have the still better +part—His own surely—of giving; for "more blessed it is to give than +to receive." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap07"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VII. +</H3> + +<P> +But whilst the King has not that most blessed light, yet there are some +things in which he can discriminate; and here are seven comparisons in +which his unaided wisdom can discern which is the better:— +</P> + +<PRE> +1. A good name is better than precious ointment. +2. The day of death " " " the day of birth. +3. The house of mourning " " " the house of feasting. +4. Borrow " " " laughter. +5. The rebuke of the wise " " " the song of fools. +6. The end of a thing " " " the beginning. +7. The patient in spirit " " " the proud in spirit. +</PRE> + +<BR> + +<P> +Lofty, indeed, is the level to which Solomon has attained by such +unpopular conclusions, and it proves fully that we are listening in +this book to man at his highest, best. Not a bitter, morbid, diseased +mind, simply wailing over a lost life, and taking, therefore, highly +colored and incorrect views of that life, as so many pious commentators +say; but the calm, quiet result of the use of the highest powers of +reasoning man, as man, possesses; and we have but to turn for a moment, +and listen to Him who is greater than Solomon, to find His holy and +infallible seal set upon the above conclusions. "Blessed are the pure +in heart,—they that mourn,—and the meek," is surely in the same +strain exactly; although reasons are there given for this blessedness +of which Solomon, with all his wisdom, had never a glimpse. +</P> + +<P> +Let us take just one striking agreement, and note the contrasts: "It is +better to go to the house of mourning than to go to the house of +feasting: for that is the end of all men; and the living will lay it to +his heart. Sorrow is better than laughter; for by the sadness of the +countenance the heart is made better. The heart of the wise is in the +house of mourning; but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth." +That is, the loftiest purest wisdom of man recognizes a quality in +sorrow itself that is purifying. "In the sadness of the face the heart +becometh fair." In a scene where all is in confusion,—where Death, as +King of Terrors, reigns supreme over all, forcing his presence on us +hourly, where wickedness and falsehood apparently prosper, and goodness +and truth are forced to the wall,—in such a scene of awful disorder, +laughter and mirth are but discord, and grate upon the awakened +spirit's ear with ghastly harshness. Whilst an honest acceptance of +the truth of things as they are, looking Death itself full in the face, +the house of mourning not shunned, but sought out; the sorrow within is +at least in harmony with the sad state of matters without; the +"ministration of death" has its effect, the spirit learns its lesson of +humiliation; and this, says all wisdom, is "<I>better</I>." +</P> + +<P> +And yet this very level to which Reason can surely climb by her own +unaided strength may become a foothold for Faith to go further. Unless +Wrong, Discord, and Death, are the normal <I>permanent</I> condition of +things, then sorrow, too, is not the normal permanent state of the +heart; but this merely remains a question, and to its answer no reason +helps us. Age after age has passed with no variation in the fell +discord of its wails, tears, and groans. Generation has followed in +the footsteps of generation, but with no rift in the gloomy shadow of +death that has overhung and finally settled over each. Six thousand +years of mourning leave unaided Reason with poor hope of any change in +the future,—of any expectation of true comfort. But then listen to +that authoritative Voice proclaiming, as no "scribe" ever could, +"Blessed are they that mourn, <I>for they shall be comforted</I>." Ah, +there is a bright light breaking in on the dark clouds, with no +lightning-flash of added storm, but a mild and holy ray,—the promise +of a day yet to break o'er our sorrow-stricken earth, when there shall +be no need for mourning, for death no more shall reign, but be +swallowed up in victory. +</P> + +<P> +But turn over a few pages more, and the contrast is still further +heightened. The sun of divine revelation is now in mid-heaven; and not +merely future, but present, comfort is revealed by its holy and blessed +beam. Come, let us enter now into the "house of mourning," not merely +to clasp hands with the mourners, and to sit there in the silence of +Ecclesiastes' helplessness for the benefit of our own hearts, nor even +to whisper the promise of a future comfort, but, full of the comfort of +a present hope, to pour out words of comfort into the mourners' ears. +Tears still are flowing,—nor will we rebuke them. God would never +blunt those tender sensibilities of the heart that thus speaks the Hand +that made it; but He would take from the tears the bitterness of +hopelessness, and would throw on them His own blessed Light,—a new +direct word of revelation from Himself,—Love and Light as He +is,—till, like the clouds in the physical world, they shine with a +glory that even the cloudless sky knows not. +</P> + +<P> +<I>First</I>, then, all must be grounded and based on faith in the Lord +Jesus. We are talking to those who share with us in a common divine +faith. <I>We believe that Jesus died</I>: but more, <I>we believe that He +rose again</I>: and here alone is the foundation of true hope or comfort. +They who believe not or know not this are as absolutely hopeless—as +comfortless—as Ecclesiastes: they are "the rest which have no hope." +True divine Hope is a rare sweet plant, whose root is found <I>only</I> in +His empty tomb, whose flower and fruit are in heaven itself. Based on +this, comforts abound; and in every step the living Lord Jesus is seen: +His resurrection throws its blessed light everywhere. If One has +actually risen from the dead, what glorious possibilities follow. +</P> + +<P> +For as to those who are falling asleep, is <I>He</I> insensible to that +which moves us so deeply? Nay; He Himself has put them to sleep. They +are fallen asleep [not "in," as our version says, but] <I>through</I> +(<I>dia</I>) Jesus. He who so loved them has Himself put them to sleep. No +matter what the outward, or apparent, causes of their departure to +<I>sight</I>, faith sees the perfect love of the Lord Jesus giving "His +beloved sleep." Sight may take note only of the flying stones as they +crush the martyr's body; mark, with horror, the breaking bone, the +bruised and bleeding flesh; hear the air filled with the confusion of +shouts of imprecation, and mocking blasphemy; but to faith all is +different: to her the spirit of the saint, in perfect calm, is enfolded +to the bosom of Him who has loved and redeemed it, whilst the same Lord +Jesus hushes the bruised and mangled form to <I>sleep</I>, as in the holy +quiet of the sanctuary. +</P> + +<P> +Let our faith take firm hold of this blessed word, "fallen asleep +through Jesus," for our comfort. So shall we be able to instil this +comfort into the wounded hearts of others,—comforting them with the +comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God. What would +Solomon have given to have known this? +</P> + +<P> +<I>Second</I>, the mind must be gently loosened from occupation with itself +and its own loss; and that by no rebuke or harsh word, so out of place +with sorrow, but by the <I>assumption</I>, at least, that it is for the loss +that the departed themselves suffer that we grieve. It is because we +love them that our tears flow: but suppose we know beyond a question +that <I>they</I> have suffered no loss by being taken away from this scene, +would not that modify our sorrow? Yea; would it not change its +character completely, extracting bitterness from it? So that blessed +Lord Himself comforted His own on the eve of His departure: "If ye +loved me, ye would rejoice because I go unto my Father, for my Father +is greater than I." The more you love me, the less—not the more—will +you sorrow. Nay; you would change the sorrow into actual joy. <I>The +measure of the comfort is exactly the measure of the love</I>. That is +surely divine. So here, "You are looking forward to the day when your +rejected Lord Jesus shall be manifested in brightest glories: your +beloved have not missed their share in that triumph. God will show +them the same "path of life" He showed their Shepherd (Ps. xvi.), and +will "bring them with Him" in the train of their victorious Lord. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Third</I>. But is that triumph, that joy, so far off that it can only be +seen through the dim aisles and long vistas of many future ages and +generations? Must our comfort be greatly lessened by the thought that +while that end is "sure," it is still "very far off,"—a thousand years +may—nay, some say, <I>must</I>—have to intervene; and must we sorrowfully +say, like the bereaved saint of old, "I shall go to him, but he shall +not return to me"? Not at all. Better, far better than that. For +Faith's cheerful and cheering voice is "we who are alive and remain." +That day is so close ever to faith that there is nothing between us and +it. No long weary waiting expected; and that very <I>attitude</I>—that +very hope—takes away the "weariness" from the swift passing days. +Those dear saints of old grasped and cherished this blessed hope that +their saviour Lord would return even during their life. Did they lose +anything by so cherishing it? Have we gained by our giving it up? Has +the more "reasonable" expectation that, after all, the tomb shall be +our lot as theirs, made our days brighter, happier, and so to speed +more quickly? Has it made us more separate from the world, more +heavenly in character, given us less in common with the worldling? Has +this safe "reasoning" made us to abound in works of love, labors of +faith, and in patience of hope, as did the "unreasonable" and +"mistaken" hope of His immediate coming the dear Thessalonians of old? +For look at the first chapter, and see how the "waiting for the Son +from heaven" worked. Again I ask, have we improved on this? <I>Can</I> we +improve upon it? Was it not far better, then, for them—if these its +happy accompaniments—to hold fast, even to their last breath, that +hope; and even to pass off this scene clasping it still fondly to their +hearts, than our dimmed and dull faith with—it may be boldly said—all +the sad loss that accompanies this? +</P> + +<P> +Hold it fast, my brethren, "<I>We who are alive and remain</I>." Let that +be the only word in our mouths, the only hope in our hearts. It is a +cup filled to the brim with comfort. How they ring with life and hope +in contrast with the dull, heavy, deathful word of poor +Ecclesiastes—"For that is the end of all men"! +</P> + +<P> +Oh, spring up brighter in all our hearts, thou divinely given, divinely +sustained Hope! +</P> + +<P> +<I>Fourth</I>.—"For the Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a +shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and +the dead in Christ shall rise first." +</P> + +<P> +Another sweet and holy word of comfort. We have seen Jesus putting His +saints to sleep, as to their bodies; and here we see the same Lord +Jesus Himself bidding them rise. No indiscriminate general +resurrection this: "the dead in Christ" alone are concerned: they rise +first. He who died for them knows them; and they, too, have known His +voice in life: that same voice now awakens them, and bids them rise as +easily as the little damsel at the "Talitha Cumi"! How precious is +this glorious word of the Lord! How perfect the order! No +awe-inspiring trumpet, "sounding long and waxing loud," as at Sinai of +old, awakening the panic-stricken dead, and bidding them come to an +awful judgment. Such the picture that man's dark unbelief and guilty +conscience have drawn. Small comfort would we have for mourners were +that true. God be thanked it is not. Their Saviour's well-known voice +that our dead have loved shall awaken them, ringing full and true in +every tone and note of it with the love He has borne them. Then the +voice of the Archangel Michael, the great marshal of God's victorious +hosts shall range our ranks. This accomplished, and all in the perfect +divine order of victory, the trumpet shall sound and the redeemed shall +begin their triumphant, blissful, upward flight. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Fifth</I>.—But the Spirit of God desires us to get and to give the +comfort of another precious word. In no strange unknown company shall +we who are alive and remain start on that homeward journey, but +"together with them." Who that has known the agony of broken +heart-strings does not see the infinitely gracious tender comfort in +those three words, "together with them"? There is reunion. Once more +we shall be in very deed with those we love, with never a thought or +fear of parting more to shadow the mutual joy. In view of those three +words it were simple impertinence to question whether we shall +recognize our dear saints who have preceded us. Not only would such a +question rob them of their beauty, but of their very meaning. They +would be empty and absolutely meaningless in such case. Sure, beyond a +peradventure, is it that our most cherished anticipations shall be far +exceeded in that rapturous moment; for we can but reason from +experience, whilst here the sweetest communion has ever been marred by +that which there shall not be. +</P> + +<P> +How sweet the prospect, my sorrowing bereaved readers! We shall, as +God is true, look once more into the very faces of those we have known +and loved in the Lord on earth. They awake to recognition as Magdalene +at the word "Mary;" not to a renewed earthly companionship, nor to a +relationship as known in the flesh, as poor Mary thought, but to a +sweeter, as well as higher; a warmer, as well as purer communion; for +the tie that there shall bind us together is that which is stronger, +sweeter than all others, even here,—Jesus Christ the Lord. +</P> + +<P> +But stay! Does this really meet fully the present sorrow? Does it +give a satisfying comfort? Is there not a lurking feeling of +disappointment that certain relationships with their affections are +never to be restored; therefore, in certain ways, "recognition" is not +probable? For instance, a husband loses the companion of his life. He +shall, it is true, meet and recognize with joy a saint whom he knew on +earth, but never again his <I>wife</I>. That sweet, pure, human affection, +is never to be renewed. Death's rude hand has chilled that warmth +forever. The shock of death has extinguished it forevermore. Is that +exactly true? Is that just as Scripture puts it? Let us see. +</P> + +<P> +We may justly reason that if, in the resurrection, relationships were +exactly as here, sorrow would necessarily outweigh joy. To find broken +families there would be a perpetuation of earth's keenest distresses. +To know that that break was irreparable would cause a grief unutterable +and altogether inconsistent with the joy of the new creation. Marriage +there is not, and hence all relationships of earth we may safely gather +are not there. But the natural affections of the soul of man have they +absolutely come to nothing? +</P> + +<P> +That soul, connected as it is with that which is higher than +itself—the spirit—is immortal, and its powers and attributes must be +in activity beyond death. It is the seat of the affections here, and, +surely, there too. Why, then, shall not these affections there have +full unhindered play? Let us seek to gather something from analogy. +Knowledge has its seat in the spirit of man, and here he exercises that +faculty; nor does the spirit any more than the soul cease to exist; nor +are its attributes therefore to be arrested. Yet we read of knowledge +in that scene, "it shall vanish away." And why? Is it not because of +the perfect light that there shines? Human knowledge is but a candle, +and what worth is candlelight when the noonday sun shines? It is +overwhelmed, swallowed up, by perfect light. It "vanishes away,"—is +not extinguished, any more than is human knowledge, by the shock of +death or change; but perfection of Light has done away with the very +appearance of imperfection. Now is this not equally and exactly true +of that other part of the divine nature—Love? <I>Here</I> we both know in +part and love in part. <I>There</I> the perfection of Love causes that +which is imperfect—the human affection of the soul—to "vanish away." +The greater swallows up the less. The infinite attraction of the Lord +Jesus—that "glory" which He prayed that we might see (John +xvii.)—overwhelms all lower affections with no rough rude shock as of +death, but by the very superabundance of the bliss. His glory! What +is it but the radiant outshining of His infinitely blessed, infinitely +attractive, divine nature,—Love and Light, Light and Love,—each +swallowing up in their respective spheres every inferior imperfect +reflection of them that we have enjoyed here in this scene of +imperfection, leaving nothing to be desired, nothing missed; allowing +perfect play to every human faculty and affection,—crushing, +extinguishing none. Death has not been permitted to annul these +faculties. The perfect love of the Lord Jesus has outstripped them, +swallowed them up in warmer affections, sweeter communion. +</P> + +<P> +The coming of that precious Saviour is close: just as close is the +fulfillment of those words, "together with them." "He maketh the +clouds His chariots," and in those chariots we are taken home +"together." +</P> + +<P> +<I>Sixth</I>.—"To meet the Lord in the air." Another word of divine +comfort, again. How bold the assertion! Its very boldness is +assurance of its truth. It becomes God, and God only, so to speak that +His people may both recognize His voice in its majesty and rest on His +word. No speculation; no argument; no deduction; no reasoning; but a +bare, authoritative statement, startling in its boldness. Not a +syllable of past Scripture on which to build and to give color to it; +and yet <I>when</I> revealed, <I>when</I> spoken, in perfect harmony with the +whole of Scripture. How absolutely impossible for any man to have +conceived that the Lord's saints should be caught up to meet Him "<I>in +the air</I>." Were it not true, its very boldness and apparent +foolishness would be its refutation. And what must be the character of +mind that would even seek to invent such a thought? What depths of +awful wickedness it would bespeak! What cruelty thus to attempt to +deceive the whole race! What corruption, thus to speak false in the +holiest matters, attaching the Lord's name to a falsehood! The spring +from which such a statement, if false, could rise must be corrupt +indeed. But, oh, how different in fact! What severe righteousness! +what depths of holiness! what elevated morality! what warmth of tender +affection! what burning zeal, combined with the profoundest reasoning, +characterize every word of the writer of this same statement! Every +word that he has written testifies that he has <I>not</I> attempted to +deceive. +</P> + +<P> +There is, perhaps, one other alternative: the writer may have <I>believed +himself</I> thus inspired, and was thus self-deceived But in this case +far gone in disease must his mind have been; nor could it fail +constantly to give striking evidence of being thus unhinged in other +parts of his writings. This is a subject with which unbalanced minds +have shown their inability to be much occupied without the most +sorrowful evidences of the disease under which they suffer. Let there +be independence of the Scriptures (as there confessedly is in this +case), and let man's mind work in connection with this subject of the +Lord's second coming, and all history has but one testimony: such minds +become unbalanced, and feverish disquietude evidences itself by +constant recurrence to the one theme. Find, on the other hand, one +single instance, if you can, in which such a mind makes mention <I>once, +and only once</I>, of that subject that has so overmastered every other as +to have deceived him into the belief that falsehood is truth, his own +imagination is the inspiration of the Spirit of God! +</P> + +<P> +Have you not wondered why this wondrous word of revelation occurs thus +in detail once and only once? Is it not one of the weapons of those +who contend against this our hope that we base too much on this +isolated Scripture text? Not that that is true, for all Scripture, as +we have said, is in perfect harmony and accord with it; but what a +perfect, complete, thorough answer, this fact gives to the other +alternative—that the writer was self-deceived. This is impossible; +or, like every other self-deceived man that ever lived, he would have +pressed his one theme in every letter, forced it on unwilling minds +every time he opened his mouth or took up his pen. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"No wild enthusiast ever yet could rest<BR> +Till half mankind were like himself possessed."