Chapter VII: Introduction (5)

There is a kind of competition between Wisdom and Folly, between Righteousness and Sin, between Virtue and Vice; and the allurements of the two are disposed in an intentional parallelism; the colouring and arrangement are of such a kind that it becomes incredible how any sensible person, or for that matter even the simple himself, could for a moment hesitate between the noble form of Wisdom and the meretricious attractions of Folly. The two voices are heard in the high places of the city; each of them invites the passers-by, especially the simple and unsophisticated--the one into her fair palace, the other into her foul and deadly house. The words of their invitation are very similar: "Whoso is simple, let him turn in hither: as for him that is void of understanding, she saith to him;" but how different is the burden of the two messages! Wisdom offers life, but is silent about enjoyment; Folly offers enjoyment, but says nothing of the death which must surely ensue.[134]

First of all we will give our attention to the Palace of Wisdom and the voices which issue from it, and then we will note for the last time the features and the arts of Mistress Folly.

The Palace of Wisdom is very attractive; well built and well furnished, it rings with the sounds of hospitality; and, with its open colonnades, it seems of itself to invite all passers-by to enter in as guests. It is reared upon seven well-hewn marble pillars, in a quadrangular form, with the entrance side left wide open.[135] This is no shifting tent or tottering hut, but an eternal mansion, that lacks nothing of stability, or completeness, or beauty. Through the spacious doorways may be seen the great courtyard, in which appear the preparations for a perpetual feast. The beasts are killed and dressed; the wine stands in tall flagons ready mixed for drinking; the tables are spread and decked. All is open, generous, large, a contrast to that unhallowed private supper to which the unwary youth was invited by his seducer.[136] There are no secret chambers, no twilight suggestions and insinuations: the broad light shines over all; there is a promise of social joy; it seems that they will be blessed who sit down together at this board. And now the beautiful owner of the palace has sent forth her maidens into the public ways of the city: theirs is a gracious errand; they are not to chide with sour and censorious rebukes, but they are to invite with winning friendliness; they are to offer this rare repast, which is now ready, to all those who are willing to acknowledge their need of it. "Come, eat ye of my bread, and drink of the wine which I have mingled."[137]

We were led to inquire in the last chapter how far our Lord identified Himself with the hypostatic Wisdom who was speaking there, and we were left in some doubt whether He ever consciously admitted the identity; but it is hardly a matter of doubt that this passage was before His mind when He spoke His parable of the Wedding Feast.[138] And the connection is still more apparent when we look at the Greek version of the LXX., and notice that the clause "sent forth her bond-servants" is precisely the same in Prov. ix. 3 and in Matt. xxii. 3. Here, at any rate, Jesus, who describes Himself as "a certain king," quite definitely occupies the place of the ancient Wisdom in the book of Proverbs, and the language which in this passage she employs He, as we shall see, in many slight particulars made His own.

Yes, our Lord, the Wisdom Incarnate, has glorious ideas of hospitality; He keeps open house; His purpose is to call mankind to a great feast; the "bread and the wine" are prepared; the sacrifice which furnishes the meat is slain. His messengers are not commissioned with a mournful or a condemnatory proclamation, but with good tidings which they are to publish in the high places. His word is always, Come. His desire is that men should live, and therefore He calls them into the way of understanding.[139] If a man lacks wisdom, if he recognizes his ignorance, his frailty, his folly, if he is at any rate wise enough to know that he is foolish, well enough to know that he is sick, righteous enough to know that he is sinful, let him approach this noble mansion with its lordly feast. Here is bread which is meat indeed; here is wine which is life-giving, the fruit of the Vine which God has planted.

But now we are to note that the invitation of Wisdom is addressed only to the simple, not to the scorner.[140] She lets the scorner pass by, because a word to him would recoil only in shame on herself, bringing a blush to her queenly face, and would add to the scorner's wickedness by increasing his hatred of her. Her reproof would not benefit him, but it would bring a blot upon herself, it would exhibit her as ineffectual and helpless. The bitter words of a scorner can make wisdom appear foolish, and cover virtue with a confusion which should belong only to vice. "Speak not in the hearing of a fool; for he will despise the wisdom of thy words."[141] Indeed, there is no character so hopeless as that of the scorner; there proceeds from him, as it were, a fierce blast, which blows away all the approaches which goodness makes to him. Reproof cannot come near him;[142] he cannot find wisdom, though he seek it;[143] and as a matter of fact, he never seeks it.[144] If one attempts to punish him it can only be with the hope that others may benefit by the example; it will have no effect upon him.[145] To be rid of him must be the desire of every wise man, for he is an abomination to all,[146] and with his departure contention disappears.[147] They that scoff at things holy, and scorn the Divine Power, must be left to themselves until the beginnings of wisdom appear in them--the first sense of fear that there is a God who may not be mocked, the first recognition that there is a sanctity which they would do well at all events to reverence. There must be a little wisdom in the heart before a man can enter the Palace of Wisdom; there must be a humbling, a self-mistrust, a diffident misgiving before the scorner will give heed to her invitation.