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +'Tis an attractive theme. Long could we linger here, but we must pass +on; but before leaving, let us see if we were justified in saying that +whilst this word is based on no previous Scripture, yet, when spoken, +it is in harmony with all. First, then, is it not in perfect accord +with the peculiar character and calling of the Church? Israel, as a +nation, finds her final deliverance on the earth. Her calling and her +hopes have ever been limited to this scene. Fitting then, indeed, it +is that she be saved by her Deliverer's <I>feet standing once more on the +Mount of Olives</I> (Zach. xiv. 4), and the judgment of the living nations +should then take place. But with the Church, how different: her +blessings heavenly; her character heavenly; her calling heavenly. Is +it not, then, in accord with this that her meeting with her Lord should +be literally heavenly, too? Israel, exponent of the righteous +government of God, may rightly long to "dip her foot in the blood of +the wicked." Nor can she expect or know of any deliverance except, as +of old, in victories in the day of battle. The Church, exponent of the +exceeding riches of His grace, is of another spirit; and our +deliverance "in the air" permits—nay, necessitates—our echoing that +gracious word of our Lord, "Father, forgive them." +</P> + +<P> +Then too, how beautifully this rapture follows the pattern of His whom +the Lord's people now are following even to a dwelling that has no name +nor place on earth (John i. 38, 39). The clouds received Him: they, +too, shall receive us. Unseen by the world He left the world, too busy +with its occupations to note or care for the departure of Him who is +its Light. So the poor feeble glimmer of the Lord's dear people now +shall be lost, secretly, as it were, to the world in which they shine +as lights, leaving it in awful gloomy darkness till the Day dawn and +the Sun arise. +</P> + +<P> +Nor is illustration or type lacking. In Enoch, caught up before the +judgment of the flood, surely we may see a figure of the rapture of the +heavenly saints before the antitype of the flood, the tribulation that +is to try "the dwellers upon the earth," as in Noah brought through +that judgment, a picture of the earthly ones. +</P> + +<P> +In this connection, too, what could be more exquisitely harmonious than +the way in which the Lord thus presents Himself to the expectant faith +of His earthly and heavenly people? To the former the full plain Day +is ushered in by the Sun of Righteousness arising with healing in His +wings: for that Day they look. To the latter, who are watching through +the long hours of the night, the Bright and Morning Star shining ere +the first beams of the Sun are thrown upon the dark world is the object +of faith and hope. +</P> + +<P> +Is not the word that believers shall, "meet the Lord in the air" in +absolute accord with these different aspects of the Lord as Star and +Sun? Most certainly it is. +</P> + +<P> +More than at any other time, a solid foundation for comfort is needed +in times of deep grief. Then the hosts of darkness press round the +dismayed spirit; clouds of darkness roll across the mental sky; the sun +and all light is hidden; in the storm-wrack the fiery darts of the +wicked one fall thick as rain. Every long-accepted truth is +questioned; the very foundations seem to dissolve. A firm foothold, +indeed, must we have on which to stand at such a time. Faith must be +seen not at war with her poor blind—or at least short-sighted—sister +Reason, but in perfect accord, leading her, with her feebler powers, by +the hand. But here is where the world's efforts to comfort—and, +indeed, alas, the worldly Christians too—lack. Sentimentalism abounds +here; and the poor troubled heart is told to stand fast on airy +speculations, and to distil comfort from wax-flowers, as it were,—the +creations of the imagination. How solid the comfort here given in +contrast with all this. <I>God</I> speaks, and in the <I>Light</I>, that with +clear yet gentle ray, exactly meets the needs of our present +distress,—in the <I>Love</I> that in its infinite tenderness and beautiful +delicacy knows how to heal the wounded spirit,—in the grand +<I>authority</I> that rests on no other word or testimony for proof,—and +yet in the perfect, absolute <I>harmony</I> with the whole scope of His own +holy word, we, His children, recognize again His voice; for never man +could speak thus, and we are comforted, and may comfort one another. +</P> + +<P> +<I>It is true</I>. <I>It is divine</I>. We shall meet the Lord in the air. +Happy journey that, in such a company to such a goal,—to meet the +Lord! Who can picture the joy of that upward flight? What words +extract the comfort of that meeting,—the Lord,—our Lord,—alone with +Him,—"together with them,"—in the quiet chambers of the air! +</P> + +<P> +<I>Seventh</I>.—"And so shall we ever be with the Lord." There is an +eternity of unmingled bliss. How short the time of separation, oh ye +mourning ones, compared with this! The pain is but for a moment, +whilst there is a far more exceeding and eternal weight of comfort. +</P> + +<P> +What a contrast! Death is the sad, gloomy, mysterious, unknown +boundary for all, groans Ecclesiastes, "for that is the end of all +men." There is no end to the joy of the redeemed, says Revelation; and +Faith sings "forever with the Lord." What deep need of Himself has +this man's heart, that He has made. If in this sad scene we get one +ray of true comfort it is when "with Him"; one thrill of true joy it is +when "with Him"; one hour of true peace it is when "with Him." We were +intended, meant, created, <I>to need Him</I>. Let us remember that, and +then see the sweet comfort in that word, "so shall we <I>ever</I> be with +the Lord." Man is at last, may it be said, in his <I>element</I>. His +spirit gets the communion that it needs—with Him forever; his soul, +the love it needs, in Him forever; his body the perfection it +needs—like Him forever! Is not this revelation self-evidently of +God—worthy of Him—possible only to Him? +</P> + +<P> +Again, let us ask what would Solomon have given for a song like this, +instead of his mournful, groan "for death is the end of all men"! +Alas, as he goes on, he finds that even this is not the case, except as +regards the scene "under the sun." He finds it impossible to escape a +conclusion, as startling as it is logical, that there is another scene +to which death may introduce, from which there is no escape. +</P> + +<P> +Our writer, ignorant as he confessedly is of this glorious light of +divine revelation, still speaks in praise of the feeble glimmer that +human wisdom gives. From his point of view, wealth and wisdom are both +good,—are a "defense" or "shadow" to their possessors; but still that +which men generally esteem the most—wealth—is given the second place; +for knowledge, or wisdom, has in itself a positive virtue that money +lacks. It "gives life to them that have it," animates, preserves in +life, modifies, at least in measure, the evils from which it cannot +altogether guard its possessor; and, by giving equanimity to a life of +change and vicissitude, proves, in some sort, its own life-giving +energy. How infinitely true this is with regard to Him who is absolute +infinite Wisdom, and who is our Life, it is our health and joy to +remember. +</P> + +<P> +The Preacher continues: Ponder the work of God, but you will find +nothing in anything that you can <I>see</I> that shall enable you to +forecast the future with any certainty. Adversity follows prosperity, +and my counsel is to make the best use of both,—enjoy this when it +comes, and let that teach you that God's ways are inscrutable, nor can +you straighten out the tangle of His providences. Evidently he +<I>intends</I> these vicissitudes that still follow no definite rule, so +that man may recognize his own ignorance and impotence. In one word, +reason as you may from all that you can <I>see</I>, and your reason will +throw no ray of light on God's future dealings. And there again, +having brought us face to face with a dense, impenetrable cloud, +Ecclesiastes leaves us. +</P> + +<P> +How awful that dark cloud is, it is difficult for us now to realize, so +accustomed are we to the light God's word has given. But were it +possible to blot out entirely from our minds all that Word has taught +us, and place ourselves for a moment just by the side of our +"Preacher," look alone through <I>his</I> eyes, recognize with him the +existence of the Creator whose glorious Being is so fully shown in all +His works, and yet with nothing whereby to judge of His disposition +toward us except what we <I>see</I>,—in the physical world the blasting +storm sweeping over the landscape that but now spoke only in its +beauties and bounties of His love and benevolence, leaving in its +desolating track, not only ruined homesteads and blighted harvests; +but, far worse, the destruction of all our hopes, of all the estimates +we had formed of Him. In the world of providences the thoughts of His +love, based on yesterday's peace and prosperity, all denied and swept +away by to-day's sorrows and adversities,—awful, agonizing +uncertainty! And, since all is surely in His hand, to be compelled to +recognize that He <I>permits</I>, at least, these alternations "<I>to the end +that</I> (with that express purpose) man should find nothing of what shall +be after Him"! Reason, or Intelligence, with all her highest powers, +stands hopeless and helpless before that dark future, and wrings her +hands in agony. +</P> + +<P> +But look, my beloved reader, at that man who speeds his way with fleet +and steady footfall. His swift tread speaks no uncertainty nor doubt +of mind. Mark the earnest, concentrated, forward look. His eye is +upward, and something he sees there is drawing him with powerful +magnetic attraction quite contrary to the course or path of men at +large. He presses against the stream: the multitude are floating in +the other direction. As with the kine of Bethshemesh, some hidden +power takes him in a course quite contrary to all the ties or calls of +mere nature. Look at him,—irrespective of anything else, the figure +itself is a grand sight. The path he has chosen lies through the +thorny shrubs of endurance, afflictions, necessities, distresses, +stripes, imprisonments, tumults, labors, watchings, and fastings. No +soft or winsome meadow-way this, nor one that any would choose, except +he were under some strong conviction,—whether true or false,—that +will surely be admitted. For men have at rare times suffered much even +in the cause of error; but never for that which they themselves <I>knew</I> +to be false, and which at the same time brought them no glory,—nothing +to feed their vanity, or pride, or exalt them in any way. Admit, then, +for a moment, that he is self-deceived, under some strong delusion, and +that the object of which he is in pursuit is but a phantom. Then mark +the path in which that phantom leads: it has turned him from being a +blasphemer, persecutor, and an insolent, overbearing man (1 Tim. 1), +into one of liveliest affections, most tender sympathies, a lowly +servant of all; it has given him a joy that no wave of trouble can +quench, a song that dungeons cannot silence, a transparent truthfulness +which permits a lie nowhere; and all this results from that which is in +itself a delusion,—a lie! Oh, holy "delusion"! Oh, wondrous, +truth-loving, wonder-working "lie"! Was ever such a miracle, that a +falsehood works truth?—that a delusion, instead of leading into marsh, +or bog, or quicksand, as other will-o'-the-wisps ever and always have, +leads along a morally elevated path where every footstep rings with the +music of divine certainty, as though it trod upon a rock! Such a +miracle, contrary to all reason, is worthy of acceptance only by the +blind, childish, credulity of infidelity. Whatever the object before +him, then, it is <I>real</I>; his convictions are soberly and well founded; +he runs his race to no visionary, misty goal; but some actual reality +is the lode-star of his life. Let us listen to his own explanation: +"forgetting those things that are being, reaching forth unto those that +are before, I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling +of God in Christ Jesus." But Solomon, the wisest of the wise, groans +no man can find out "that which shall come after him"; or, in other +words, that future of which Paul sings: I have heard a voice that has +called from heaven, and looking up I have seen a Light that has +darkened every other. One in beauty and attraction infinite,—to Him I +press. <I>He is before me</I>, and not till Him I reach will I rest. +Blessed contrast! +</P> + +<P> +Now, my dear reader, let us also seek to keep our eye on that same +Object, for the man at whom we have been looking is one just like +ourselves, with every passion that we have, and the One who drew him +can draw you and me,—Who satisfied him can satisfy us, for He who +loved and died for him has loved and died for us. +</P> + +<P> +And since we are not now contemplating the wondrous cross, but His +glory, let us sing together:— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Oh, my Saviour glorified!<BR> +Now the heavens opened wide<BR> +Show to Faith's exultant eye<BR> +One in beauteous majesty.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Worthy of the sweetest praise<BR> +That my ransomed heart can raise,<BR> +Is that Man in whom alone<BR> +God Himself is fully known.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +For those clust'ring glories prove<BR> +That glad gospel "God is Love,"<BR> +Whilst those wounds, in glory bright,<BR> +Voice the solemn "God is Light."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Holy Light, whose searching ray<BR> +Brings but into perfect day<BR> +Beauties that my heart <I>must</I> win<BR> +To the Sinless once made Sin.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Hark, my soul! Thy Saviour sings;<BR> +Catch the joy that music brings;<BR> +And, with that sweet flood of song,<BR> +Pour thy whisp'ring praise along.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +For no film of shade above<BR> +Hides me now from perfect Love.<BR> +Deep assurance all is right<BR> +Gives me peace in perfect Light.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Find I then on God's own breast<BR> +Holy, happy, perfect rest,<BR> +In the person of my Lord,—<BR> +"Ever be His name adored!"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Oh, my Saviour glorified,<BR> +Turn my eye from all beside.<BR> +Let me but Thy beauty see,—<BR> +Other light is dark to me.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +But the Preacher's experiences of anomalies are by no means ended. +These alternations of adversity and prosperity, he says, whilst there +is no forecasting <I>when</I> they will come, so there seems to be no +safeguard, even in righteousness and wisdom, against them. They are +not meted out here at all on the lines of righteousness. The just man +dies in his righteousness, whilst the wicked lives on in his +wickedness: therefore be not righteous overmuch; do not abstain, or +withdraw thyself, from the natural blessings of life, making it joyless +and desolate; but then err not on the other side, going into folly and +licentiousness,—a course which naturally tends to cut off life itself. +It is the narrow way of philosophy: as said the old Latins, "Medio +tutissimus ibis," "midway is safety"; but Solomon is here again, as we +have seen before, on a far higher moral elevation than any of the +heathen philosophers, for he has one sheet-anchor for his soul from the +evils of either extreme, in the fear of God. +</P> + +<P> +As for the despairing, hopeless groans of "vanity," we, with our +God-given grace, learn to feel pity for our Author, so for his moral +elevation do we admire him, whilst for his sincerity and love of truth +we learn to respect and love him. See in the next few verses that +clear, cold, true, reason of his, confessing the narrow limits of its +powers, and yet the whole soul longs, as if it would burst all bars to +attain to that which shall solve its perplexity. "Thus far have I +attained by wisdom," he says, "and yet still I cry for wisdom. I see +far off the place where earth can reach and touch the heavens; but +when, by weary toil and labor, I reach that spot, those heavens are as +inimitably high above me as ever, and an equally long journey lies +between me and the horizon where they meet. Oh, that I might be wise; +but it was far from me." +</P> + +<P> +Now, in our version, the next verse reads very tamely and flat, in view +of the strong emotion under which it is so clear that the whole of the +book was written. "That which is far off and exceeding deep, who can +find it out?" The Revised, both in text and margin, gives us a hint of +another thought, "That which is, or hath been, is afar off," etc. But +other scholars, in company with the Targum and many an old Jewish +writer, lift the verse into harmony with the impassioned utterances of +this noble man, as he expresses in broken ejaculatory phrase his +longings and his powerlessness: +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Far off, the past,—what is it?<BR> +Deep,—that deep! Ah, who can sound?<BR> +Then turned I, and my heart, to learn, explore.<BR> +To seek out wisdom, reason—sin to know—<BR> +Presumption—folly—vain impiety.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +He <I>must</I> unravel the mystery, and turns thus, once more, with his sole +companion, his own heart, to measure everything,—even sin, folly, +impiety,—and more bitter even than that bitter death that has again +and again darkened all his counsel and dashed his hopes, is one awful +evil that he has found. +</P> + +<P> +One was nearest Adam in the old creation. Taken <I>from</I> his side, a +living one, she was placed <I>at</I> his side to share with him his wide +dominion over that fair, unsullied scene. Strong where he was weak, +and weak where he was strong, how evidently was she meant of an +all-gracious and all-wise Creator as a true helpmeet for him: his +complement—filling up his being. But that old creation is as a vessel +reversed, so that the highest is now the lowest,—the best has become +the worst,—the closest may be the most dangerous; and foes spring even +from within households. Intensified disorder and confusion! When she +who was so clearly intended by her strength of affection to call into +rightful play the affections of man's heart, whose very weakness and +dependence should call forth his strength—alas, our writer has found +that that heart is too often a snare and a net, and those hands drag +down to ruin the one to whom they cling. It is the clearest sign of +God's judgment to be taken by those nets and bands, as of his mercy, to +escape them. Thus evil ever works, dual—as is good—in character. +Opposed to the Light and Love of God we find a liar and murderer in +Satan himself; corruption and violence in man, under Satan's power. +The weaker vessel makes up for lack of strength by deception; and +whilst the man of the earth expresses the violence, so the woman of the +earth has become, ever and always, the expression of corruption and +deceit, as here spoken of by our preacher, "her heart snares and nets; +her hands as bands." +</P> + +<P> +But further in his search for wisdom, the Preacher has found but few +indeed who would or could accompany him in his path. A man here and +there, one in a thousand, would be his companion, but no single woman. +This statement strongly evidences that the gospel is outside his +sphere; the new creation is beyond his ken. He takes into no account +the sovereign grace of God, that in itself can again restore, and more +than restore, all to their normal conditions, and make the weaker +vessel fully as much a vessel unto honor as the stronger, giving her a +wide and blessed sphere of activity; in which love—the divine nature +within—may find its happy exercise and rest. Naturally, and apart +from this grace, the woman does not give herself to the same exercise +of mind as does the man. +</P> + +<P> +But then, is it thus that man came from his Maker's hands? Has He, who +stamped His own perfection on all His works, permitted an awful hideous +exception in the moral nature of man? Does human reason admit such a +possible incongruity? No, indeed. Folly may claim license for its +lusts in the plea of a nature received from a Creator. Haughty pride, +on the other hand, may deny that nature altogether. The clearer, +nobler, truer, philosophy of our writer justifies God, even in view of +all the evil that makes him groan, and he says, "Lo, this only have I +found, that God hath made man upright, but they have sought out many +inventions." +</P> + +<P> +Interesting as well as beautiful it is to hear this conclusion of man's +reason, not at all in view of the exceeding riches of God's grace, but +simply looking at <I>facts</I>, in the light that Nature gives. Man neither +is, nor can be, an exception to the rule. God has made him upright. +If not so now, it is because he has departed from this state, and his +many inventions, or <I>arts</I> (as Luther translates the word +significantly), his devices, his search after new things (but the word +"inventions" expresses the thought of the original correctly), are so +many proofs of dissatisfaction and unrest. +</P> + +<P> +He may, in that pride, which turns everything to its own glory, point +to these very inventions as evidences of his progress; and in a certain +way they do unquestionably speak his intelligence and immense +superiority over the lower creation. Yet the very invention bespeaks +need; for most truthful is the proverb, "Necessity is the mother of +invention"; and surely in the way of Nature <I>necessity</I> is not a glory, +but a shame. Let him glory in his inventions, then; and his glory is +in his shame. Adam in his Eden of delights, upright, content, thought +never of invention. He took from God's hand what God gave, with no +need to make calls upon his own ingenuity to supply his longings. The +fall introduces the inventive faculty, and human ingenuity begins to +work to overcome the need, of which now, for the first time, man +becomes aware; but we hear no singing in connection with that first +invention of the apron of fig-leaves. That faculty has marked his path +throughout the centuries. Not always at one level, or ever moving in +one direction,—it has risen and fallen, with flow and ebb, as the +tides; now surging upward with skillful "artifice in brass and iron," +and to the music of "harp and organ," until it aims at heaven itself, +and the Lord again and again interposes and abases by flood and +scattering,—now ebbing, till apparently extinct in the low-sunken +tribes of earth. Its activity is the accompaniment usually of the +light that God gives, and which man takes, and turns to his own +boasting, with no recognition of the Giver, calling it "civilization." +The Lord's saints are not, for the most part, to be found amongst the +line of inventors. The seed of Cain, and not the seed of Seth, +produces them. The former make the earth their home, and naturally +seek to beautify it, and make it comfortable. The latter, with deepest +soul-thirst, quenched by rills of living water springing not here; with +heart-longings satisfied by an infinite, tender, divine Love, pass +through the earth strangers and pilgrims, to the Rest of God. +</P> + +<P> +Let us glance forward a little. The Church is not found on earth; but +the earth still is the scene of man's invention; and with that +surpassing boast "opposing and exalting himself above all that is +called God, or is worshiped; so that he sitteth in the temple of God +showing himself that he is God," he heads up his wickedness and +ingenuity together, in calling down fire from heaven and in making "the +image of the beast to breathe." (Rev. xiii. 14, 15.) 'Tis his last +crowning effort,—his day is over,—and the flood and the scattering of +old shall have their awful antitype in an eternal judgment and +everlasting abasing. +</P> + +<P> +But the heavenly saints have been caught up to their home. Is there +invention there? Does human ingenuity still work? How can it, if +every heart is fully satisfied, and nothing can be improved? But then +is all at one dead level? No, surely; for "discovery" shall abide when +"invention" has vanished away,—constant, never-ceasing "discovery." +The unfoldings, hour by hour, and age by age, of a Beauty that is +infinite and inexhaustible,—the tasting a new and entrancing +perfection in a Love in which every moment shows some fresh attraction, +some new sweet compulsion to praise! +</P> + +<P> +Discovery is already "ours," my reader—not invention; and each day, +each hour, each moment, may be fruitful in discovery. Every difficulty +met in the day's walk may prove but its handmaid; every trial in the +day's path serve but to bring out new and happy discoveries. Nay, even +grief and sorrow shall have their sweet discoveries, and open up to +sight fountains of water hitherto altogether unknown, as with the +outcast Egyptian mother in the wilderness of Paran, till we learn to +glory in what hitherto was our sorrow, and to welcome infirmities and +ignorance, for they show us a spring of infinite Strength and a +fountain of unfathomable Wisdom, that eternal Love puts at our service! +Oh, to grow in Faith's Discoveries! +</P> + +<P> +Philip had a grand opportunity for "discovery," in the sixth of John; +but, poor man, he lost it; for he fell back on creature resources, or, +in other words, "Invention." Brought face to face with difficulty, how +good it would have been for him to have said, "Lord Jesus, I am empty +of wisdom, nor have I any resources to meet this need; but my heart +rests in Thee: I joy in this fresh opportunity for Thee to display Thy +glory, for thou knowest what Thou wilt do." Oh, foolish Philip, to +talk of every one having a <I>little</I>, in that Presence of infinite Love, +infinite Power. Do I thus blame him? Then let this day see me looking +upward at every difficulty, and saying "Lord, Thou knowest what Thou +wilt do." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The morning breaks, my heart awakes,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And many thoughts come crowding o'er me,—</SPAN><BR> +What hopes or fears, what smiles or tears<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Are waiting in that path before me?</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Am I to roam afar from home,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">By Babel's streams, in gloom despondent?</SPAN><BR> +On sorrow's tree must my harp be<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To grief's sad gusts alone respondent?</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +The mists hang dank, on front and flank,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">My straining eye can naught discover;</SPAN><BR> +But well I know that many a foe<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Around that narrow path doth hover.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Nor this alone would make me groan,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Alas, a traitor dwells within me;</SPAN><BR> +With hollow smile and heart of guile<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">The world without, too, plots to win me.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Thus I'm beset with foes, and yet<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">I would not miss a single danger:</SPAN><BR> +Each foe's a friend that makes me wend<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">My homeward way,—on earth a stranger.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +For never haze dims <I>upward</I> gaze,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Oh, glorious sight! for there above me</SPAN><BR> +Upon God's throne there sitteth One<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Who died to save—who lives to love me!</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +And like the dew each dayspring new<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">That tender love shall onward lead me:</SPAN><BR> +My thirst shall slake, yet thirst awake<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Till every breath shall pant:—"I need Thee."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +No wisdom give; I'd rather live<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">In conscious lack dependent on Thee:</SPAN><BR> +Each parting way I meet this day<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Then proves my claim to call upon Thee.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +No strength I ask, for Thine the task<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">To bear Thine own on Shepherd-shoulder.</SPAN><BR> +Then Faith may boast when helpless most,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And greater need make weakness bolder.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Then Lord, thy breast is, too, my rest;<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And there, as in my home, I'm hidden,—</SPAN><BR> +Where quiet peace makes groanings cease,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And Zion's songs gush forth unbidden.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Yes, e'en on earth may song have birth,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">And music rise o'er Nature's groanings,—</SPAN><BR> +Whilst Hope new born each springing morn<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Dispel with joy my faithless moanings.</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap08"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER VIII. +</H3> + +<P> +Still continues the praise of "wisdom." For if, as the last verses of +the previous chapters have shown, there be but very few that walk in +her paths, she necessarily lifts those few far above the thoughtless +mass of men; placing her distinguishing touch even on the features of +her disciples, lighting them up with intelligence, and taking away the +rudeness and pride that may be natural to them. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Man's wisdom lighteth up his face—its aspect stern is changed." +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +If this, then, the result, listen to her counsels: "Honor the king," +nor be connected with any conspiracy against him. It is true that +authorities are as much "out of joint" as everything else under the +sun; and instead of being practically "ministers of God for good," are +but too often causes of further misery upon poor man; yet wisdom +teaches to wait and watch. Everything has a time and season; and +instead of seeking to put matters right by conspiracy, await the turn +of the wheel; for this is most sure, that nothing is absolutely +permanent here—the evil of a tyrant's life any more than good. His +power shall not release him from paying the debt of nature; it helps +him not to retain his spirit. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +This too I saw,—'twas when I gave my heart<BR> +To every work that's done beneath the sun,—<BR> +That there's a time when man rules over man to his own hurt.<BR> +'Twas when I saw the wicked dead interred,<BR> +And to and from the holy place (men) came and went.<BR> +Then straight were they forgotten in the city of their deeds.<BR> +Ah, this was vanity!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Thus our Preacher describes the end of the tyrant. Death ends his +tyranny, as it does, for the time being at least, the misery of those +who were under it. Men follow him to his burial, to the holy place, +return to their usual avocations—all is over and forgotten. The +splendor and power of monarchy now show their hollowness and vanity by +so quickly disappearing, and even their memory vanishing, at the touch +of death. And yet this retributive end is by no means speedy in every +case. Sentence is often deferred, and the delay emboldens the heart of +man to further wickedness. Still, he says, "I counsel to fear God, +irrespective of present appearances. I am assured this is the better +part: fear God, and, soon or late, the end will justify thy choice." +</P> + +<P> +Beautiful and interesting it is thus to see man's unaided reason, his +own intelligence, carrying him to this conclusion: that there is +nothing better than to "fear God;" and surely this approves itself to +any intelligence. He has impressed the proofs of His glorious Being on +every side of His creature, man. "Day unto day uttereth speech;" and +the Sun, that rejoiceth as a strong man to run his race, voices aloud, +in his wondrous adaptations to the needs of this creation on which he +shines, His Being—His eternal power and godhead. Not only light but +warmth he brings, for "there is nothing hid from the heat thereof," and +in this twofold benevolence testifies again to his Creator, who is Love +and Light. Further, wherever he shines he manifests infinite +testimonies to the same truth. From the tiny insect that balances or +disports itself with the joy of life in his beams, to the grandeur of +the everlasting hills, or the majesty of the broad flood of +ocean—all—all—with no dissentient, discordant voice, proclaim His +being and utter His creative glory. Nor does darkness necessarily veil +that glory: moon and stars take up the grand and holy strain; and what +man can look at all—have all these witnesses reiterating day and +night, with ever-fresh testimonies every season, the same refrain, +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"The Hand that made us is divine,"<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +and yet say, even in His heart, "There is no God!" Surely all reason, +all wisdom, human or divine, says "Fool!" to such. +</P> + +<P> +Thus, step by step, human wisdom treads on, and, as here, in her most +worthy representative, "the king," concludes that it is most reasonable +to give that glorious Creator the reverence due, and to "fear" Him. +</P> + +<P> +But soon, very soon, poor reason has to stop, confounded. Something +has come into the scene that throws her all astray: verse 14— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"'Tis vanity, what's done upon the earth; for so it is,<BR> +That there are righteous to whom it haps as to the vile;<BR> +And sinners, too, whose lot is like the doings of the just.<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 2em">For surely this is vanity, I said."</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Yes, man's soul must be, if left to the light of nature, like that +nature itself. If the sky be ever and always cloudless, then may a +calm and unbroken faith be expected, when based on things seen. But it +is not so. Storm and cloud again and again darken the light of nature, +whether that light be physical or moral; and under these storms and +clouds reason is swayed from her highest and best conclusions; and the +contradictions without, are faithfully reflected within the soul. +</P> + +<P> +"And so I commended mirth, because a man hath no better thing under the +sun, than to eat, and to drink, and to be merry: for that shall abide +with him of his labor the days of his life, which God giveth him under +the sun." Here we get the heralds of a storm indeed. They are the +first big drops that bespeak the coming flood that shall sweep our +writer from all reason's moorings; the play of a lightning that shall +blind man's wisdom to its own light; the sigh of a wind that soon shall +develop into a very blast of despair. +</P> + +<P> +What a contradiction to the previous sober conclusion, "It shall be +well with them that fear God"! Now, seeing that there is no apparent +justice in the allotment of happiness here, and the fear of God is +often followed by sorrow, while the lawless as often have the easy +lot,—looking on this scene, I say, "Eat, drink, and be merry;" get +what good you can out of life itself; for all is one inextricable +confusion. +</P> + +<P> +Oh, this awful tangle of providences! Everything is wrong! All is in +confusion! There is law everywhere, and yet law-breaking everywhere. +How is it? Why is it? Is not God the source of order and harmony? +Whence, then, the discord? Is it all His retributive justice against +sin? Why, then, the thoroughly unequal allotment? Here is a man born +blind. Surely this cannot be because he sinned before his birth! But, +then, is it on account of his parents' sinning? Why, then, do the +guilty go comparatively free, and the guiltless suffer? Sin, surely, +is the only cause of the infliction. So the disciples of old, brought +face to face with exactly this same riddle, the same mystery, ask, +"Master, who did sin—this man, or his parents, that he was born +blind?" "Neither." Another—higher, happier, more glorious reason, +Jesus gives: "Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that +the works of God should be made manifest in him." So the afflicted +parents weep over their sightless babe; so they nurse him through his +helpless, darkened childhood, or guide him through his lonely youth, +their hearts sorely tempted surely to rebel against the providence that +has robbed their offspring of the light of heaven. Neighbors, too, can +give but little comfort here. Why was he born blind? Who did <I>the +sin</I> that brought this evident punishment? +</P> + +<P> +Oh wait, sorrowing parents! wait, foolish friends! One is even now on +His glorious way who shall with a word unravel the mystery, ease your +troubled hearts, quell each rebellious motion, till ye only sorrow that +ever a disloyal thought of the God of Love and Light has been +permitted; and, whilst overwhelming you with blessing, answer every +question your hearts—nay, even your intelligences—could ask. +</P> + +<P> +Oh wait, my beloved readers, wait! We, too, look on a world still all +in confusion. Nay, ourselves suffer with many an afflictive stroke, +whose cause, too, seems hidden from us, and to contradict the very +character of the God we know. One only is worthy to unlock this, as +every other, sealed book—wait! He must make Himself known; <I>and, +apart from things being wrong, this were impossible</I>. "The works of +God must be made manifest." Precious thought! Blessed words! +Sightless eyes are allowed for a little season, that He—God—may +manifest <I>His</I> work in giving them light—accompanied by an everlasting +light that knows no dimming. Tears may fall in time, that God's gentle +and tender touch may dry them, and that for ever and ever. Nay, Death +himself, with all his awful powers shall be made to serve the same end, +and, a captive foe, be compelled to utter forth His glory. Lazarus is +suffering, and the sisters are torn with anxiety; but the Lord abides +"two days still in the same place where he" is. Death is allowed to +have his way for a little space—nay, grasp his victim, and shadow with +his dark wing the home that Jesus loves; and still He moves not. +Strange, mysterious patience! Does He not care? Is He calmly +indifferent to the anguish in that far-off cottage? Has He forgotten +to be gracious? or, most agonizing question of all, Has some inmate of +that home sinned, and chilled thus His love? How questions throng at +such a time! But—patience! All shall be answered, every question +settled—every one; and the glorious end shall fully, perfectly justify +His "waiting." +</P> + +<P> +Let Death have his way. The power and dignity of his Conqueror will +not permit Him to hasten. For haste would bespeak anxiety as to the +result; and that result is in no sense doubtful. The body of the +brother shall even see corruption, and begin to crumble into dust, +under the firm and crushing hand of Death. Many a tear shall the +sisters shed, and poor human sympathy tell out its helplessness. But +the Victor comes! In the calm of assured victory He comes. And the +"express image of the substance" of the Living God stands face to face +as Man with our awful foe, Death. And lo, He speaks but a +word—"Lazarus, come forth!"—and the glory of God shines forth with +exceeding brightness and beauty! Oh, joyous scene! oh, bright figure +of that morn, so soon approaching, when once again that blessed Voice +shall lift itself up in a "shout," that shall be heard, not in one, but +in every tomb of His people, and once more the glory of God shall so +shine in the ranks upon ranks of those myriads, that all shall again +fully justify His "waiting"! +</P> + +<P> +It was indeed a blessed light that shone into the grave of Lazarus. +Such was its glory, that our spirits may quietly rest forever; for we +see our Lord and Eternal Lover is Conqueror and Lord of Death. Nor +need we ask, with our modern poet, who sings sweetly, but too much in +the spirit of Ecclesiastes, +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Where wert thou, brother, those four days?<BR> +There lives no record of reply,<BR> +Which, telling what it is to die,<BR> +Had surely added praise to praise.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +The resurrection of Lazarus does tell us what it is +</P> + +<P> +for His redeemed to die. It tells that it is but a sleep for the body, +till He come to awaken it,—that those who thus sleep are not beyond +His power, and that a glorious resurrection shall soon "add praise to +praise" indeed. +</P> + +<P> +But do not these blessed words give us a hint, at least, of the answer +to that most perplexing of all questions, Why was evil ever permitted +to disturb the harmony and mar the beauty of God's primal creation, +defile heaven itself, fill earth with corruption and violence, and +still exist even in eternity? Ah, we tread on ground here where we +need to be completely self-distrustful, and to cleave with absolute +confidence and dependence to the revelation of Himself! +</P> + +<P> +The works of God must be manifested; and He is Light and Love, and +nothing but Light and Love. Every work of His, then, must speak the +source whence it comes, and be an expression of Light or Love; and the +end, when He shall again—finding everything very good—rest from His +work to enjoy that eternal sabbath, never to be broken, shall shew +forth absolutely in heaven, in earth, and in hell, that He is Light and +Love, and nothing but that. +</P> + +<P> +Light and Love!