There is an echo of this solemn truth in more than one saying of the Lord's. He too cautioned His disciples against casting their pearls before swine, lest they should trample the pearls under their feet, and turn to rend those who were foolish enough to offer them such treasure.[148] Men must often be taught in the stern school of Experience, before they can matriculate in the reasonable college of Wisdom. It is not good to give that which is holy to dogs, nor to display the sanctities of religion to those who will only put them to an open shame. Where we follow our own way instead of the Lord's, and insist on offering the treasures of the kingdom to the scorners, we are not acting according to the dictates of Wisdom, we get a blot for that goodness which we so rashly offer, and often are needlessly rent by those whom we meant to save. It is evident that this is only one side of a truth, and our Lord presented with equal fulness the other side; it was from Him we learnt how the scorner himself, who cannot be won by reproof, can sometimes be won by love; but our Lord thought it worth while to state this side of the truth, and so far to make this utterance of the ancient Wisdom His own.

Again, how constantly He insisted on the mysterious fact that to him that hath shall be given, and from him that hath not shall be taken what he hath, precisely in the spirit of this saying: "Give instruction to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser: teach a righteous man, and he will increase in learning."[149] The entrance into the kingdom, as into the house of Wisdom, is by humility. Except a man turn, and become as a little child, he cannot enter. Wisdom is only justified of her children: until the heart is humble it cannot even begin to be wise; although it may seem to possess a great deal, all must be taken away, and a new beginning must be made--that beginning which is found in the fear of the Lord, and in the knowledge of the Holy One.[150]

The closing words in the invitation of Wisdom are entirely appropriate in the lips of Jesus, and, indeed, only in His lips could they be accepted in their fullest signification. There is a limited sense in which all wisdom is favourable to long life, as we saw in chap. iii., but it is an obvious remark, too, that the wise perish even as the fool; one event happens to them both, and there appears to be no difference. But the Incarnate Wisdom, Jesus Christ, was able to say with a broad literalness, "By Me thy days shall be multiplied, and the years of thy life shall be increased." With Him the outlook widened; He could speak of a new life, of raising men up at the last day; He could for the first time give a solution to that constant enigma which has puzzled men from the beginning, How is it that Wisdom promises life, and yet often requires that her children should die? how is it that the best and wisest have often chosen death, and so to all appearance have robbed the world of their goodness and their wisdom? He could give the answer in the glorious truth of the Resurrection; and so, in calling men to die for Him, as He often does, He can in the very moment of their death say to them with a fulness of meaning, "By Me thy days shall be multiplied, and the years of thy life shall be increased."

And then how entirely is it in harmony with all His teaching to emphasize to the utmost the individual choice and the individual responsibility. "If thou art wise, thou art wise for thyself: and if thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it." There can be no progress, indeed no beginning, in the spiritual life, until this attitude of personal isolation is understood. It is the last result of true religion that we live in others; but it is the first that we live in ourselves; and until we have learnt to live in ourselves we can be of no use by living in others. Until the individual soul is dealt with, until it has understood the demands which are made upon it, and met them, it is in no position to take its rightful place as a lively stone in the temple of God, or as a living member in the body of Christ. Yes, realize this searching assurance of Wisdom, let us say, rather, of Christ: if you are like the wise virgins in the parable, it is for your own everlasting good, you shall enter into the hall with the Bridegroom; but if you are like the foolish virgins, no wisdom of the wise can avail you, no vicarious light will serve for your lamps; for you there must be the personal humiliation and sorrow of the Lord's "I know you not."

If with scornful indifference to your high trust as a servant of the Master you hide your talent, and justify your conduct to yourself by pleading that the Master is a hard man, that scorn must recoil upon your own head; so far from the enlarged wealth of the others coming to meet your deficiencies, the misused trifle which you still retain will be taken from you and given to them. Men have sometimes favoured the notion that it is possible to spend a life of scornful indifference to God and all His holy commandments, a life of arrogant self-seeking and bitter contempt for all His other creatures, and yet to find oneself at the end entirely purged of one's contempt, and on precisely equal terms with all pious and humble hearts; but against this notion Wisdom loudly exclaims; it is the notion of Folly, and so far from redeeming the folly, it is Folly's worst condemnation; for surely Conscience and Reason, the heart and the head, might tell us that it is false; and all that is sanest and wisest in us concurs in the direct and simple assurance, "If thou scornest, thou alone shalt bear it."

Such is the invitation, and such the warning, of Wisdom; such is the invitation, and such the warning, of Christ. Leave off, ye simple ones, and live. After all, most of us are not scorners, but only very foolish, easily dazzled with false lights, easily misled with smooth utterances which happen to chime in with our own ignorant prejudices, easily seduced into by-paths which in quiet moments we readily acknowledge to be sinful and hurtful. The scorners are but a few; the simple ones are many. Here is this gracious voice appealing to the simple ones, and with a winsome liberality inviting them to the feast of Wisdom.