—blending, harmonizing, in perfect equal manifestation, +in the cross of the Lord Jesus, and—Light now approving Love's +activity—in the righteous eternal redemption of all who believe on +Him; banishing from the new creation every trace of sin, and its +companion, sorrow; whilst the Lake of Fire itself shall prove the +necessity of its own existence to display that same nature of God, and +naught else—Love then approving the activity of Light, as we may say. +</P> + +<P> +As Isaiah shows, in the millennial earth, in those +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Scenes surpassing fable, and yet true—<BR> +Scenes of accomplished bliss"—<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +there is still sorrowful necessity for an everlasting memorial of His +righteousness in "the carcases of those men that have transgressed +against me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be +quenched; and (mark well the <I>sympathies</I> of that scene) they shall be +an abhorring to all flesh." Love rejected, mercy neglected, truth +despised, or held in unrighteousness, grace slighted,—nothing is left +whereby the finally impenitent can justify their creation except in +being everlasting testimonies to that side of God's nature, "Light," +whilst "Love," and all who are in harmony therewith, unfeignedly +<I>approve</I>. All shall be right. None shall then be perplexed because +"there be just men, unto whom it happeneth according to the work of the +wicked; again, there be wicked men to whom it happeneth according to +the work of the righteous." All shall be absolutely right. No whisper +shall be heard, even in hell itself, of the charges that men so boldly +and blasphemously cast at His holy name now. +</P> + +<P> +God is all in all. His works are manifested; and whilst it is His +strange work, yet Judgment <I>is</I> His work, as every age in Time has +shown; as the Eternal age, too, shall show—in time, this judgment is +necessarily temporal; in eternity, where character, as all else, is +fixed, it must as necessarily be <I>eternal</I>! +</P> + +<P> +Solemn, and perhaps unwelcome, but wholesome theme! We live in a time +peculiarly characterized by a lack of reverence for <I>all</I> authority. +It is the spirit of the times, and against that spirit the saint must +ever watch and guard himself by meditation on these solemn truths. +Fear is a godly sentiment, a just emotion, in view of the holy +character of our God. "I will forewarn whom ye shall fear," said the +Lord Jesus: "Fear him which, after he hath killed, hath power to cast +into hell; yea, I say unto you, fear him." The first Christians, +walking in <I>the fear of the Lord</I> as well as the comfort of the Holy +Ghost, were multiplied; and when Annanias and Sapphira fell under God's +judgment, great <I>fear</I> came on all the <I>church</I>; whilst apostasy is +marked by men feeding, themselves without fear. +</P> + +<P> +All shall be "<I>right</I>." It is the wrong and disorder and unrighteous +allotment prevailing here that caused the groans of our writer. Let us +listen to them. Their doleful, despairing sound shall again add +sweeter tone to the lovely music of God's revelation, speaking, as it +does, of One who solves every mystery, answers every question, heals +every hurt; yea, snatches His own from the very grasp of Death; for all +is <I>right</I>, for all is <I>light</I>, where Jesus is, and He is coming. +Patience! Wait! +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER IX. +</H3> + +<P> +The last two verses of Chapter VIII. connect with the opening words of +this chapter. The more Ecclesiastes applies every faculty he has to +solve the riddle under the sun, robbing himself of sleep and laboring +with strong energy and will, he becomes only the more aware that that +solution is altogether impossible. The contradictions of nature baffle +the wisdom of nature. There is no assured sequence, he reiterates, +between righteousness and happiness on the one hand, and sin and misery +on the other. The whole confusion is in the sovereign hand of God, and +the righteous and the wise must just leave the matter there, for "no +man knoweth either love or hatred by all that is before them." What +discrimination is there here? Do not all things happen alike to all? +Yes, further, does not Time, unchecked by any higher power, sweep all +relentlessly to one common end? Love cannot be inferred from the "end" +of the righteous, nor hatred from the "end" of the sinner; for it is +one and the same death that stops the course of each. Oh, this is +indeed an "evil under the sun." +</P> + +<P> +Darker and darker the cloud settles over his spirit; denser and still +more dense the fogs of helpless ignorance and perplexity enwrap his +intelligence. For, worse still, do men recognize, and live at all +reasonably in view of, that common mortality? Alas, madness is in +their hearts while they live, and after that they go to the dead; and +then all hope for them, as far as can be seen, is over forever. Dead! +What does that mean? It means that every faculty, as far as can be +seen, is stilled forever. The dead lion, whose majesty and strength, +while living, would have even now struck me with awe, is less +formidable as it lies there than a living dog. So with the dead among +men: their hatred is no more to be feared, for it can harm nothing; +their love is no more to be valued, for it can profit nothing; their +zeal and energy are no more to be accounted of, for they can effect +nothing; yea, all has come to an end forever under the sun. Oh, the +awfulness of this darkness! "Then I will give," continues +Ecclesiastes, "counsel for this vain life in conformity with the dense +gloom of its close. Listen! Go eat with joy thy bread, and merrily +drink thy wine; let never shade of sorrow mar thy short-lived pleasure; +let no mourning on thy dress be seen, nor to thy head be oil of +gladness lacking; merrily live with her whom thy affection has chosen +as thy life-companion, and trouble not thyself as to God's acceptance +of thy works—that has been settled long ago; nor let a sensitive +conscience disturb thee: whatsoever is in thy power to do, that do, +without scruple or question;[<A NAME="chap09fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap09fn1">1</A>] for soon, but too soon, these days of +thy vanity will close, and in the grave, whither thou surely goest, all +opportunities for activity, of whatever character, are over, and +that—<I>forever</I>!" +</P> + +<P> +Strange counsel this, for sober and wise Ecclesiastes to give, is it +not? Much has it puzzled many a commentator. Luther boldly says it is +sober Christian advice, meant even now to be literally accepted, "lest +you become like the monks, who would not have one look even at the +sun." Hard labor indeed, however, is it to force it thus into harmony +with the general tenor of God's word. +</P> + +<P> +But is not the counsel good and reasonable enough under certain +conditions? And are not those conditions and premises clearly laid +down for us in the context here? It is as if a whirlwind of awful +perplexities had swept the writer with irresistible force away from his +moorings,—a black cloud filled with the terrors of darkness and death +sweeps over his being, and out of the black and terrible storm he +speaks—"Man has but an hour to enjoy here, and I know nothing as to +what comes after, except that death, impenetrable death, ends every +generation of men, throws down to the dust the good, the righteous, the +sober, as well as the lawless, the false, and the profligate; ends in a +moment all thought, knowledge, love, and hatred;—then since I know +nothing beyond this vain life, I can only say, Have thy fling;—short, +short thy life will be, and vain thou wilt find this short life; so get +thy fill of pleasure here, for thou goest, and none can help thee, to +where all activities cease, and love and hatred end forever." +</P> + +<P> +This, we may say, based on these premises, and excluding all other, is +reasonable counsel. Does not our own apostle Paul confirm it? Does he +not say, if this life be all, this life of vanity under the sun, then +let us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die? Yea, we who have turned +aside from this path of present pleasures are of all men most +miserable, if this vain life be all. +</P> + +<P> +And are we to expect poor unaided human wisdom to face these awful +problems of infinite depth without finding the strongest evidence of +its utter incapacity and helplessness? Like a feather in the blast, +our kingly and wise preacher (beyond whom none can ever go) is whirled, +for the time being, from his soberness, and, in sorrow akin to despair, +gives counsel that is in itself revolting to all soberness and wisdom. +Nothing could so powerfully speak the awful chaos of his soul; +and—mark it well—<I>in that same awful chaos</I> would you and I be at any +moment, my reader, if we thought at all, but for one inestimably +precious fact. Black like unto the outer darkness is the storm-cloud +we are looking at, and the wild, despairing, yet sad counsel, to "live +merrily" is in strict harmony with the wild, awful darkness, like the +sea-gull's scream in the tempest. +</P> + +<P> +Let us review a little the path of reasoning that has led our author to +where he is; only we will walk it joyfully in the light of God. +</P> + +<P> +"No man knoweth love or hatred by all that is before him." We have +looked upon a scene where a holy Victim—infinitely holy—bowed His +head under the weight of a judgment that could not be measured. It was +but a little while, and the very heavens could not contain themselves +with delight at His perfect beauty, His perfect obedience; but again, +and yet again, were they opened to express the pleasure of the Highest +in this lowly Man. Now, not only are they closed in silence, but a +horror seems to enwrap all creation. The sun, obscured by no +earth-born cloud, gives out no spark nor ray of light; and in that +solemn darkness every voice is strangely hushed. From nine till noon +the air was filled with revilings and reproaches—all leveled at the +one sinless Sufferer; but now, for three hours, these have been +absolutely silent, till at last one cry of agony breaks the stillness; +and it is from Him who "was oppressed and afflicted, yet opened not His +mouth; was brought as a lamb to the slaughter; and as a sheep before +her shearer is dumb, so opened He not His mouth:"—"Eli, Eli, lama +sabachthani"—"My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me!" +</P> + +<P> +There, my beloved readers, look there! Let that cross be before us, +and then say, "No man knoweth love or hatred by all that is before +them." Are not both revealed there as never before? Hatred! What +caused the blessed God thus to change His attitude towards the One who +so delighted Him that the heavens burst open, as it were, under the +weight of that delight? There is but one answer to that question. +<I>Sin</I>. Sin was there on that holiest Sufferer—mine, yours, my reader. +And God's great hatred of sin is fully revealed there. I know "hatred" +when I see God looking at my sin on His infinitely holy, infinitely +precious, infinitely beloved Son. * * * * +</P> + +<P> +Let us meditate upon, without multiplying words over this solemn theme, +and turn to the Love that burns, too, so brightly there. Who can +measure the infinity of love to us when, in order that that love might +have its way unhindered, God forsakes the One who, for all the +countless ages of the eternal past, had afforded Him perfect "daily" +delight, was ever in His bosom—the only one in that wide creation who +could satisfy or respond, in the communion of equality, to His +affections—and turns away from Him; nay, "it pleased the Lord to +bruise Him"; "He hath put Him to grief." Ponder these words; and in +view of who that crucified Victim was, and His relationship with God, +measure, if you can, the love displayed there, the love in that one +short word "so"—"God <I>so</I> loved the world that He gave His only +begotten Son;"—then, whilst viewing the cross, hear, coming down to us +from the lips of the wise king, "No man knoweth love or hatred." Hush! +Ecclesiastes, hush! Breathe no such word in such a scene as this. +Pardonable it were in that day, when you looked only at the disjointed +chaos and tangle under the sun; but looking at that cross, it were the +most heinous sin, the most unpardonable disloyalty and treason, to say +now, "No man knoweth love." Rather, adoringly, will we say, "In this +was manifested the love of God toward us, because that God sent His +only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. +Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent +His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. And <I>we have known and +believed the love that God has to us</I>." +</P> + +<P> +Yea, now let "all things come alike to all:"—that tender Love shall +shed its light over this stormy scene, and enable the one that keeps +<I>it</I> before him to walk the troubled waters of this life in quiet +assurance and safety. Death still may play sad havoc with the most +sensitive of affections; but that Love shall, as we have before seen, +permit us to weep tears; but not bitter despairing tears. Further, it +sheds over the spirit the glorious light of a coming Day, and we look +forward, not to an awful impending gloom, but to a pathway of real +light, that pierces into eternity. The Day! We are of the Day! The +darkness passes, the true light already shines! Then listen, my +fellow-pilgrims, to the <I>Spirit's</I> counsel: "But ye, brethren, are not +in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. Ye are all +the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the +night, nor of darkness. Therefore, <I>let us not sleep</I>, as do others, +but <I>let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep, sleep in the +night; and they that are drunken, are drunken in the night. But let us +who are of the Day be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and +love, and for an helmet the hope of salvation</I>." +</P> + +<P> +Our poor preacher, in the darkness of the cloud of death, counsels, +"merrily drink thy wine." And not amiss, with such an outlook, is such +advice. In the perfect Light of Revelation, lighting up present and a +future eternity, well may we expect counsel as differing from this as +the light in which it is given differs from the darkness. <I>"The night +is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works +of darkness, and let us put on the armor of light. Let us walk +honestly, as in the Day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in +chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envy. But put on the Lord +Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to fulfill the lusts +thereof</I>." <I>Amen and Amen</I>. +</P> + +<P> +But once again our Preacher turns; and now he sees that it is not +assuredly possible for the advice he has given to be followed, and that +even in this life neither work, device, knowledge, nor wisdom, are +effective in obtaining good or in shielding their possessor from life's +vicissitudes. The swift—does he always win the race? Are there no +contingencies that more than counterbalance his swiftness? A slip, a +fall, a turned muscle, and—the race is not to the swift. The +strong—is he necessarily conqueror in the fight? Many an unforeseen +and uncontrollable event has turned the tide of battle and surprised +the world, till the "fortune of war" has passed into a proverb. The +skillful may not be able at all times to secure even the necessaries of +life; nor does abundance invariably accompany greater wisdom, whilst no +amount of intelligence can secure constant and abiding good.[<A NAME="chap09fn2text"></A><A HREF="#chap09fn2">2</A>] +</P> + +<P> +Time and doom hap alike to all, irrespective of man's purposes or +proposings, and no man knows what his hap shall be, since no skill of +any kind can avail to guide through the voyage of life without +encountering its storms. From the unlooked-for quarter, too, do those +storms burst on us. As the fishes suspect no danger till in the net +they are taken, and as the birds fear nothing till ensnared, so we poor +children of Adam, when our "evil time" comes round, are snared without +warning. +</P> + +<P> +Absolutely true this is, if life be regarded solely by such light as +human wisdom gives: "Time and doom happen alike to all." The whole +scene is like one vast, confused machine, amongst whose intricate +wheels, that revolve with an irregularity that defies foresight, poor +man is cast at his birth; and ever and anon, when he least expects it, +he comes between these wheels; and then he is crushed by some "evil," +which may make an end of him altogether or leave him for further +sorrows. All things seem to work confusedly for evil, and this caps +the climax of Ecclesiastes's misery. +</P> + +<P> +Here is the sequence of his reasoning: +</P> + +<P> +Firstly, There is no righteous allotment upon earth; the righteous +suffer here, whilst the unjust escape. Nay, +</P> + +<P> +Secondly, There is an absolute lack of all discrimination in the death +that ends all; and, +</P> + +<P> +Thirdly, So complete is that end, bringing all so exactly to one dead +level, without the slightest difference; and so impenetrable is the +tomb to which all go, that I counsel, in my despair, "Eat, drink, and +be merry, irrespective of any future." +</P> + +<P> +Fourthly, But, alas! that, too, is impossible; for no "work, nor +device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom," can assure freedom from the evil +doom that haps, soon or late, to all. +</P> + +<P> +Intensified misery! awful darkness indeed! And our own souls tremble +as we stand with Ecclesiastes under its shadow and respond to his +groanings. For the same scene still spreads itself before us as before +him. Mixed with the mad laughter and song of fools is the continued +groan of sorrow, pain, and suffering, that still tells of "time and +doom." +</P> + +<P> +A striking instance of this comes to my hand even as I write; and since +its pathetic sadness makes it stand out even from the sorrows of this +sad world, I would take it as a direct illustration of Ecclesiastes's +groan. At Nyack on the Hudson a Christian family retire to rest after +the happy services of last Lord's Day, the 21st of October—an unbroken +circle of seven children, with their parents. Early on the following +morning, before it is light, a fire is raging in the house, and four of +the little children are consumed in the conflagration. The account +concludes: "The funeral took place at eleven o'clock to-day." That is, +in a little more than twelve hours after retiring to sleep, four of the +members of that family circle were in their graves! Here is an "evil +time" that has fallen suddenly indeed; and the sad and awful incident +enables us to realize just what our writer felt as he penned the words. +With one stroke, in one moment, four children, who have had for years +their parents' daily thought and care, meet an awful doom, and all that +those parents themselves have believed receives a blow whose force it +is hard to measure. Now listen, as the heathen cry, "Where is now +their God?" Why was not His shield thrown about them? Had he not the +power to warn the sleeping household of the impending danger? Is He so +bound by some law of His own making as to forbid his interfering with +its working? Worse still, was He indifferent to the awful catastrophe +that was about to crush the joy out of that family circle? If His was +the power, was His love lacking? +</P> + +<P> +Oh, awful questions when no answer can be given to them;—and nature +gives no answer. She is absolutely silent. No human wisdom, even +though it be his who was gifted "with a wise and understanding heart, +so that none was like him before him, neither after him should any +arise like unto him," could give any answer to questions like these. +And think you, my reader, that nature does not cry out for comfort, and +feel about for light at such a time? Nor that the enemy of our souls +is not quick in his malignant activity to suggest all kinds of awful +doubt? Every form of darkness and unbelief is alive to seize such +incidents, and make them the texts on which they may level their +attacks against the Christian's God. +</P> + +<P> +But is there really no eye to pity?—no heart to love?—no arm to save? +Are men really subject to blind law—"time and doom"? +</P> + +<P> +Hark, my reader, and turn once more to that sweetest music that ever +broke on distracted reason's ear. It comes not to charm with a false +hope, but with the full authority of God. None but His Son who had +lain so long in His Father's bosom that He knew its blessed heart-beats +thoroughly, could speak such words—"Are not five sparrows sold for two +farthings." Here are poor worthless things indeed that may be truly +called creatures of chance. "Time and doom" must surely "hap" to +these. Indeed no; "not one of them is forgotten before God." Ponder +every precious word in simple faith. God's <I>memory</I> bears upon it the +lot of every worthless sparrow; it may "fall to the ground," but not +without Him. He controls their destiny and is interested in their very +flight. If it be so with the sparrow, that may be bought for a single +mite, shall the <I>saint</I>, who has been bought at a price infinitely +beyond all the treasures of silver and gold in the universe, even at +the cost of the precious blood of His dear Son,—shall <I>he</I> be subject +to "time and doom"? Shall his lot not be shaped by infinite love and +wisdom? Yes, verily. Even the very hairs of his head are all +numbered. No joy, no happiness, no disappointment, no perplexity, no +sorrow, so infinitesimally small (let alone the greatest) but that the +One who controls all worlds takes the closest interest therein, and +turns, in His love, every thing to blessing, forcing "<I>all to work +together for good</I>," and making the very storms of life obedient +servants to speed His children to their Home. +</P> + +<P> +Faith <I>alone</I> triumphs here; but faith <I>triumphs</I>; and apart from such +tests and trials, what opportunity would there be for faith <I>to</I> +triumph? May we not bless God, then, (humbly enough, for we know how +quickly we fail under trial,) that He <I>does</I> leave opportunity for +faith to be in exercise and to get victories? +</P> + +<P> +God first reveals Himself, and then says, as it were, "Now let Me see +if you have so learned what <I>I am</I> as to trust <I>Me</I> against all +circumstances, against all that you see, feel, or suffer." And what +virtue there must be in the Light of God, when so little of it is +needed to sustain His child! Even in the dim early twilight of the +dawning of divine revelation, Job, suffering under a very similar and +fully equal "evil time," could say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath +taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord:" accents sweet and +refreshing to Him who values at an unknown price the confidence of this +poor heart of man. And yet what did Job know of God? <I>He</I> had not +seen the cross. <I>He</I> had not had anything of the display of tenderest +unspeakable love that have we. It was but the <I>dawn</I>, as we may say, +of revelation; but it was enough to enable that poor grief-wrung heart +to cry, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him." Shall we, who enjoy +the very meridian of revelation light;—shall we, who have seen <I>Him +slain for us</I>, say <I>less</I>? Nay, look at the wondrous <I>possibilities</I> +of our calling, my reader,—a song, nothing but a song will do now. +Not quiet resignation only; but "strengthened with all might, according +to His glorious power, unto all patience and long-suffering with +<I>joyfulness</I>,"—and that means a song. +</P> + +<P> +How rich, how very rich, is our portion! A goodly heritage is ours. +For see what our considerations have brought out: a deep <I>need</I> +universally felt; for none escape the sorrows, trials, and afflictions, +that belong, in greater or less degree, to this life. +</P> + +<P> +The highest, truest, human wisdom can only recognize the need with a +groan, for it finds no remedy for it—time and doom hap alike to all. +</P> + +<P> +God shows Himself a little, and, lo! quiet, patience, and resignation +take the place of groaning. The need <I>is</I> met. +</P> + +<P> +God reveals His whole heart fully, and no wave of sorrow, no billow of +suffering, can extinguish the joy of His child who walks with Him. +Nay, as thousands upon thousands could testify, the darkest hour of +trial is made the sweetest with the sense of His love, and tears with +song are mingled. +</P> + +<P> +Oh, for grace to enjoy our rich portion more. +</P> + +<P> +But to return to our book. Its author rarely proceeds far along any +one line without meeting with that which compels him to return. So +here; for he adds, in verses 13 to the end of the chapter, "And yet I +have seen the very reverse of all this, when apparently an inevitable +doom, an 'evil time,' was hanging over a small community, whose +resources were altogether inadequate to meet the crisis—when no way of +escape from the impending destruction seemed possible—then, at the +moment of despair, a 'poor wise man' steps to the front (such the +quality there is in wisdom), delivers the city, comes forth from his +obscurity, shines for a moment, and, lo! the danger past, is again +forgotten, and sinks to the silence whence he came. But <I>this</I> the +incident proved to me, that where strength is vain, there wisdom shows +its excellence, even though men as a whole appreciate it so little as +to call upon it only as a last resource. For let the fools finish +their babbling, and their chief get to the end of his talking; then, in +the silence that tells the limit of their powers, the quiet voice of +wisdom is heard again, and that to effect. Thus is wisdom better even +than weapons of war, although, sensitive quality that it is, a little +folly easily taints it." +</P> + +<P> +Can we, my readers, fail to set our seal to the truth of all this? We, +too, have known something much akin to that "little city with few men," +and one Poor Man, the very embodiment of purest, perfect wisdom, who +wrought alone a full deliverance in the crisis—a deliverance in which +wisdom shone divinely bright; and yet the mass of men remember Him not. +A few, whose hearts grace has touched, may count Him the chief among +ten thousand and the altogether lovely; but the world, though it may +call itself by His name, counts other objects more worthy of its +attention, and the poor wise man is forgotten "under the sun." +</P> + +<P> +Not so above the sun. There we see the Poor One, the Carpenter's Son, +the Nazarene, the Reviled, the Smitten, the Spit-upon, the Crucified, +seated, crowned with glory and honor, at the right hand of the Majesty +in the heavens; and there, to a feeble few on earth, He sums up all +wisdom and all worth, and they journey on in the one hope of seeing Him +soon face to face, and being with Him and like Him forever. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap09fn1"></A> +<A NAME="chap09fn2"></A> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +[<A HREF="#chap09fn1text">1</A>] I believe this is distinctly the bearing of these words, and not as +in our version. +</P> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +[<A HREF="#chap09fn2text">2</A>] There seems lo be an intensive force to these words, constantly and +in each phase becoming stronger, in evident antithesis to the "work, +device, knowledge, and wisdom," that Ecclesiastes had just counseled to +use to the utmost in order to obtain "good" in this life. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap10"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER X. +</H3> + +<P> +The climax of Ecclesiastes' exercises seems to have been reached in the +previous chapter. The passionate storm is over, and now his thoughts +ripple quietly along in proverb and wise saying. It is as if he said +"I was altogether beyond my depth. Now I will confine myself only to +the present life, without touching on the things unseen, and here I can +pronounce with assurance the conclusion of wisdom, and sum up both its +advantages and yet inadequacy." +</P> + +<P> +The proverbs that follow are apparently disjointed, and yet, when +closely looked at, are all connected with this subject. He shows, in +effect, that, take any view of life, and practically wisdom has +manifold advantages. +</P> + +<P> +Ver. 1. The least ingredient of folly spoils as with the corruption of +death the greatest wisdom. (There is only One whose name is as +ointment poured forth untainted.) +</P> + +<P> +Ver. 2. The wise man's heart is where it should be. He is governed by +his understanding, (for the heart in the Old Testament is the seat of +the thought as well as of the affections, as the same word, "<I>lehv</I>," +translated "wisdom" in the next verse shows), a fool is all askew in +his own being. His heart is at his left hand. In other words, his +judgment is dethroned. +</P> + +<P> +Ver. 3. Nor can he hide what he really is for any length of time. +"The way," with its tests, soon reveals him, and he proclaims to all +his folly. +</P> + +<P> +Ver. 4. Yielding to the powers above rather than rebelling against +them, marks the path of wisdom. This may be an example of the testing +of "the way" previously spoken of, for true wisdom shines brightly out +in the presence of an angry ruler. Folly leaves its place,—a form of +expression tantamount to rebelling, and may throw some light on that +stupendous primal folly when angels "left their place," or, as Jude +writes, "kept not their first estate, but left their habitation," and +thus broke into the folly of rebelling against the Highest. For let +any leave their place, and it means necessarily confusion and disorder. +If all has been arranged according to the will and wisdom of the +Highest, he who steps out of the place assigned him rebels, and discord +takes the place of harmony. The whole of the old creation is thus in +disorder and confusion. All have "left their place." For God, the +Creator of all, has been dethroned. It is the blessed work of One we +know, once more to unite in the bonds of love and willing obedience all +things in heaven and in earth, and to bind in such way all hearts to +the throne of God, that never more shall one "leave his place." +</P> + +<P> +Vers. 5-7. But rulers themselves under the sun are not free from +folly, and this shows itself in the disorder that actually proceeds +from them. Orders and ranks are not in harmony. Folly is exalted, and +those with whom dignities accord are in lowly place. It is another +view of the present confusion, and how fully the coming of the Highest +showed it out! A stable, a manger, rejection, and the cross, were the +portion under the sun of the King of kings. That fact rights +everything even now, in one sense, to faith for the path closest to the +King must be really necessarily the <I>highest</I>, though it be in the +sight of man the lowest. Immanuel, the Son of David, walking as a +servant up and down the land that was His own—The Lord Jesus, The Son +of Man, having less than the foxes or birds of the air, not even where +to lay his head,—Christ, the Son of God, wearied with His journey, on +the well of Sychar,—this has thrown a glory about the lowly path now, +that makes all the grandeur of the great ones of the earth less than +nothing. Let the light of His path shine on this scene, and no longer +shall we count it an evil under the sun for folly and lawlessness to +have the highest place, as men speak, but rather count it greatest +honor to be worthy to suffer for His name, for we are still in the +kingdom and patience of the Lord Jesus Christ,—not the Kingdom and +Glory. That shall come soon. +</P> + +<P> +Vers. 8-10. But then, Ecclesiastes continues, is there complete +security in the humbler ranks of life? Nay, there is no occupation +that has not its accompanying danger. Digging or hedging, quarrying or +cleaving wood,—all have their peculiar difficulties. Although there, +too, wisdom is still evidently better than brute strength. +</P> + +<P> +Vers. 11 to 15 turn to the same theme of comparison of wisdom and +folly, only now with regard to the use of the tongue. The most gifted +charmer (lit. master of the tongue) is of no worth <I>after</I> the serpent +has bitten. The waters that flow commend the spring whence they issue. +Grace speaks for the wise: folly, from beginning to end, proclaims the +fool; and nowhere is that folly more manifested than in the +boastfulness of assertion as to the future. +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"Predicting words he multiplies, yet man can never know<BR> +"The thing that shall be; yea, what cometh after who shall tell?<BR> +"Vain toil of fools! It wearieth him,—this man who knoweth naught<BR> +"That may befall his going to the city."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +This seems to be exactly in line with the apostle James: "Go to now, ye +that say, To-day or to-morrow we will go into such a city, and continue +there a year, and buy, and sell, and get gain: ye who know not what +shall be on the morrow." +</P> + +<P> +Vers. 16-18. The land is blessed or cursed according to her head. A +well-marked principle in Scripture, which has evidently forced itself +on the notice of human wisdom in the person of Ecclesiastes. A city +flourishes under the wise diligence of her rulers, or goes to pieces +under their neglect and sensual revelry. For the tendency to decay is +everywhere under the sun, and no matter what the sphere,—high or low, +city or house,—constant diligence alone offsets that tendency. +</P> + +<P> +Ver. 19. The whole is greater than its part. Money can procure both +the feast and the wine; but these are not, even in our preacher's view, +the better things, but the poorer, as chapter vii. has shown us. We, +too, know that which is infinitely higher than feasts and revelry of +earth, and here money avails nothing. "Wine and milk," joy and food, +are here to be bought without money and without price. The currency of +that sphere is not corruptible gold nor silver, but the love that +gives,—sharing all it possesses. There it is love that answereth all +things:—the more excellent way, inasmuch as it covers and is the +spring of all gifts and graces. Without love, the circulating medium +of that new creation, a man is poor indeed,—is worth nothing, nay, +<I>is</I> nothing, (1 Cor. xiii.) He may have the most attractive and showy +of gifts: the lack of love makes the silver tongue naught but empty +sound,—a lack of love makes the deepest understanding naught; and +whilst he may be a very model of what the world falsely calls charity, +giving of his goods to feed the poor, and even his body to be burned, +it is love alone that gives life and substance to it all,—lacking love +it profits nothing. He who abounds most in loving, and consequent +self-emptying, is the richest there. The words of the Lord Jesus in +Luke xii. confirm this: "So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, +and is not rich toward God." The two are in direct contrast. Rich +here—laying up treasure for one's self here—<I>is</I> poverty there, and +the love that gives <I>is</I> divine riches. For he who loves most has +himself drunk deepest into the very nature of God, for God is Love, and +his heart fully satisfied with that which alone in all the universe can +ever satisfy the heart of man, filled up,—surely, therefore, +rich,—pours forth its streams of bounty and blessing according to its +ability to all about. How thoroughly the balances of the sanctuary +reverse the estimation of the world. +</P> + +<P> +But, then, how may we become rich in that true, real sense? To obtain +the money that "answereth all things" under the sun, men <I>toil</I> and +<I>plan</I>. Perhaps as the balances of the sanctuary show that selfish +accumulation here is poverty there, so the means of attaining true +riches may be, in some sort, the opposite to those prevailing for the +false—"quietness and confidence." +</P> + +<P> +The apostle, closing his beautiful description of charity, says: +"Follow after charity." Ponder its value—meditate on its +beauties—till your heart becomes fascinated, and you press with +longing toward it. But as it is difficult to be occupied with "Love" +in the abstract, can we find anywhere an embodiment of love? A person +who illustrates it in its perfection, in whose character every glorious +mark that the apostle depicts in this 13th chapter of Corinthians is +shown in perfect moral beauty—yea, who is in himself the one complete +perfect expression of love. And, God be thanked, we know One such; +and, as we read the sweet and precious attributes of Love, we recognize +that the Holy Spirit has pictured every lineament of our Lord Jesus +Christ. Wouldst thou be rich, then, my soul? Follow after, occupy +thyself with, press toward, the Lord Jesus, till His beauties so +attract as to take off thy heart from every other infinitely inferior +attraction, and the kindling of His love shall warm thy heart with the +same holy flame, and thou shalt seek love's ease—love's rest—in +pouring out all thou hast in a world where need of all kinds is on +every side, and thus be "rich toward God." So may it be for the +writer, and every reader, to the praise of His grace. Amen. +</P> + +<P> +Where are we, in time, my readers? Are we left as shipwrecked sailors +upon a raft, without chart or compass, and know not whether sunken +wreck or cliff-bound coast shall next threaten us? No; a true divine +chart and compass is in our hands, and we may place our finger upon the +exact chronological latitude and longitude in which our lot is cast. +Mark the long voyage of the professing Church past the quiet waters of +Ephesus, where first love quickly cools and is lost; past the stormy +waves of persecution which drive her onward to her desired haven, in +Smyrna; caught in the dangerous eddy, and drifted to the whirlpool of +the world in Pergamos, followed by the developed Papal hierarchy in +Thyatira, with the false woman in full command of the ship; past +Sardis, with its memories of a divine recovery in the Reformation of +the sixteenth century:—Philadelphia and Laodicea alone are left; and, +with mutual contention and division largely in the place of brotherly +love, who can question but that we have reached the last stage, and +that there is every mark of Laodicea about us? This being so, mark the +word of our Lord Jesus to the present state of the professing Church: +"Thou sayest I am rich and increased with goods, and have need of +nothing, but knowest not that thou art poor, and blind, and naked, and +wretched, and miserable." Yes, in the light of God, in the eyes of the +Lord, in the judgment of the sanctuary, we live in a day of <I>poverty</I>. +It is this which characterizes the day in which our lot is cast,—a +lack of all true riches, whilst the air is filled with boastings of +wealth and attainment. +</P> + +<P> +Further, I can but believe that we whose eyes scan these lines are +peculiarly in danger here. Thyatira goes on to the very end. Sardis +is an offshoot from her. Sardis goes on to the end. Philadelphia is +an offshoot from her. Philadelphia goes on to the end, and is thus the +stock from whence the proud self-sufficiency of Laodicea springs. If +we (you and I) have shared in any way in the blessings of Philadelphia, +we share in the dangers of Laodicea. Yea, he who thinks he represents +or has the characteristics of Philadelphia, is most open to the boast +of Laodicea. Let us have to do—have holy commerce—with Him who +speaks. Buy of Him the "gold purified by the fire." But how are we to +buy? What can we give for that gold, when He says we are already poor? +A poor man is a bad buyer. Yes, under the sun, where toil and +self-dependency are the road to wealth; but above the sun quietness and +confidence prevail, and the poor man is the best—the only—buyer. +Look at that man in Mark's Gospel, chapter x., with every mark of +Laodicea upon him. <I>Blind</I>, by nature; <I>poor</I>, for he sat and <I>begged; +naked</I>, for he has thrown away his garment, and thus surely <I>pitiable, +miserable</I>, now watch him buy of the Lord. +</P> + +<P> +"What wilt thou that I should do unto thee?" +</P> + +<P> +"Lord, that I might receive my sight." +</P> + +<P> +"Go thy way; thy faith hath made thee whole." +</P> + +<P> +And the transaction is complete; the contract is settled; the buying is +over. "Immediately he received his sight, and followed Jesus in the +way." Yes; there is just one thing that that poor, naked, blind man +has, that is of highest value even in the eyes of the Lord, and that is +the quiet confidence of his poor heart. All Scripture shows that that +is what God ever seeks,—the heart of man to return and rest in Him. +It is all that we can give in the purchase, but it buys all He has. +"All things are possible to him that believeth." In having to do with +the Lord Jesus we deal with the rich One whose very joy and rest it is +to give; and it is surely easy <I>buying</I> from Him whose whole heart's +desire is to <I>give</I>. Nothing is required but need and faith to +complete the purchase. +</P> + +<P> +"Need and Faith" are our "two mites." They are to us what the two +mites were to the poor widow—all our "living," all we have. Yet, +casting them into the treasury, God counts them of far more value than +all the boasted abundance of Laodicea. They are the servants, too, +that open all doors to the Lord. They permit no barriers to keep Him +at a distance. That gracious waiting Lord then may enter, and sweet +communion follow as He sups with poor "Need and Faith"—Himself +providing all the provender for that supper-feast. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XI. +</H3> + +<P> +We are drawing near the end, and to the highest conclusions of true +human wisdom; and full of deepest interest it is to mark the character +of these conclusions. Reason speaks; that faculty that is rightly +termed divine, for its possession marks those who are "the offspring of +God." He is the Father of <I>spirits</I>, and it is in the spirit that +Reason has her seat; whilst in our Preacher she is enthroned, and now +with authority utters forth her counsels. Here we may listen to just +how far she can attain, mark with deepest interest, and indeed +admiration, the grand extent of her powers; and at the same time their +sorrowful limit,—note their happy harmony up to that limit, with her +Creator; and then, when with baffled effort and conscious helplessness, +in view of the deepest questions that ever stir the heart, she is able +to find no answer to them, and groans her exceeding bitter cry of +"Vanity," <I>then</I> to turn and listen to the grace and love of that +Creator meeting those needs and answering those questions,—this is +inexpressibly precious; and with the light thus given we must let our +spirits sing a new song, for we are nigh to God, and it is still true +that "none enter the king's gate clothed with sackcloth." Joy and +praise have their dwelling ever within those boundaries; for He +inhabiteth the praises of His people. +</P> + +<P> +In the first eight verses of our chapter we shall thus find man's +Reason running in a beautiful parallel with the divine, and yet in +marked contrast with the narrow, selfish, short-sighted policy of the +debased wisdom of this world. Their broad teaching is very clear; look +forward,—live not for the present; but instead of hoarding or laying +up for the evil day, cast thy bread—that staff of life, thy +living—boldly upon the waters, it shall not be lost. You have, in so +doing, intrusted it to the care of Him who loseth nothing; and the +future, though perhaps far off, shall give thee a full harvest for such +sowing. But, to be more explicit, give with a free hand without +carefully considering a limit to thy gifts ("a portion to seven and +also to eight" would seem to have this bearing), for who knows when, in +the future, an evil time to thee may make thee the recipient of others' +bounty. +</P> + +<P> +Can we but admire the harmony, I say again, between the voice of poor, +feeble, limited human wisdom and the perfect, absolute, limitless, +divine wisdom of New Testament revelation: +</P> + +<P> +"For I mean not that other men be eased and ye burdened; but by an +equality, that now at this time your abundance may be a supply for +their want, that their abundance also may be a supply for your want: +that there may be equality." This is very closely in the same line. +But Solomon continues: Nay, see the lessons that Nature herself would +teach (and he is no wise man, but distinctly and scripturally "a fool," +who is deaf to her teachings, blind to her symbols). The full clouds +find relief by emptying themselves on the parched earth, only to +receive those same waters again from the full ocean, after they have +fulfilled their benevolent mission; and it is a small matter to which +side, north or south, the tree may fall, it is there for the good of +whoever may need it there.[<A NAME="chap11fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap11fn1">1</A>] +</P> + +<P> +The accidental direction of the wind determines which way it falls; but +either north or south it remains for the good of man. In like manner +watch not for favorable winds; dispense on every side, north and south, +of thy abundance; nor be too solicitous as to the worthiness of the +recipients. He who waits for perfectly favorable conditions will never +sow, consequently never reap. Results are with God. It is not thy +care in sowing at exactly the right moment that gives the harvest; all +<I>that</I> is God's inscrutable work in nature, nor can man tell how those +results are attained. Life in its commencements is as completely +enshrouded in mystery now as then. No science, no human wisdom has, +or—it may be boldly added—ever can throw the slightest glimmer of +clear light upon it. Thy part is diligence in sowing, the harvest +return is God's care. "In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening +withhold not thy hand" is wisdom's counsel here, just as a higher +wisdom teaches "Preach the word: be instant in season and out of +season." +</P> + +<P> +Thus human reason and divine wisdom "keep step" together till the +former reaches its limit; and very soon, in looking forward, is that +limit reached. For listen now to her advice, consequent on the +foregoing. Therefore she says, Let not the enjoyment of the present +blind thee to the future; for alas there stands that awful mysterious +Exit from the scene that has again and again baffled the Preacher +throughout the book. And here again no science or human reason ever +has or ever can throw the faintest glimmer of clear light beyond it. +That time is still, at the end of the book, the "days of darkness." As +poor Job in the day of his trial wails: "I go whence I shall not +return, even to the land of darkness and the shadow of death; a land of +darkness as darkness itself, and of the shadow of death, without any +order, and where the light is as darkness." So Ecclesiastes says, "let +him remember the days of darkness, for they shall be many." Oh sad and +gloomy counsel! Is <I>this</I> what life is? Its bright morning ever to be +clouded,—its day to be darkened with the thoughts of its <I>end</I>? Oh +sorrowful irony to tell us to rejoice in the years of life, and yet +ever to bear in mind that those years are surely, irresistibly, +carrying us on to the many "days of darkness." Yes, this is where the +highest intellect, the acutest reason, the purest wisdom of any man at +any time has attained. But +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Where Reason fails, with all her powers,<BR> +There Faith prevails and Love adores.<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +Where the darkness by reason's light is deepest, there Love—Infinite +and Eternal—has thrown its brightest beam, and far from that time +beyond the tomb being "the days of darkness," by New Testament +revelation it is the one eternal blessed Day lit up with a Light that +never dims; yes, even sun and moon unneeded for "The glory of God +enlightens it, and the Lamb is the Light thereof." Think of a +Christian with that blessed hope of the coming of his Saviour to take +him to that well-lighted Home—His Father's House—with the sweet and +holy anticipations of seeing His own blessed Face,—once marred and +smitten for him; of never grieving Him more, of sin never again to mar +his communion with Him, of happy holy companionship for eternity with +kindred hearts and minds all tuned to the one glorious harmony of +exalting "Him that sits upon the throne and the Lamb,"—of loving Him +perfectly, of serving Him perfectly, of enjoying Him perfectly,—think +of such a Christian saying, as He looks forward to this bliss, "All +that cometh is <I>vanity</I>," and we may get some measure of the value of +the precious word of God. +</P> + +<P> +But now with a stronger blow our writer strikes the same doleful chord: +"Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth, and let thy heart cheer thee in +the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thy heart, and in the +sight of thine eyes: but know thou, that for all these things God will +bring thee into judgment." +</P> + +<P> +One would think that there could be no possible misunderstanding the +sorrowful irony of the counsel "to walk in the ways of thy heart, and +in the sight of thine eyes,"—expressions invariably used in an evil +sense (compare Num. xv. 39; Isa. lvii. 17); and yet, to be consistent +with the interpretation to similar counsel in other parts of the book, +expounders have sought to give them a <I>Christian</I> meaning, as if they +were given in the light of revelation and not in the semi-darkness of +nature. But here the concluding sentence, "know thou, that for all +these things God will bring thee into judgment," is quite unmistakable. +</P> + +<P> +But here is indeed a startling assertion. Where has our writer +learned, with such emphatic certainty, of a judgment to come? Have we +mistaken the standpoint whence our book was written? Has the writer, +after all, been listening to another Voice that has taught him what is +on the other side of the grave? Does Revelation make itself heard here +at last? Or may, perhaps, even this be in perfect harmony with all +that has gone before, and be one step further—almost the last +step—along the path that unaided (but not depraved) human Reason may +tread? In a word, does Nature herself give Reason sufficient light to +enable her, when in right exercise, to discover a judgment-seat in the +shadows of the future? +</P> + +<P> +This is surely a question of deepest—yes, thrilling—interest; and, we +are confident, must be answered in the affirmative. It is to this +point that our writer has been climbing, step by step. Nature has +taught him that the future must be looked at rather than the present; +or, rather, the present must be looked at in the light of the future; +for that future corresponds <I>in its character</I> to the present, as the +crop does to the seed, only exceeds it <I>in intensity</I> as the harvest +exceeds the grain sown. Thus bread hoarded gives no harvest; or, in +other words, he who lives for the present alone, necessarily, by the +simplest and yet strongest law of Nature, must suffer loss: <I>this is +Judgment by Nature's law</I>. This, too, is the keynote of every +verse—"the future," "the future"; and God, who is clearly discerned by +Reason as behind Nature, "which is but the name for an effect whose +Cause is God,"—God is clearly recognized as returning a harvest in the +<I>future</I>, in strict and accurate accord with the sowing of the +<I>present</I>. This is very clear. Then how simple and how certain that +if this is God's irrefragable law in Nature, it must have its +fulfillment too in the moral nature of man. It has been one of the +chief sorrows of the book that neither wrong nor confusion is righted +here, and those "days of darkness" to which <I>all</I> life tends are no +discriminative judgment, nor is there anything of the kind in a scene +where "all things come alike to all." Then surely, most surely, unless +indeed man alone sows without reaping,—alone breaks in as an exception +to this law,—a thought not consonant with reason,—there must be to +him also a harvest of reaping according to what has been sown: in other +words a <I>Judgment</I>. Although still, let us mark, our writer does not +assume to say anything as to where or when that shall be, or how +brought about, this is all uncertain and indefinite: the fact is +<I>certain</I>; and more clear will the outline of that judgment-seat stand +out, as our writer's eyes become accustomed to the new light in which +he is standing,—the fact is already certain. +</P> + +<P> +Solemn, most solemn, is this; and yet how beautiful to see a true +reason—but let us emphasize again not <I>depraved</I>, but exercising her +royal function of sovereignty over the flesh, not subject to +it—drawing such true and sure lessons from that which she sees of the +law of God in Nature. It is a <I>reasonable</I>, although in view of sin, a +fearful expectation; and with exactness is the word chosen in Acts: +Paul <I>reasoned</I> of judgment to come; and reason, with conscience, +recognized the force of the appeal, as "Felix trembled." Thus that +solemn double appointment of man: death and judgment has been discerned +by Nature's light, and counsel is given in view of each. We said that +our writer had reached the climax of his perplexities in view of death +in chap. ix. when he counseled us to "merrily drink our wine"; but now +judgment discerned, death itself even not necessarily the end, at +length soberness prevails; and with an evident solemn sincerity he +counsels "Therefore remove sorrow from thy heart, and put away evil +from thy flesh, for childhood and youth are vanity." +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap11fn1"></A> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +[<A HREF="#chap11fn1text">1</A>] The current interpretation of this clause, that it speaks of the +future state of man after death, seems hardly in keeping with the +context, and certainly not at all in keeping with the character and +scope of the book. Ecclesiastes everywhere confesses the strict +limitation of his knowledge to the present scene. This is the cause of +his deepest groanings that he cannot pierce beyond it; and it would be +entirely contrary for him here, in this single instance, to assume to +pronounce authoritatively of the nature of that place or state of which +he says he knows nothing. +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +CHAPTER XII. +</H3> + +<P> +Our last chapter concluded with the words, "For childhood and youth are +vanity": that is, childhood proves the emptiness of all "beneath the +sun," as well as old age. The heart of the child has the same +needs—the same capacity in kind—as that of the aged. <I>It needs God</I>. +Unless it knows Him, and His love is there, it is empty; and, in its +fleeting character, childhood proves its vanity. But this makes us +quite sure that if childhood can feel the need, then God has, in His +wide grace, <I>met the need</I>; nor is that early life to be debarred from +the provision that He has made for it. There are then the same +<I>possibilities</I> of filling the heart and life of the young child with +that divine love that fills every void, and turns the cry of "Vanity" +into the Song of Praise: "Yea, out of the mouth of babes and sucklings +Thou hast perfected praise." +</P> + +<P> +But our writer is by no means able thus to touch any chord in the young +heart that shall vibrate with the music of praise. Such as he has, +however, he gives us: "Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy +youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou +shalt say, I have no pleasure in them." +</P> + +<P> +This counsel must not be separated from the context. It is based +absolutely and altogether on what has now been discerned: for not only +is our writer a man of the acutest intelligence, but he evidently +possesses the highest qualities of moral courage. He shirks no +question, closes his eyes to no fact, and least of all to that awful +fact of man's compulsory departure from this scene which is called +"death." But following on, he has found that even this cannot possibly +be all; there must be a <I>judgment</I> that shall follow this present life. +It is in view of this he counsels "Remember thy Creator in the days of +thy youth," whilst the effect of time is to mature, and not destroy, +the powers He has given thee: for not forever will life's enjoyment +last; old age comes surely, and He who made thee, holds thy spirit in +His hand, so that whilst the body may return to dust, the spirit must +return to Him who gave it. +</P> + +<P> +We will only pause for a moment again to admire the glorious elevation +of this counsel. How good were it if the remembrance of a Creator-God, +to whom all are accountable, could tone, with out quenching, the fire +and energy of youthful years, and lead in the clean paths of +righteousness. But, alas, how inadequate to meet the actual state of +things. Solomon himself shall serve to illustrate the utter inadequacy +of his own counsel. What comfort or hope could he extract from it? +His were now already the years in which he must say "I have no pleasure +in them." A more modern poet might have voiced his cry,— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"My age is in the yellow leaf,<BR> +The bud, the fruit of 'life,' is gone:<BR> +The worm, the canker, and the grief,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 5em">Remain alone!"</SPAN><BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +His youth was no more: its bright days were forever past, never to be +restored. What remains, then, for Solomon, and the myriads like him? +What shall efface the memory of those wasted years, or what shall give +a quiet peace, in view of the fast-coming harvest of that wild sowing? +Can Reason—can any human Wisdom—find any satisfactory answer to these +weighty questions? <I>None</I>! +</P> + +<P> +Verses 2 to 7 beautifully and poetically depict the fall of the city of +man's body under the slow but sure siege of the forces of Time. +Gradually, but without one moment's pause, the trenches approach the +walls. Outwork after outwork falls into the enemy's hands, until he is +victor over all, and the citadel itself is taken. +</P> + +<P> +Verse 2.—First, clouds come over the spirit: the joyousness of life is +dulled,—the exuberance of youth is quenched. Sorrow follows quickly +on the heel of sorrow,—"clouds return after rain." Those waves that +youth's light bark rode gallantly and with exhilaration, now flood the +laboring vessel and shut out the light—the joy—of life. +</P> + +<P> +Verse 3.—Then the hands (the keepers of the house) tremble with +weakness, and the once strong men (the knees) now feeble, bend under +the weight of the body they have so long borne. The few teeth +(grinders) that may remain fail to do their required service. Time's +finger touches, too, those watchers from the turret-windows (the eyes): +shade after shade falls over them; till, like slain sentinels that drop +at their posts, they look out again never-more. +</P> + +<P> +Verse 4.—Closer still the enemy presses, till the close-beleaguered +fortress is shut out from all communication with the outer world; "the +doors are shut in the streets"; the ears are dulled to all sounds. +Even the grinding of the mill,[<A NAME="chap12fn1text"></A><A HREF="#chap12fn1">1</A>] which in an eastern house rarely +ceases, reaches him but as a low murmur, though it be really as loud as +the shrill piping of a bird, and all the sweet melodies of song are no +longer to be enjoyed. +</P> + +<P> +Verse 5.—Time's sappers, too, are busily at work, although unseen, +till the effect of their mining becomes evident in the alarm that is +felt at the slightest need of exertion. The white head, too, tells its +tale, and adds its testimony to the general decay. The least weight is +as a heavy burden; nor can the failing appetite be again awakened. The +man is going to his age-long home[<A NAME="chap12fn2text"></A><A HREF="#chap12fn2">2</A>]; for now those four seats of life +are invaded and broken up—spinal-cord, brain, heart, and blood,—till +at length body and spirit part company, each going whence it +came;—that, to its kindred dust; this, to the God who gave it. +</P> + +<P> +Thus to the high wisdom of Solomon man is no mere beast, after all. He +may not penetrate the Beyond to describe that "age-long home," but +never of the <I>beast</I> would he say "the spirit to God who gave it." But +his very wisdom again leads us to the most transcendent need of <I>more</I>. +To tell us this, is to lead us up a mountain-height, to a bridgeless +abyss which we have to cross, without having a plank or even a thread +to help us. To God the spirit goes,—to God who gave it,—to Whom, +then, it is responsible. But in what condition? Is it conscious +still, or does it lose consciousness as in a deep sleep? Where does it +now abide? How can it endure the searching Light—the infinite +holiness and purity—of the God to whom it goes? How shall it give +account for the wasted years? How answer for the myriad sins of life? +How reap what has been sown? Silence here—no answer here—is awful +indeed,—is <I>maddening</I>; and if reason does still hold her seat, then +"Vanity of vanities, all is vanity," is alone consistent with the +fearful silence to such questions, and the scene is fitly ended by a +groan. +</P> + +<P> +Deep even unto the shadow of death is the gloom. Every syllable of +this last sad wail is as a funeral knell to all our hopes, tolling +mournfully; and, like a passing bell, attending <I>them</I>, too, to their +"age-long home"! +</P> + +<P> +Oh, well for us if we have heard a clearer Voice than that of poor +feeble human Reason break in upon the silence, and, with a blessed, +perfect, lovely combination of Wisdom and Love, of Authority and +Tenderness, of Truth and Grace, give soul-satisfying answers to all our +questionings. +</P> + +<P> +Then may we rejoice, if grace permit, with joy unspeakable; and, even +in the gloom of this sad scene, lift heart and voice in a shout of +victory. We, too, know what it is for the body thus to perish. We, +too, though redeemed, still await the redemption of the body, which in +the Christian is still subject to the same ravages of time,—sickness, +disease, pain, suffering, decay. But a gracious Revelation has taught +us a secret that Ecclesiastes never guessed at; and we may sing, even +with the fall of Nature's walls about us, "Though our outward man +perish, yet the inward man is renewed day by day." Yea, every apparent +victory of the enemy is now only to be answered with a "new song" of +joyful praise. +</P> + +<P> +It is true that, "under the sun," the clouds return after the rain; +and, because it is true, we turn to that firmament of faith where our +Lord Jesus is both Sun and Star, and where the light ever "shineth more +and more unto perfect day." +</P> + +<P> +<I>Let</I> the keepers tremble, and the strong men bow themselves. We may +now lean upon another and an everlasting Arm, and know another Strength +which is even <I>perfected</I> in this very weakness. +</P> + +<P> +The grinders may cease because they are few; but their loss cannot +prevent our feeding ever more and more heartily and to the fill on +God's Bread of Life. +</P> + +<P> +<I>Let</I> those that look out of the windows be darkened: the inward eye +becomes the more accustomed to another—purer, clearer—light; and we +see "that which is invisible," and seeing, we hopefully sing— +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +"City of the pearl-bright portal,<BR> +City of the jasper wall,<BR> +City of the golden pavement,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">Seat of endless festival,—</SPAN><BR> +City of Jehovah, Salera,<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 1em">City of eternity,</SPAN><BR> +To thy bridal-hall of gladness,<BR> +From this prison would I flee,—<BR> +<SPAN STYLE="margin-left: 4em">Heir of glory,</SPAN><BR> +That shall be for thee and me!"