At the close of ver. 12 the LXX. give a very interesting addition, which was probably translated from a Hebrew original. It seems to have been before our Lord's mind when He drew the description of the unclean spirit walking through waterless places, seeking rest and finding none.[151] The passage is a figurative delineation of the evils which result from making shams and insincerities the support of life, in place of the unfailing sureness and available strength of wisdom; it may be rendered thus: "He who makes falsehood his support shepherds the winds, and will find himself pursuing birds on the wing; for it means leaving the paths of his own vineyard, and wandering over the borders of his own husbandry; it means walking through a waterless wilderness, over land which is the portion of the thirsty; he gathers in his hands fruitlessness." What a contrast to the spacious halls and the bountiful fare of Wisdom! A life based upon everlasting verities may seem for the time cold and desolate, but it is founded upon a rock, and not a barren rock either, for it sends forth in due course corn, and wine, and oil. The children in that house have bread enough and to spare. But when a man prefers make-believe to reality, and follows the apparently pleasant, instead of the actually good, what a clutching of winds it is! what a chase after swift-vanishing birds of joy! The wholesome ways, fruitful, responsive to toil, are left far behind; and here soon is the actual desert, without a drop of water to cool the lips, or a single fruit of the earth which a man can eat. The deluded soul consumed his substance with harlots, and he gathers the wind. The ways of vice are terrible; they produce a thirst which they cannot quench; and they fill the imagination with torturing images of well-being which are farther removed from reality by every step we take. Wisdom bids us to make truth our stay, for after all the Truth is the Way and the Life, and there is no other way, no other life.

And now comes the brief closing picture of Folly, to which again the LXX. give a short addition. Folly is loud, empty-headed as her victims, whom she invites to herself, not as Wisdom invites them, to leave off their simplicity, but rather as like to like, that their ignorance may be confirmed into vice, and their simplicity into brutishness. She has had the effrontery to build her house in the most prominent and lofty place of the city, where by good rights only Wisdom should dwell. Her allurements are specially directed to those who seem to be going right on in their wholesome ways, as if she found her chief delight, not in gratifying the vicious, but in making vicious the innocent. Her charms are poor and tawdry enough; seen in the broad sunlight, and with the wholesome air all round her, she would be revolting to every uncorrupted nature; her clamorous voice would sound strident, and her shameless brow would create a blush of shame in others; she naturally therefore seeks to throw a veil over herself and a glamour over her proposals; she suggests that secrecy and illicitness will lend a charm to what in itself is a sorry delight. It is clandestine, therefore it is to be sweet; it is forbidden, therefore it is to be pleasant. Could anything be more sophistical? That which owes its attraction to the shadows of the night must obviously be intrinsically unattractive. It is an argument fit only for the shades of the lost, and not for those who breathe the sweet air and behold the sun. Her house is indeed haunted with ghosts, and when a man enters her portal he already has his foot in hell. Well may the LXX. add the vehement warning, "Spring away from her clutches; do not linger in the place; let her not have thy name, for thou wilt traverse another's waters; from another's waters hold aloof, from another's fountains do not drink, in order that thou mayest live long, and add to thy years of life."

And now, before leaving this subject, we must briefly remark the great change and advance which Christ has brought into our thought of the relation between the two sexes. This Book of Wisdom is a fair illustration of the contempt in which woman was held by the wise men of Israel. One would suppose that she is the temptress, and man is the victim. The teacher never dreams of going a step backward, and asking whose fault it was that the temptress fell into her vicious ways. He takes no note of the fact that women are first led astray before they lead others. Nor does he care to inquire how the men of his day ruined their women by refusing to them all mental training, all wholesome interest and occupation, shutting them up in the corrupting atmosphere of the seraglio, and teaching them to regard the domestic sphere, and that only in its narrowest sense, as the proper limit of their thought and affection. It was reserved for the Great Teacher, the Incarnate Wisdom Himself, to redress this age-long injustice to woman, by sternly holding up to men the mirror of truth in which they might see their own guilty hearts.[152] It was reserved for him to touch the conscience of a city woman who was a sinner, and to bring her from her clamorous and seductive ways to the sweetness of penitential tears, and the rapturous love which forgiveness kindles. It is He, and not the ancient Wisdom, which has turned the current of men's thoughts into juster and kindlier ways on this great question. And thus it is that the great Christian poet represents the archangel correcting the faulty judgment of man.[153] Adam, speaking with the usual virtuous indignation of the stronger sex in contemplation of the soft vision of frail women presented to his eyes, says:--

"O pity and shame, that they, who to live well
Entered so fair, should turn aside to tread
Paths indirect, or in the midway faint!
But still I see the tenour of man's woe
Holds on the same, from woman to begin."

The correction is the correction of Christ, though Michael is the speaker:--

"From man's effeminate slackness it begins,"
Said the angel, "who should better hold his place,
By wisdom and superior gifts received."

Our Lord draws no such pictures as these in the book of Proverbs; they have their value; it is necessary to warn young men against the seductions which the vices of other men have created in woman's form; but He prefers always to go to the root of the matter; He speaks to men themselves; He bids them restrain the wandering eye, and keep pure the fountains of the heart. To that censorious Wisdom which judges without any perception that woman is more sinned against than sinning He would oppose His severe command to be rid of the beam in one's own eye, before making an attempt to remove the mote from another's. It is in this way that He in so many varied fields of thought and action has turned a half truth into a whole truth by going a little deeper, and unveiling the secrets of the heart; and in this way He has enabled us to use the half truth, setting it in its right relation to the whole.[154]

FOOTNOTES:

[134] _Cf._ for this contrast between the two xxiii. 26-28, where Wisdom speaks, and expressly warns against her rival.

[135] The arrangement of the house is that of an open courtyard, surrounded with apartments, the general roof supported on the pillars thus.

[136] Prov. vii. 14.

[137] Prov. ix. 5.