<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +<I>Let</I> doors be shut in the streets, and <I>let</I> all the daughters of +music be brought low, so that the Babel of this world's discord be +excluded, and so that the Lord Himself be on the <I>inside</I> of the closed +door, we may the more undistractedly enjoy the <I>supper of our life</I> +with Him, and He (the blessed, gracious One!) with us. Then naught can +prevent His Voice being heard, whilst the more sweet and clear (though +still ever faint, perhaps) may the echo to that Voice arise in melody +within the heart, where God Himself is the gracious Listener! +</P> + +<P> +<I>Let</I> fears be in the way, we know a Love than can dispel all fear and +give a new and holy boldness even in full view of all the solemn +verities of eternity; for it is grounded on the perfect accepted work +of a divine Redeemer—the faithfulness of a divine Word. +</P> + +<P> +The very hoary head becomes not merely the witness of decay, and of a +life fast passing; but the "almond-tree" has another, brighter meaning +now: it is a figure of that "crown of life" which in the new-creation +scene awaits the redeemed. +</P> + +<P> +If appetite fail here, the more the inward longing, and the +satisfaction that ever goes hand in hand with it, may abound; and the +inward man thus be strengthened and enlarged so as to have greater +capacity for the enjoyment of those pleasures that are "at God's right +hand for evermore." +</P> + +<P> +Till at length the earthly house of this tabernacle may be dissolved. +Dust may still return to dust, and there await, what all Creation +awaits—the glorious resurrection, its redemption. Whilst the +spirit—yes, what of the spirit? To God who gave it? Ah, far better: +to God who loved and redeemed it,—to Him who has so cleansed it by His +own blood, that the very Light of God can detect no stain of sin upon +it, even though it be the chief of sinners. So amid the ruins of this +earthly tabernacle may the triumphant song ascend above the snapping of +cords, the breaking of golden bowls and pitchers, the very crash of +nature's citadel: "Oh, death, where is thy sting? Oh, grave, where is +thy victory? The sting of death is sin; and the strength of sin is the +law. But thanks be to God that giveth us the victory through our Lord +Jesus Christ." +</P> + +<P> +This meets—meets fully, meets satisfactorily—the need. Now none will +deny that this need is deep,—<I>real</I>. Hence it can be no mere +sentiment, no airy speculation, no poetical imagination, no cunningly +devised fable that can meet that need. <I>The remedy must be as real as +the disease, or it avails nothing</I>. No phantom key may loosen so +hard-closed a lock as this: it must be real, and be made for it. For +suppose we find a lock of such delicate and complicated construction +that no key that can be made will adapt itself to all its windings. +Many skilled men have tried their hands and failed,—till at length the +wisest of all attempts it, and even he in despair cries "vanity." Then +another key is put into our hands by One who claims to have made the +very lock we have found. We apply it, and its intricacies meet every +corresponding intricacy; its flanges fill every chamber, and we open it +with perfect facility. What is the reasonable, necessary conclusion? +We say—and rightly, unavoidably say—"He who made the lock must have +made the key. His claim is just: they have been made by one maker." +</P> + +<P> +So by the perfect rest it brings to the awakened conscience—by the +quiet calm it brings to the troubled mind—by the warm love that it +reveals to the craving heart—by the pure light that it sheds in +satisfactory answer to all the deep questions of the spirit—by the +unceasing unfoldings of depths of perfect transcendent wisdom—by its +admirable unity in variety—by the holy, righteous settlement of sin, +worthy of a holy, righteous God—by the peace it gives, even in view of +wasted years and the wild sowing of the past—by the joy it maintains +even in view of the trials and sorrows of the present—by the hope with +which it inspires the future;—by all these we know that our key (the +precious Word that God has put into our hands) is a reality indeed, and +as far above the powers of Reason as the heavens are above the earth, +therefore necessarily—incontestably—DIVINE! +</P> + +<P> +This brings us to the concluding words of our book. Now who has been +leading us all through these exercises? A disappointed sensualist? A +gloomy stoic? A cynic—selfish, depressed? Not at all. Distinctly a +wise man;—wise, for he gives that unequivocal proof of wisdom, in that +he cares for others. It is the wise who ever seek to "win souls," "to +turn many to righteousness." "Because the preacher was wise, he still +<I>taught the people knowledge</I>." No cynic is Ecclesiastes. His +sympathies are still keen; he knows well and truly the needs of those +to whom he ministers: knows too, how man's wretched heart ever rejects +its own blessing; so, in true wisdom, he seeks "acceptable words": +endeavoring to sweeten the medicine he gives, clothes his counsel in +"words of delight" (margin). Thus here we find all the "words of +delight" that human wisdom <I>can</I> find, in view of life in all its +aspects from youth to old age. +</P> + +<P> +For whilst it is certainly difficult satisfactorily to trace the order +in detail in the book,—and perhaps this is perfectly consistent with +its character,—yet there can be no question but that it begins by +looking at, and testing, those sensual enjoyments that are peculiarly +attractive to <I>youth</I>, and ends with the departure of all in <I>old age</I>, +and, finally—dissolution. There is, evidently, that much method. We +may also, further, note that the body of the book is taken up with such +themes as interest men who are between these two extremes: occupations, +business, politics, and, as men speak, religion. All the various +states and conditions of man are looked at: kings, princes, nobles, +magistrates, rich and poor, are all taken up and discussed in this +search for the one thing that true human reason can call absolutely +"good" for man. Further method than this might perhaps be inconsistent +with the confusion of the scene "under the sun" he is regarding, and +his own inability to bring order out of the confusion. There would be +thus true method in the <I>absence</I> of method, as the cry of "Vanity," +doleful as it is, is alone in harmony with the failure of all his +efforts. Yes, for whilst here he speaks of "words of delight," one can +but wonder to what he can refer, unless it be to something still to +come. Thus far, as he has taken up and dropped, with bitter +discouragement, subject after subject, his burdened, overcharged heart +involuntarily has burst out with the cry, "Vanity of vanities, all is +vanity!" Words of delight! Find one in all that we have gone over +that can be to a guilty sinner's ear a "word of delight"—such as it +can really <I>take in as meeting its needs</I>; for this seems to be the +force of the word here translated "acceptable": so perfectly adapted to +the needs of the heart it addresses that that heart springs joyfully to +embrace it at once. We have surely, thus far, found none such. A +Judge has been discerned in God; but small delight in this surely, if I +am the sinner to be judged. +</P> + +<P> +Verses 11-14. Wisdom's words are not known by quantity, but quality. +Not many books, with the consequent weary study; but the right +word—like a "goad": sharp, pointed, effective—and on which may hang, +as on a "nail," much quiet meditation. "Given, too, from one +shepherd," hence not self-contradictory and confusing to the listeners. +In this way Ecclesiastes would evidently direct our most earnest +attention to what follows: "the conclusion of the whole matter." Here +is absolutely the highest counsel of true human wisdom—the climax of +her reasonings—the high-water-mark of her attainments—the limit to +which she can lead us: "Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this +is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into +judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be +evil." +</P> + +<P> +Who will deny that this is indeed admirable? Is there not a glorious +moral elevation in this conclusion? Note how it gives the Creator-God +His rightful place; puts the creature, man, in the absolutely correct +relationship of obedience, and speaks with perfect assurance of a +discriminative judgment where every single work, yes, "secret thing," +shall be shown out in its true character as it is good or evil in His +holy sight: where everything that is wrong and distorted here shall be +put right. +</P> + +<P> +It is truly much, but alas for man if this were indeed the end. Alas +for one, conscious of having sinned already, and broken His +commandments, whether those commandments be expressed in the ten words +of the law, as given from Sinai, or in that other law which is common +to all men, the work of which, "written in their hearts," they +show—conscience. There is no gleam of light, ray of hope, or grain of +comfort here. A judgment to come, <I>assured</I>, can only be looked +forward to, with, at the best, gloomy uncertainty, and awful +misgiving—if not with assured conviction of a fearful condemnation; +and here our writer leaves us with the assurance that this is the +"conclusion of the whole matter." +</P> + +<P> +Who can picture the terrors of this darkness in which such a conclusion +leaves us? Guilty, trembling, with untold sins and wasted years +behind; with the awful consciousness that my very being is the corrupt +fountain whence those sins flowed, and yet with a certain judgment +before in which no single thing is to escape a divinely searching +examination: better had it been to have left us still asleep and +unconscious of these things, and so to have permitted us to secure, at +least, what pleasure we could out of this present life "under the sun," +without the shadow of the future ever thrown over us;—yea, such +"conclusion" leaves us "of all men most miserable." +</P> + +<P> +I would, beloved reader, that we might by grace realize something of +this. Nor let our minds be just touched by the passing thoughts, but +pause for a few minutes, at least, and meditate on the scene at this +last verse in the only book in our Bible in which man at his best and +highest, in his richest and wisest, is heard telling us his exercises +as he looks at this tangled state of affairs "under the sun" and gives +us to see, as nowhere else can we see, the very utmost limit to which +he, as such, can attain. If this sinks down into our hearts, we shall +be the better prepared to apprehend and appreciate the grace that meets +him there at the edge of that precipice to which Reason leads but which +she cannot bridge. Oh, blessed grace! In the person of our royal +Preacher we are here indeed at our "wit's end" in every sense of the +word; but that is ever and always the place where another hand may lead +us, where another Wisdom than poor feeble human Reason may find a way +of escape, and "deliver us out of our distresses." +</P> + +<P> +Then let us turn our ear and listen to another voice: "For we must all +appear before the judgment-seat of Christ, that every one may receive +the things done in his body, according to that he hath done, whether it +be good or bad." But stay. Is this the promised grace of which even +now we spoke? Is this the deliverance for which we hoped? A +judgment-seat still?—from which still no escape for any: and a +"reception" according to the things done, whether they be good or bad! +Wherein does this differ from Solomon's "conclusion of the whole +matter"? In just two words only—"<I>Of Christ</I>." It is now the +"judgment-seat of Christ." Added terror, I admit, to His despisers and +rejectors; but to you and me, dear fellow-believer, through grace the +difference these two words make is infinity itself. For look at Him +who sits upon the judgment-seat;—be not afraid; regard Him patiently +and well; He bears many a mark whereby you may know Him, and recognize +in the Judge the very One who has Himself borne the full penalty of all +your sins. See His hands and His feet, and behold His side! You stand +before <I>His</I> judgment-seat. Remember, too, the word He spake long ago, +but as true as ever, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that heareth +my word, and believeth on Him that sent me, hath everlasting life, and +shall not come into judgment, but is passed from death unto life"—and +as we thus remember both His word and His work, we may be fully +assured, even as we stand here, that there must be a sense, and an +important sense, in which judgment for us is passed forever. I may not +be able to harmonize these Scriptures; but I will cleave, at least, to +that which I clearly understand; in other words, to that which meets my +present needs (for we only truly understand what meets our need); +afterward, other needs may arise that shall make the other scriptures +equally clear. He bore my sins—the judgment of God has been upon Him, +cannot, therefore, be upon me—into that judgment I shall never come. +</P> + +<P> +Then why is it written we must all appear (or rather "be <I>manifested</I>," +be clearly shown out in true light) before the judgment seat of Christ? +There is just one thing I need before entering the joys of eternity. I +am, as Jacob in Genesis xxxv., going up "to Bethel, to dwell there." I +must know that everything is fully suited to the place to which I go. +I need, <I>I must have</I>, everything out clearly. Yes, so clearly, that +it will not do to trust even my own memory to bring it out. I need the +Lord "who loved me and gave Himself for me" to do it. <I>He will</I>. How +precious this is for the believer who keeps his eye on the Judge! How +blessed for him that ere eternity begins full provision is made for the +perfect security of its peace—for a communion that may not be marred +by a thought! Never after this shall a suspicion arise in our hearts, +during the long ages that follow, that there is one thing—one secret +thing—that has not been known and dealt with holily and righteously, +according to the infinite purity of the Judgment Seat of Christ. +Suppose that this were not so written; let alone for a moment that +there never could be true discriminative rewards; might not memory be +busy, and might not some evil thought allowed during the days of the +life in the flesh, long, long forgotten, be suddenly remembered, and +the awful question arise, "Is it possible that that particular evil +thing has been overlooked? It was subsequent to the hour that I first +accepted Him for my Saviour. I have had no thought of it since. I am +not aware of ever having confessed it." Would not <I>that</I> silence the +song of Heaven, embitter even its joy, and still leave tears to be +wiped away? <I>It shall not be</I>. All shall be out first. All—"every +secret thing." Other Scriptures shall show us how these things are +dealt with. "Every man's work shall be made manifest, for the day +shall declare it, because it (that is, the day) shall be revealed in +fire, and the fire shall try every man's work, of what sort it is. If +any man's work abide, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work +shall be burnt, he shall suffer loss, but he himself shall be saved, +yet so as by fire. If any man defile the temple of God, him shall God +destroy." (1 Cor. iii.) +</P> + +<P> +That day is revealed in fire, (Divine judgment,) and gold, silver, +precious stones—those works which are of God—alone can stand the +test. All others burn like "wood, hay, stubble." +</P> + +<P> +Look forward a little. In the light of these Scriptures, see one +standing before that Judgment Seat. He once hung by the side of the +Judge Himself upon a cross on earth. See his works being manifested. +Is there one that can be found gold, silver, precious stones? Not one. +They burn; they all burn: but mark carefully his countenance as his +works burn. Mark the emotions that manifest themselves through the +ever-deepening sense of the wondrous grace that could have snatched +such an one as is there being manifested from the burning. Not a sign +of terror. Not a question for a single instant as to his own salvation +now. He has been with Christ, in the Judge's own company, for a long +time already, and perfectly established is his heart, in the love that +said to him long ago, "This day thou shalt be with me in Paradise." +Now as all his works burn, the fire within burns too, and he is well +prepared to sing "unto Him who loves us and washed us from our sins in +His own blood." And yet stay:—Here is something at the very last. It +is his word, "Dost thou not fear God, seeing thou art in the same +condemnation, and we indeed justly, for we receive the due reward of +our deeds, but this man hath done nothing amiss. Lord, remember me +when Thou comest into Thy kingdom." Gold! gold at last! as we may say; +and he too receives praise of God. Yes, not one that shall have the +solemn joy of standing before that tribunal but has, in some measure, +that praise. For is it not written, "then" (at that very time) "shall +every one have praise of God." "This honor have all his saints." +</P> + +<P> +Where and when does this judgment of our works, then, take place? It +must be subsequent to our rapture to the air of which we have spoken, +and prior to our manifestation with Christ as sons of God. For by all +the ways of God, through all the ages, those scenes could never be +carried out before an unbelieving hostile world. Never has He exposed, +never will He so expose His saints. All will be over when we come +forth with Him to live and reign a thousand years. "The bride has made +herself ready," and the robes in which she comes forth—the white +linen—are indeed the righteousnesses of the saints, but these have +been "washed and made white in the blood of the Lamb." +</P> + +<P> +But "<I>all</I>" must stand before Him; and not even yet has that been +fulfilled. Cain and the long line of rejectors of mercy and light, +ever broadening as time's sad ages have passed till their path has been +called the "broad way," have not yet stood there. Has death saved them +from judgment? No, for we read of the "resurrection of judgment"—the +judgment that comes necessarily after death, and includes the dead, and +only the dead. "I saw a great white throne, and Him that sat on it, +from whose face the earth and the heavens fled away, and there was +found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, stand +before God; and the books were opened, and another book was opened, +which is the Book of Life: and the dead were judged out of those things +which were written in the books, according to their works. And the sea +gave up the dead which were in it, and death and hell delivered up the +dead which were in them, and they were judged every man according to +their works, and death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This +is the second death. And whosoever was not found written in the Book +of Life was cast into the lake of fire." Here, too, we see an exact, +perfect, retributive, discriminating judgment. The Book of Life bears +not the name of one here. There is that one broad distinction between +the saved and the lost—the "life-line," as we may call it. How +carefully are we told at the very last of this Book of Life, that we +may most clearly understand, for our comfort, that the feeblest touch +of faith of but the hem of His garment—perhaps not even <I>directly</I> His +Person, but that which is seen surrounding His Person, as the visible +creation may be said to do—(Psalms cii. 25, 6) let any have touched +Him there, and <I>life</I> results. His name is found in the Book of Life, +and he shall not see the second death. Apart from this—the second +death: "the lake of fire!" +</P> + +<P> +And yet, whilst "darkness and wrath" are the common lot of the +rejectors of "light and love," there is, necessarily, almost infinite +difference in the degrees of that darkness and fierceness of that +wrath, dependent exactly on the degree of rejection of light and love. +As our Lord tells us, "he that knew his Lord's will, and prepared not +himself, shall be beaten with many stripes. But he that knew not, and +did commit things worthy of stripes shall be beaten with few stripes. +For unto whomsoever much is given of him shall be much required; and to +whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more." All is +absolutely <I>right</I>. Nothing more now to be <I>made</I> right The ages of +eternity may roll in unbroken peace; with God—manifested in all the +universe as light and love—all in all. +</P> + +<P> +And now, dear readers, the time has come to say farewell for a season +to our writer and to each other. Let this leave-taking not be with the +groans of Ecclesiastes' helplessness in our ears. We have stood by his +side and tested with him the sad unsatisfying pleasures connected with +the senses under the sun. We have turned from them, and tried the +purer, higher pleasures of the intellect and reason, and groaned to +find <I>them</I> equally