[138] Matt. xxii. 1, _et seq._

[139] Prov. ix. 6.

[140] Prov. ix. 7.

[141] Prov. xxiii. 9.

[142] Prov. xiii. 1.

[143] Prov. xiv. 6.

[144] Prov. xv. 12.

[145] Prov. xix. 25.

[146] Prov. xxiv. 9.

[147] Prov. xxii. 10.

[148] Matt. vii. 6.

[149] Prov. ix. 9. _Cf._ xviii. 15, "The heart of the prudent getteth knowledge; and the ear of the wise seeketh knowledge."

[150] Prov. ix. 10.

[151] Matt. xii. 43.

[152] See John viii. 1 _et seq._

[153] Milton, _Paradise Lost_, xi. 650 etc.

[154] The fuller teaching of the book on the subject of Woman will be found in Lect. XXXI.

X.

_WEALTH._

"Treasures of wickedness profit nothing:
But righteousness delivereth from death."--PROV. x. 2.

"O'erweening statesmen have full long relied
On fleets and armies and external wealth;
But from _within_ proceeds a Nation's health."
WORDSWORTH.

No moral system is complete which does not treat with clearness and force the subject of wealth. The material possessions of an individual or of a nation are in a certain sense the pre-requisites of all moral life; for until the human being has food to eat he cannot be virtuous, he cannot even live; until he has clothing he cannot be civilised; and unless he has a moderate assurance of necessaries, and a certain margin of leisure secured from the toil of life, he cannot live well, and there can be no moral development in the full sense of that term. And so with a nation: it must have a sufficient command of the means of subsistence to maintain a considerable number of people who are not engaged in productive labour, before it can make much advance in the noblest qualities of national life, progress in the arts, extension of knowledge, and spiritual cultivation. The production of wealth, therefore, if not strictly speaking a moral question itself, presses closely upon all other moral questions. Wisdom must have something to say about it, because, without it, Wisdom, in a material world like ours, could not exist.

Wisdom will be called upon to direct the energies which produce wealth, and to determine the feelings with which we are to regard the wealth which is produced.

Moral problems weightier still begin to emerge when the question of Distribution presents itself. Moral considerations lie at the root of this question; and Political Economy, so far as it attempts to deal with it apart from moral considerations, must always be merely a speculative, and not a practical or a fruitful science.

If Production is in a sense the presupposition of all moral and spiritual life, no less certainly correct moral conceptions--may we not even say true spiritual conditions?--are the indispensable means of determining Distribution. For a society in which every individual is striving with all his strength or cunning to procure for himself the largest possible share of the common stock, in which therefore the material possessions gravitate into the hands of the strong and the unscrupulous, while the weak and the honourable are left destitute--such a society, if it ever came into existence, would be a demoralised society. Such a demoralisation is always probable when the means of production have been rapidly and greatly improved, and when the fever of getting has overpowered the sense of righteousness and all the kindlier human feelings. Such a demoralisation is to be averted by securing attention to the abiding moral principles which must govern men's action in the matter of wealth, and by enforcing these principles with such vividness of illustration and such cogency of sanction that they shall be generally accepted and practised.

In our own day this question of the distribution of wealth stands in the front rank of practical questions. Religious teachers must face it, or else they must forfeit their claim to be the guides and instructors of their generation.

Socialists are grappling with this question not altogether in a religious spirit: they have stepped into a gap which Christians have left empty; they have recognised a great spiritual issue when Christians have seen nothing but a material problem of pounds, shillings, and pence, of supply and demand, of labour and capital. Where Socialism adopts the programme of Revolution, Wisdom cannot give in her adhesion; she knows too well that suffering, impatience, and despair are unsafe, although very pathetic, counsellors; she knows too well that social upheaval does not produce social reconstruction, but a weary entail of fresh upheavals; she has learnt, too, that society is organic, and cannot, like Pelops in the myth, win rejuvenescence by being cut up and cast into the cauldron, but can advance only by a quiet and continuous growth, in which each stage comes naturally and harmoniously out of the stage which preceded. But all Socialism is not revolutionary. And Wisdom cannot withhold her sympathy and her aid where Socialism takes the form of stating, and expounding, and enforcing truer conceptions concerning the distribution of wealth. It is by vigorous and earnest grappling with the moral problem that the way of advance is prepared; every sound lesson therefore in the right way of regarding wealth, and in the use of wealth, is a step in the direction of that social renovation which all earnest men at present desire.

The book of Proverbs presents some very clear and decisive teaching on this question, and it is our task now to view this teaching, scattered and disconnected though it be, as a whole.

I. The first thing to be noted in the book is its _frank and full recognition that Wealth has its advantages_, and _Poverty has its disadvantages_. There is no quixotic attempt to overlook, as many moral and spiritual systems do, the perfectly obvious facts of life. The extravagance and exaggeration which led St. Francis to choose Poverty as his bride find no more sanction in this Ancient Wisdom than in the sound teaching of our Lord and His Apostles. The rich man's wealth is his strong city,[155] we are told, and as an high wall in his own imagination, while the destruction of the poor is their poverty. The rich man can ransom himself from death if by chance he has fallen into difficulties, though this benefit is to some extent counterbalanced by the reflection that the poor escape the threats of such dangers, as no bandit would care to attack a man with an empty purse and a threadbare cloak.[156] The rich man gains many advantages through his power of making gifts; it brings him before great men,[157] it procures him universal friendship, such as it is,[158] it enables him to pacify the anger of an adversary,[159] for indeed a gift is as a precious stone in the eyes of him that hath it, whithersoever it turneth it prospereth.[160] Not only does wealth make many friends,[161] it also secures positions of influence and authority, over those who are poorer, enabling a man to sit in Parliament or to gain the governorship of a colony.[162] It gives even the somewhat questionable advantage of being able to treat others with brusqueness and hauteur.[163]

On the other hand, the poor man has to use entreaties.[163] His poverty separates him from his neighbours, and even incurs his neighbours' hatred.[164] Nay, worse than this, his friends go far from him, his very brethren hate him, if he calls after them they quickly get out of his reach;[165] while the necessity of borrowing from wealthier men keeps him in a position of continual bondage.[166] Indeed, nothing can compensate for being without the necessaries of life: "Better is he that is lightly esteemed, and is his own servant, than he that honoureth himself, and lacketh bread."[167]

Since then Poverty is a legitimate subject of dread, there are urgent exhortations to diligence and thrift, quite in accordance with the excellent apostolic maxim that if a man will not work he shall not eat; while there are forcible statements of the things which tend to poverty, and of the courses which result in comfort and wealth. Thus it is pointed out how slack and listless labour leads to poverty, while industry leads to wealth.[168] We are reminded that the obstinate refusal to be corrected is a fruitful source of poverty,[169] while the humble and pious mind is rewarded with riches as well as with honour and life.[170] In the house of the wise man are found treasures as well as all needful supplies.[171] Drunkenness and gluttony lead to poverty, and drowsiness clothes a man with rags.[172] And there is a beautiful injunction to engage in an agricultural life, which is the only perennial source of wealth, the only secure foundation of a people's prosperity. As if we were back in patriarchal times, we are thus admonished in the later proverbs of Solomon[173]:--

"Be thou diligent to know the state of thy flocks,
And look well to thy herds;
For riches are not for ever;
And doth the crown endure unto all generations?
The hay is carried, and the tender grass showeth itself,
And the herbs of the mountains are gathered in.
The lambs are for thy clothing,
And the goats are the price of the field:
And there will be goats' milk enough for thy food, for the
food of thy household;
And maintenance for thy maidens."

II. But now, making all allowance for the advantages of wealth, we have to notice _some of its serious drawbacks_. To begin with, it is always insecure. If a man places any dependence upon it, it will fail him; only in his imagination is it a sure defence.[174] "Wilt thou set thine eyes upon it? it is gone. For riches certainly make themselves wings, like an eagle that flieth toward heaven."[175]

But, further, if the wealth has been obtained in any other way than by honest labour it is useless, at any rate for the owner, and indeed worse than useless for him.[176]

As the text says, treasures of wickedness profit nothing. In the revenues of the wicked is trouble.[177] Got in light and fallacious ways, the money dwindles; only when gathered by labour does it really increase.[178] When it is obtained by falsehood--by the tricks and misrepresentations of trade, for example--it may be likened to a vapour driven to and fro--nay, rather to a mephitic vapour, a deadly exhalation, the snares of death.[179] Worst of all is it to obtain wealth by oppression of the poor; one who does so shall as surely come to want as he who gives money to those who do not need it.[180] In fact, our book contains the striking thought that ill-earned wealth is never gathered for the benefit of the possessor, but only for the benefit of the righteous, and must be useless until it gets into hands which will use it benevolently.[181]

And while there are these serious drawbacks to material possessions, we are further called upon to notice that there is wealth of another kind, wealth consisting in moral or spiritual qualities, compared with which wealth, as it is usually understood, is quite paltry and unsatisfying. When the intrinsic defects of silver and gold have been frankly stated, this earthy treasure is set, as a whole, in comparison with another kind of treasure, and is observed to become pale and dim. Thus "riches profit not in the day of wrath, but righteousness delivereth from death."[182] Indeed it is only the blessing of the Lord which brings riches without drawbacks.[183] In the house of the righteous is much treasure.[184] Better is a little with righteousness than great treasure without right.[185] In the light of these moral considerations the relative positions of the rich and the poor are reversed; it is better to be an honest poor man than a perverse rich man; the little grain of integrity in the heart and life outweighs all the balance at the bank.[186]

A little wisdom, a little sound understanding, or a little wholesome knowledge is more precious than wealth. How much better is it to get wisdom than gold. Yea, to get understanding is rather to be chosen than silver.[187] There may be gold and abundance of rubies, but the lips of knowledge are a precious jewel.[188]

Nay, there are some things apparently very trifling which will so depreciate material wealth that if a choice is to be made it is well to let the wealth go and to purchase immunity from these trivial troubles. Better is a little with the fear of the Lord than great treasure and trouble therewith. Better is a dinner of herbs where love is than a stalled ox and hatred therewith.[189] Better is a dry morsel and quietness therewith than an house full of feasting with strife.[190] Yes, the good will and affectionate regard of our fellow-men are on the whole far more valuable than a large revenue. A good name is rather to be chosen than great riches, and loving favour rather than silver and gold.[191] Indeed, when the relations of the rich and the poor are brought up into God's presence our whole conception of the matter is liable to change; we observe the rich and the poor meet together, and the Lord the maker of them all;[192] we observe that any slur cast on the poor or any oppression of them is practically a reproach against the Maker,[193] whilst any act of pity or tenderness to the needy is in effect a service rendered to God; and more and more we get to feel that notwithstanding the rich man's good opinion of himself he presents rather a sorry spectacle in the presence of the wise, even though the wise may be exceedingly poor.[194]