unsatisfying. We have looked through his wearied +eyes at this scene, restless in its unending changes, and yet with +nothing really new. We have felt a little, with his sensitive, +sympathetic heart, for the oppressed and down-trodden "under the sun," +and groaned in our helplessness to right their wrongs. We have +groaned, too, at his and our inability to understand or solve the +contradictory tangle of life that seemed to deny either the providence +or the goodness of a clearly recognized Creator. We have followed with +him along many a hopeful path till it led us to a tomb, and then we +have bowed head with him, and groaned in our agonizing inability to +pierce further. We have seen, too, with him that there is not the +slightest discrimination in that ending of man's race, and worse, even +than groans to our ears, has been the wild, sad counsel of despair, +"Merrily drink thy wine." But quickly recovering from this, we have +wondered with great admiration as our guide's clear reason led him, and +us, still on and on to discern, a final harvest-judgment that follows +all earth's sowings. But there, as we have stood beside him in spirit, +before that awful judgment-seat to which he has led us, and turned to +him for one word of light or comfort in view of our sin and wrong +doings—the deepest need of all—we have been met with a silence too +deeply agonizing, even for the groan of vanity. Groans, groans, +nothing but groans, at every turn! +</P> + +<P> +And then with what relief—oh, what relief, ever increasing as the +needs increased—have we turned to the Greater than the greatest of men +"under the sun," and, placing the hand of faith in His, we have been +led into other scenes, and have found every single need of our being +fully, absolutely, satisfactorily met. Our body if now the seat of sin +and suffering, yet we have learned to sing in the joyful hope of its +soon being "like Him forever." Our soul's affections have in Him a +satisfying object, whilst His love may fill the poor, empty, craving +heart till it runs over with a song all unknown under the sun,—our +spirit's deep questions, as they have come up, have all been met and +answered in such sort that each answer strikes a chord that sounds with +the melody of delight;—till at last death itself is despoiled of his +terrors, and our song is still more sweet and clear in the tyrant's +presence, for he is no longer a "king" over us, but our "servant." +Even the deepest, most awful terror of all to sinners such as we—the +Judgment-seat—has given us new cause for still more joyful singing; +for we have in that pure clear light recognized in God—our +Creator-God, our Redeemer-God—a love so full, so true,—working with a +wisdom so infinite, so pure,—in perfect harmony with a righteousness +so unbending, so inflexible,—with a holiness not to be flecked or +tarnished by a breath,—all combining to put us at joyful ease in the +very presence of judgment—to find there, as nowhere else possible, all +that is in God in His infinity told out, ("love with us made perfect,") +and that means that all the creatures' responsive love must find sweet +relief in a song that it will take eternity itself to end. In our +Father's House we only "begin to be merry," and end nevermore, as we +sound the depths of a wisdom that is fathomless, know a "love that +passeth knowledge";—singing, singing, nothing but singing, and ever a +new song! +</P> + +<P> +May God, in His grace, make this the joyful experience of reader and +writer, for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake! Amen. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap12fn1"></A> +<A NAME="chap12fn2"></A> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +[<A HREF="#chap12fn1text">1</A>] This differs from the usual interpretation, which makes this verse +a metaphor of the mouth and teeth. This has been rejected above, not +only on account of the direct evidence of its faultiness, and the +fanciful interpretation given to the "sound of grinding," but for the +twofold reason that it would make the teeth to be alluded to <I>twice</I>, +whilst all reference to the equally important sense of "hearing" would +be omitted altogether. I have therefore followed Dr. Lewis's metrical +version:— +<BR><BR> +"And closing are the doors that lead abroad,<BR> +When the hum of the mill is sounding low,<BR> +Though it rise to the sparrow's note,<BR> +And voices loudest in the song, do all to faintness sink."<BR> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +Although, I might here add, I cannot follow this writer in his view +that Ecclesiastes is describing only the old age of the sensualist. +Rather is it man as man,—at his highest,—but with only what he can +find "under the sun" to enlighten him. +</P> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +[<A HREF="#chap12fn2text">2</A>] The word rendered above "age-long," in our authorized version +"long,"—"man goeth to his <I>long</I> home"—is one of those suggestive +words with which the Hebrew Scriptures abound, and which are well worth +pondering with interest. To transfer and not translate it into English +we might call it "olamic," speaking of a cycle: having a limit, and yet +a shadowy, undefined limit. The word therefore in itself beautifully +and significantly expresses both the confidence, the faith of the +speaker as well as his ignorance. Man's existence after death is +distinctly predicated. The mere grave is not that olamic home; for the +spirit would, in that case, be quite lost sight of; nor, indeed, is the +spirit alone there,—the <I>man</I> goes there. It appears to correspond +very closely to the Greek word Hades, "the Unseen." Man has gone to +that sphere beyond human ken, but when the purposes of God are +fulfilled, his abode there shall have an end: it is for an "age," but +only an "age." All this seems to be wrapped up, as it were, in that +one phrase—<I>Beth-olam</I>, the age-long home. How blessed for us the +light that has since been shed on all this. In One case (and indeed +already more than in that One) that "age" has already come to an end, +and the first fruits of that harvest with which our earth is sown has +even now been gathered. We await merely the completion of that +harvest: "Christ the first fruits: afterwards they that are Christ's, +at His coming." +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +THE BIBLE TRUTH PRESS, 63 FOURTH AVENUE, NEW YORK. +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap13"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +"ABOVE THE SUN." +</H3> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Cease, ye Saints, your occupation with the sorrow-scenes of earth;<BR> +Let the ear of faith be opened, use the sight of second birth.<BR> +Long your hearts have been acquainted with the tear-drop and the groan;<BR> +These are <I>weeds</I> of foreign growing, seek the <I>flowers</I> that are your own.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +He who in the sandy desert looks for springs to quench his thirst<BR> +Finds his fountains are but slime-pits such as Siddim's vale accursed;<BR> +He who hopes to still the longing of the heart within his breast<BR> +Must not search within a scene where naught is at one moment's rest.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Lift your eyes <I>above</I> the heavens to a sphere as pure as fair;<BR> +There, no spot of earth's defilement, never fleck of sin-stain there.<BR> +Linger not to gaze on Angels, Principalities, nor Powers;<BR> +Brighter visions yet shall greet you, higher dignities are ours.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +All night's golden constellations dimly shine as day draws on,<BR> +And the moon must veil her beauties at the rising of the sun.<BR> +Let the grove be wrapt in silence as the nightingale outflings<BR> +Her unrivaled minstrelsy, th' eclipse of every bird that sings.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Michael, Israel's Prince, is glorious, clad in panoply of war;<BR> +*"Who is as the God of Israel" is his challenge near and far;<BR> +But a higher still than Michael soon shall meet your raptured gaze,<BR> +And ye shall forget his glories in <I>your</I> Captain's brighter rays.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="footnote"> +* "Michael" means "Who is as God." +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +List a moment to the music of the mighty Gabriel's voice,<BR> +With its message strange and tender, making Mary's heart rejoice.<BR> +Then on-speed, for sweeter music soon expectant faith shall greet:<BR> +His who chained another Mary willing captive at His feet.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +But, let mem'ry first glance backward to the scenes "beneath the sun,"<BR> +How the fairest earthly landscape echoed soon some dying groan.<BR> +There the old-creation's story, shared between the dismal Three:<BR> +Sin and Suffering and Sorrow summed that Babel's history.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Now the contrast—vain ye listen for one jarring note to fall;<BR> +For each dweller in that scene's in perfect harmony with all.<BR> +Joy has here expelled all sadness, perfect peace displaced all fears—<BR> +All around that central Throne makes the true "music of the spheres."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Now upsoar ye on faith's pinion, leave all creature things behind,<BR> +And approach yon throne of glory. Love in Light ye there shall find;<BR> +For with thrill of joy behold One—woman-born—upon that Throne,<BR> +And, with deepest self-abasement, in <I>His</I> beauties read your own.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Joyful scan the glories sparkling from His gracious Head to Feet;,<BR> +Never one that does not touch some tender chord of memory sweet;<BR> +And e'en heaven's music lacks till blood-bought ones <I>their</I> voices raise<BR> +High o'er feebler angel choirs; for richer grace wakes nobler praise.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Vain the quest amongst the thronging of the heavenly angel band<BR> +For one trace of human kinship, for one touch of human hand;<BR> +'Mongst those spirits bright, ethereal, "man" would stand a man alone;<BR> +Higher must he seek for kinship—thought amazing—on God's Throne!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Does it not attract your nature, is it not a rest to see<BR> +One e'en there at glory's summit, yet with human form like thee?<BR> +Form assumed when love compelled Him to take up your hopeless case,<BR> +Form He never will relinquish; ever shall it voice His grace.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Wondrous grace! thus making heaven but our Father's house prepared;<BR> +Since, by One who tells God's love, in wounded human form 'tis shared.<BR> +See, His Head is crowned with glory! yet a glory not distinct<BR> +From an hour of deepest suffering, and a crown of thorns succinct.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Draw still closer, with the rev'rence born of love and holy fear;<BR> +Look into those tender eyes which have been dimmed with human tear—<BR> +Tears in which <I>ye</I> see a glory hidden from th' Angelic powers;<BR> +Ours alone the state that caused them, their beauty then alone is ours.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Look once more upon that Head: finds memory no attraction there<BR> +In the time when, homeless-wandering, night-dews filled that very hair?<BR> +Brightest glories sparkle round it—crowned with honor now; and yet,<BR> +Once it found its only pillow on storm-tossed Gennesaret!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +See that Hand! it once grasped Peter's as he sank beneath the wave,—<BR> +Snatched the widow's son at Nain from the portal of the grave,—<BR> +Touched with healing grace the leper, gave the light to him born dark.<BR> +<I>Deeper love to you is spoken in that nail-print—precious mark</I>!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Let your tender gaze now rest on those dear Feet that erstwhile trod<BR> +All the weary, painful journey leading Him <I>from</I> God <I>to</I> God;<BR> +Took Him in His gentle grace wherever need and suffering thronged,<BR> +Or one lonely soul was found who for the living water longed.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Those the very Feet once bathèd with a pardoned sinner's tears,<BR> +And anointed, too, with spikenard speaking Mary's love and fears;<BR> +Took Him weary on His journey under Sychar's noontide heat,<BR> +Till the thirsty quenched His thirsting, and the hungry gave Him meat.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Blessed Feet! 'tis only <I>sinners</I> see the depth of beauty there;<BR> +<I>Angels</I> never have bowed o'er them with a penitential tear.<BR> +Angels may regard the nail-print, with a holy, reverent calm;<BR> +Ye who read the <I>love</I> it tells of, <I>must</I> break forth with thankful psalm.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Draw yet nearer, look more fondly; yea, e'en nestle and abide<BR> +In that covert from the storm-blast, in the haven of His Side.<BR> +That deep wound speaks man's great hatred, but His love surpassing great:<BR> +<I>There were focused, at one spear-point, all God's love and all man's hate</I>!<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Rest, ye saints! your search is ended; ye have reached the source of peace.<BR> +By the side of Jesus risen, earth's dull cares and sorrows cease.<BR> +Here are Elim's wells and palm-trees, grateful shade and waters cool,<BR> +Whilst in Christ's deep love there's healing far beyond Bethesda's pool.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Closer, closer, cluster round Him, till the kindling of that Love<BR> +Melt your hearts to like compassions whilst amid like scenes ye move.<BR> +Only thus abiding in Him can ye fruitfulness expect,<BR> +Or, 'mid old-creation sorrows, new-creation love reflect.<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +Ever closer gather round Him, till "the glory of that Light"<BR> +Dims the old creation glitter, proves earth's glare to be but—night!<BR> +Gaze upon Him till His beauties wing your feet as on ye run,<BR> +Faith soon bursting into sight, in God's clear day "Above the Sun."<BR> +</P> + +<P CLASS="poem"> +F. C. J.<BR> +</P> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<HR> + +<BR><BR><BR> + +<A NAME="chap14"></A> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +WORKS BY J. G. BELLETT. +</H3> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>The Patriarchs.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Being meditations upon Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and +Job; with The Canticles, and Heaven and Earth. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +435 pp. Cloth, post-paid, $1.00. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>The Evangelists.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +A study of the four gospels, "tracing the varied glories of Christ, and +to notice their characteristics, so as to distinguish the purpose of +the Spirit of God in each of them." +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +500 pp. Cloth, post-paid, $1.00. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>The Moral Glory of the Lord Jesus.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +A precious little volume for all those who, like Mary, would sit at the +Saviour's feet. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Cloth, gilt, post-paid, 50 cts. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>The Son of God.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +A treatise dwelling on the eternal glories and Godhead of the Lord +Jesus Christ;—the "Son that dwelleth in the bosom of the Father, He +hath revealed Him." +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Paper, 35 cts.; cloth, 55 cts, post-paid. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>Short Meditations</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +On Various Subjects and Portions of Scripture. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Cloth, post-paid, $1.00. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<BR><BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>Papers on the Lord's Coming.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +CONTENTS.—Introductory.—The Fact Itself.—The Double Bearing of the +Fact.—"The Coming" and "The Day"—The Two Resurrections.—The +Judgment.—The Jewish Remnant.—Christendom.—The Ten Virgins.—The +Talents.—Concluding Remarks. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +By C. H. M. Price, 15 cts.; cloth, 25 cts. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>Eight Lectures on Prophecy.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +CONTENTS.—The Importance of Prophetic Study.—The Second Coming of +Christ Premillenial.—God's Past Dealings with the Nation of +Israel.—The Return of the Jews.—The Millenial Reign of Christ.—The +Distinct Calling and Glory of the Church.—The Predicted Corruption of +Christianity, and its Final Results.—The Character and Doom of the +Great Gentile Powers.—The Hope of the Church, and her Removal before +the Apocalyptic Judgments. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +By W. T. Paper, 35 cts.; Cloth, 60 cts. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>Changed in a Moment.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +A Dialogue on the Lord's Coming to gather up His Saints to meet Him in +the air, as distinct from His Coming to the Earth in Glory, and its +present bearing upon the Church of God in the world. +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +By H. T. Price, 5 cts. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>He Cometh with Clouds; or Every Eye Shall See Him.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +Sequel to "Changed in a Moment." Price, 6 cts. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +"<I>Awake! Awake! Behold, the Bride-groom Cometh.</I>" +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +(Matt. xxv. 1-13.) +</P> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +By C. S. 18 cts. per doz. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>What God Has Said on the Second Coming of Christ and the End of the +Present Age.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +By C. S. Price, 6 cts. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>The Millennial Reign of Christ.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +A Sequel to above. By C. S. Price, 6 cts. +</P> + +<BR> + +<H4 ALIGN="center"> +<I>The Lord's Dealings with the Convict Daniel Mann.</I> +</H4> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +By P. J. L. (New Edition, 45th thousand.) Price, 4 cts. +</P> + +<BR> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<I>Postage extra—10 cts. per dollar. Catalogue sent on application.</I> +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<HR ALIGN="center" WIDTH="80%"> + +<BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +A New Library of Helpful Volumes for Bible Students. +</H5> + +<BR> + +<H3 ALIGN="center"> +The Beresford Books. +</H3> + +<P CLASS="noindent"> +<I>Uniform Size, Crown 8vo. Uniform Binding, Half-Bound Style. Uniform +Price, Half-Crown each.</I> +</P> + +<BR> + +<P> +The Gospel and its Ministry: a Handbook of Evangelical Truth. By +ROBERT ANDERSON, C.B., LL.D., Author of "Human Destiny," &c. +</P> + +<P> +Typical Foreshadowings in Genesis; or, The World to Come, and the +Divine Preparation for it. By WILLIAM LINCOLN, Author of Lectures on +the Revelation, St. John, &c. [<I>In the Press</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Abundant Grace: Select Addresses on Salvation, Warfare, Life, and Hope. +By W. P. MACKAY, M.A., author of <I>Grace and Truth</I>. With Biographical +Sketch of Author. +</P> + +<P> +"I am Coming": a Book of that Blessed Hope. By Dr. JAMES H. BROOKES, +Editor of <I>The Truth</I>. +</P> + +<P> +Truths for To-Day: Seventeen Addresses on Fundamental Truths, by Dr. +Neatby, Dr. M'Killiam, Robert Anderson, LL.D., Alex. Stewart, F. C. +Bland, G. F. Trench, H. Groves, &c. +</P> + +<P> +Always Abounding; or, Recollections of the Life and Labours of the late +George Brealey, the Evangelist of the Blackdown Hills. By W. J. H. +BREALEY. Introduction by H. GROVES, Kendal. +</P> + +<P> +The Books of the Bible: Their unity as one Volume, their diversity of +purpose, and the spiritual import of each. By Dr. W. P. MACKAY, of +Hull, Author of "Grace and Truth." +</P> + +<P> +Old Groans and New Songs; or, Meditations on the Book of Ecclesiastes. +By F. C. JENNINGS, New York. +</P> + +<P> +Lays of Life and Hope: Poems on the Atonement, Advocacy, and Appearing +of our Lord Jesus Christ, in relation to Salvation, Pilgrimage, and the +Blessed Hope. By WM. BLANE. +</P> + +<P> +The Final Crisis of the Age: The Apocalypse, or Book of Revelation, +considered as such, by THOMAS RYAN, Dublin. +</P> + +<P> +Now and for Ever: Addresses on Truths relating to "Yesterday, To-day, +and For Ever." By T. SHULDHAM HENRY, M.A. +</P> + +<BR><BR> + +<H5 ALIGN="center"> +GLASGOW: PICKERING & INGLIS, 73 BOTHWELL ST. +</H5> + +<BR><BR><BR><BR> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Old Groans and New Songs, by F. C. 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