Taking into account therefore the intrinsic insecurity of wealth, and the terrible flaws in the title which may result from questionable ways of obtaining it, and estimating at a right value the other things which are not usually reckoned as wealth,--goodness, piety, wisdom, knowledge, and love,--we can quite understand that enlightened men might be too busy in life to make money, too occupied with grave purposes and engrossed with noble objects of pursuit to admit the perturbations of mammon into their souls.[195] Making all allowance for the unquestionable advantages of being rich, and the serious inconveniences of being poor, we may yet see reasons for not greatly desiring wealth, nor greatly dreading poverty.

III. But now we come to the positive counsels which our Teacher would give on the strength of these considerations about money and its acquisition. And first of all we are solemnly cautioned against the fever of money-getting, the passion to get rich, a passion which has the most demoralising effect on its victims, and is indeed an indication of a more or less perverted character. The good man cannot be possessed by it, and if he could he would soon become bad.[196]

These grave warnings of Wisdom are specially needed at the present time in England and America, when the undisguised and the unrestrained pursuit of riches has become more and more recognised as the legitimate end of life, so that few people feel any shame in admitting that this is their aim; and the clear unimpassioned statements of the result, which always follows on the unhallowed passion, receive daily confirmation from the occasional revelations of our domestic, our commercial, and our criminal life. He that is greedy of gain, we are told, troubleth his own house.[197] An inheritance may be gotten hastily at the beginning, but the end thereof shall not be blessed.[198] A faithful man shall abound with blessings, but he that maketh haste to be rich (and consequently cannot by any possibility be faithful) shall not be unpunished.[199] He that hath an evil eye hasteth after riches, and knoweth not that want shall come upon him.[200] "Weary not thyself," therefore, it is said, "to be rich;" which, though it may be the dictate of thine own wisdom,[201] is really unmixed folly, burdened with a load of calamity for the unfortunate seeker, for his house, and for all those who are in any way dependent upon him.

Again, while we are cautioned not to aim constantly at the increase of our possessions, we are counselled to exercise a generous liberality in the disposal of such things as are ours. Curiously enough, niggardliness in giving is associated with slothfulness in labour, while it is implied that the wish to help others is a constant motive for due diligence in the business of life. "There is that coveteth greedily all the day long, but the righteous giveth and withholdeth not."[202] The law of nature,--the law of life,--is to give out and not merely to receive, and in fulfilling that law we receive unexpected blessings: "There is that scattereth and increaseth yet more, and there is that withholdeth more than is meet, and it tendeth only to want. The liberal soul shall be made fat; and he that watereth shall be watered also himself."[203] "He that giveth to the poor shall not lack; but he that hideth his eyes shall have many a curse."[204] "He that hath pity on the poor lendeth unto the Lord, and his good deed will He pay him again."[205] "He that hath a bountiful eye shall be blessed; for he giveth of his bread to the poor."[206]

Such a wholesome shunning of the thirst for wealth, and such a generous spirit in aiding others, naturally suggest to the wise man a daily prayer, a request that he may avoid the dangerous extremes, and walk in the happy mean of worldly possessions: "Give me neither poverty nor riches; feed me with the food that is needful for me; lest I be full and deny thee, and say, Who is the Lord? or lest I be poor and steal, and use profanely the name of my God."[207] It is a request not easy to make with perfect sincerity; there are not many who, like Emerson's grandfather, venture to pray that neither they nor their descendants may ever be rich; while there have been not a few who in a "show of wisdom in will-worship and humility and severity to the body" have sought for an unnecessary and an unwholesome poverty. But it is a wise request; it finds an echo in the prayer which our Lord taught His disciples, and constantly appears inwoven in the apostolic teaching. And if the individual is to desire such things for himself, he must naturally desire that such may be the lot of his fellow-creatures, and he must make it the aim of his efforts after social reform to indefinitely increase the number of those who occupy this happy middle position, and have neither riches nor poverty.

And now we have followed the lines of teaching contained in this book on the subject of wealth, and it is impossible to miss the wisdom, the moderation, the inspiration of such counsels. We cannot fail to see that if these principles were recognised universally, and very generally practised; if they were ingrained in the constitution of our children, so as to become the instinctive motives and guides of action; the serious social troubles which arise from the unsatisfactory distribution of wealth would rapidly disappear. Happy would that society be in which all men were aiming, not at riches, but merely at a modest competency, dreading the one extreme as much as the other; in which the production of wealth were constantly moderated and controlled by the conviction that wealth gotten by vanity is as the snares of death; in which all who had become the owners of wealth were ready to give and glad to distribute, counting a wise benevolence, which in giving to the needy really lends to the Lord, the best investment in the world.

If these neglected principles are hitherto very faintly recognised, we must recollect that they have never been seriously preached. Although they were theoretically taught, and practically lived out, in the words and the life of Jesus Christ, they have never been fully incorporated into Christianity. The mediæval Church fell into the perilous doctrines of the Ebionites, and glorified poverty in theory while in practice it became an engine of unparalleled rapacity. Protestantism has generally been too much occupied with the great principle of Justification by Faith to pay much attention to such a writing as the Epistle of St. James, which Luther described as "a letter of straw"; and thus, while we all believe that we are saved by faith in Christ Jesus, it seldom occurs to us that such a faith must include the most exact and literal obedience to His teachings. Christian men unblushingly serve Mammon, and yet hope that they are serving God too, because they believe on Him whom God sent--though He whom God sent expressly declared that the two services could not be combined. Christian men make it the effort of a lifetime to become rich, although Christ declared that it was easier for a camel to enter the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven; and when they hear that Christ required an intending follower to sell all that he had and give to the poor, they explain it away, and maintain that He does not require such a sacrifice from them, but simply asks them to believe in the Atonement.

In this way Christians have made their religion incredible, and even ridiculous, to many of the most earnest spirits of our time. When Christ is made unto them Wisdom as well as Redemption, they will see that the principles of Wisdom which concern wealth are obligatory upon them, just because they profess to believe in Christ.

FOOTNOTES:

[155] Prov. x. 15; xviii. 11.

[156] Prov. xiii. 8.

[157] Prov. xviii. 16.

[158] Prov. xix. 6; xiv. 20.

[159] Prov. xxi. 14.

[160] Prov. xvii. 8. More literally: "A precious stone is the gift in the eyes of him who gets possession of it, whithersoever he turneth he deals wisely." That is to say, the man who receives the gift, whether a judge or a witness or an opponent, is as it were retained for the giver, and induced to use his best faculties in behalf of his retainer.

[161] Prov. xix. 4: "Wealth addeth many friends, but the poor--his companion separates from him."

[162] Prov. xxii. 17.

[163] Prov. xviii. 23.

[164] Prov. xiv. 20; xix. 4.

[165] Prov. xix. 7. The sense of the Authorised Version is here retained, but it will be seen in Lecture XII. that there is good reason for treating the third clause of the verse as a mutilated fragment of another proverb: see p. 166.

[166] Prov. xxii. 7.

[167] Prov. xii. 9. This reading is obtained by following the LXX., whose translation ὁ δουλεύων ἐαυτῷ shows that they pointed לוֹ וְעֹבֵד. _Cf._ Eccles. x. 27: "Better is he that laboureth and aboundeth in all things than he that boasteth himself and lacketh bread."

[168] Prov. x. 4.

[169] Prov. xiii. 18.

[170] Prov. xxii. 4.

[171] Prov. xxi. 20.

[172] Prov. xxiii. 21.

[173] Prov. xxvii. 23-27.

[174] Prov. xi. 28.

[175] Prov. xxiii. 5 (marg.).

[176] _Cf._ the Turkish proverb: "Of riches lawfully gained the devil takes half, of riches unlawfully gained he takes the whole and the owner too."

[177] Prov. xv. 6, _cf._ xiv. 24, "A crown of the wise is their riches, but the folly of fools, (though they be rich, remains nothing but) folly."

[178] Prov. xiii. 11.

[179] Prov. xxi. 6. It is evident from their translation ἐπὶ παγίδας θανάτου that the LXX. read מוֹקְשֵׁי־מָוֶת as in Psalm xviii. 6, and this gives a very graphic and striking sense, while the received text of the Hebrew, מְבַקְשֵׁי־מָוֶת, is hardly intelligible.

[180] Prov. xxii. 16.

[181] Prov. xiii. 22; xxviii. 8.

[182] Prov. xi. 4.

[183] Prov. x. 22.

[184] Prov. xv. 6.

[185] Prov. xvi. 8.

[186] Prov. xix. 1. The parallelism in this verse is not so complete as in xxviii. 6. The Peshitto reads, "than he who is perverse in his lips and is rich," but it is better to retain the text and understand: There is a poor man walking in his integrity, and everyone thinks that he is to be commiserated; but he is much better off than the fool with perverse lips, though no one thinks of commiserating this last.

[187] Prov. xvi. 16.

[188] Prov. xx. 15.

[189] Prov. xv. 16, 17.

[190] Prov. xvii. 1.

[191] Prov. xxii. 1. This proverb is inscribed in the cupola which lights the Manchester Exchange. It is a good skylight, but apparently too high up for the busy merchants on the floor of the Exchange to see without more effort than is to be expected of them.

[192] Prov. xxii. 2.

[193] Prov. xiv. 31; xvii. 5.

[194] Prov. xxviii. 11. Cf. an interesting addition to xvii. 6 in the LXX.--τοῦ πιστοῦ ὅλος ὁ κόσμος τῶν χρημάτων τοῦ δὲ ἀπίστου οὐδὲ ὀβολός. The faithful man owns the whole world of possessions, the unfaithful owns not a farthing.

[195] It is said of Agassiz that he excused himself from engaging in a profitable lecturing tour on the ground that he had not time to make money.

[196] _Cf._ the saying of Sirach: "Winnow not with every wind and go not into every way, for so doth the sinner that hath a double tongue." (Eccles. v. 9).

[197] Prov. xv. 27.

[198] Prov. xx. 21.

[199] Prov. xxviii. 20.

[200] Prov. xxviii. 22.

[201] Prov. xxiii. 4.

[202] Prov. xxi. 26.

[203] Prov. xi. 24, 25.

[204] Prov. xxviii. 27.

[205] Prov. xix. 17.

[206] Prov. xxii. 9.

[207] Prov. xxx. 8, 9.

XI.

_GOODNESS._

"The righteousness of the upright shall deliver them."--PROV. xi. 6.

"An unjust man is the abomination of the righteous, and he who goes
right in his way is the abomination of the wicked."--PROV. xxix. 27.

The book of Proverbs abounds with sayings which have the sound of truisms, sayings which repeat, with innumerable variations and shades of colouring, that wickedness is an evil, hateful to God and to men, and that righteousness is a blessing not only to the righteous themselves, but to all with whom they are connected. We are disposed to say, Surely no reasonable person can question such an obvious truth; but on reflection we remember that the truth was not perceived by the great religions of antiquity, is not recognised now by the vast majority of the human race, and even where it is theoretically admitted without question is too frequently forgotten in the hurry and the pressure of practical life. There is good reason therefore why the truism, as we are inclined to call it, should be thrown into the form of maxims which will find a hold in the memory, and readily occur to the mind on occasions of trial. And as we pass in review what Proverbial Religion has to say upon the subject, we shall perhaps be surprised to find how imperfectly we have apprehended the supreme importance of goodness, and how insidiously teachings, which were originally meant to enforce it, have usurped its place and treated it with contumely. It will begin to dawn upon us that the truth is a truism, not because it is carried out in practice, but only because no one has the hardihood to question it; and perhaps we shall receive some impulse towards transforming the conviction which we cannot dispute into a mode of conduct which we cannot decline.

To begin with, our book is most unflinching in its assertions that, notwithstanding all appearances to the contrary, _wickedness is a mistake_, a source of perpetual weakness and insecurity, always in the long run producing ruin and death; while _righteousness is in itself a perpetual blessing_, and is weighted with beautiful and unexpected fruits. The very reiteration becomes most impressive.

The hope of the righteous shall be gladness; but the expectation of the wicked shall perish.[208] The righteous shall never be removed, but the wicked shall not dwell in the land.[209] The house of the wicked shall be overthrown, but the tent of the upright shall flourish.[210] The wicked earneth deceitful wages, but he that soweth righteousness hath a sure reward.[211] A man shall not be established by wickedness, while the root of the righteous shall never be moved.[212] The wicked really falls by his own wickedness, and is swept away by his own violence.[213] He sows iniquity and reaps calamity.[214] His crooked way, his malignant thoughts, the hatred against his neighbour, the guile in his heart, and the flood of evil things which comes out of his lips, have one issue--destruction.[215] When he comes to die, his expectation perishes, all the hope of iniquity ends in disappointment.[216] His lamp goes out not to be relit.[217] Meanwhile, the light of the righteous man rejoices, because he attains unto life as surely as the wicked works towards death.[218]

It is true that the appearance of things is different. Hand joins in hand to promote evil.[219] Men follow out what seems right in their own hearts, evil as they are.[220] Success seems to attend them, and one is tempted to envy the sinners, and to fret at their ways.[221] But the envy is misplaced; the evil man does not go unpunished; the wicked are overthrown and are not.[222] The way which seemed right in a man's eyes proves to be the way of death.[223] A righteous man falleth seven times and riseth up again; but the wicked are overthrown by calamity,[224] and the righteous are obliged to look upon their fall.[225]

On the other hand, goodness is its own continual reward. While treacherous men are destroyed by their perverseness, the upright are guided by their own integrity.[226] While the sinner is overthrown by his wickedness, righteousness guardeth him that is upright in the way.[227] If the righteous gets into trouble he is delivered, while the wicked falls into his place:[228] there is a kind of substitution; a ransom is paid to enable the righteous to escape, and the ransom is the person of the wicked.[229] Not only does the righteous come out of trouble,[230] but, strictly speaking, no mischief really happens to him; it is only the wicked that is filled with evil.[231] The righteous eats to the satisfying of his own soul, but the belly of the wicked shall want.[232] The good man walks on a highway and so preserves his soul.[233] Mercy and truth shine upon him because he devises good.[234] He only followed after righteousness and mercy, but he found life, righteousness, and honour.[235] His heart is flooded with joy, he actually sings as he journeys on.[236] He seems like a tree in the green leaf, a tree of life, the fruits of which cannot fail to be attractive; so that he unconsciously wins favour.[237] The fruit does not fail, because the root is alive.[238] And if in actual life this blessedness of the good man does not appear, if by reason of the evil in the world the righteous seem to be punished, and the noble to be smitten,[239] that only creates a conviction that the fruit will grow in another life; for when we have closely observed the inseparable connection between goodness and blessedness, we cannot avoid the conviction that "the righteous hath hope in his death."[240] Yes, practical goodness is the source of perpetual blessing, and it cannot be altogether hidden. Even a child maketh himself known by his doings, whether his work be pure and right.[241] To the good we must assign the supremacy; the evil must bow before them and wait at their gates.[242] And it is easy to understand why it appears so incongruous--so abnormal, like a troubled fountain and a corrupted spring, when the righteous give way to the wicked.[243]