II. How to treat a fool.“Go from the presence of a foolish man.” There are three reasons why we go from the neighbourhood of a polluted and polluting carcase. First, its odour is offensive to us. Secondly, to linger near may generate disease in our bodies. Thirdly, being diseased ourselves, we may become an occasion of injury to others. So a man void of moral wisdom ought to be an offensive presence to every man. Our moral instincts ought to be strong enough without any outside voice to say, “Go from him.” The “folly of a fool,” being deceit, he is an incarnation of the devil; our own self-love should prompt us to quit his society. The man that mocks at sin is a generator of moral disease, we cannot be in his company without moral injury, and if we catch the pestilence ourselves we shall in turn infect others with the disease.
III. What constitutes a prudent or morally wise man.He “understands his way.” A fool cannot be said to have awayor method of life any more than the leaf which is driven before the wind, or the timber that is floating down the rapid. Like them, he is the victim of circumstances; he is driven hither and thither by the currents of inclination or passion. He has no “way” to understand. He is as a cloud driven before the hurricane. He floats like a rudderless vessel upon the sea of life. But a prudent man has a“way,”or method of life (see Homiletics on chap.xiii. 14), and the great business of his life is to “understand” it—to find the best means of bringing his life into conformity with that rule of righteousness which is his standard of life; to gather from the voice of God in revelation, in conscience, and in Providence what course he is to pursue, what at all times is the right thing to do, and what is the right way of doing it. This is the life-study of the man who is morally prudent, and the highest aim that a man can propose to himself is to attain to a right understanding of his way. (On the latter clause of verse 9 see Homiletics on chap.xiii. 14.)
outlines and suggestive comments.
Verse 7. The path of sin is much more easily avoided than relinquished. We can far more easily keep out of the course of the stream than stem the torrent.—Bridges.
Thou mayest tarry with a foolish man while he holdeth his peace, and while he is willing and patient to hear thee. For he may get knowledge by hearing, and thou mayest have comfortby speaking. But it is time to be gone when by his lips thou perceivest knowledge to be gone from them.—Jermin.
In nature, some creatures are strong and bold, having both instincts and instruments for combat: other creatures are feeble but fleet. It is the intention of their Maker that they should seek safety, not in fighting, but in fleeing. It would be a fatal mistake if the hare, in a fit of bravery, should turn and face her pursuers. In the moral conflict of human life it is of great importance to judge rightly when we should fight and when we should flee. The weak might escape if they knew their own weakness, and kept out of harm’s way. That courage is not a virtue which carries the feeble into the lion’s jaws. I have known of some who ventured too far with the benevolent purpose of bringing a victim out, and were themselves sucked in and swallowed up. To go in among the foolish for the rescue of the sinking may be necessary, but it is dangerous work, and demands robust workmen. . . . The specific instruction recorded in Scripture for such a case is, “save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating even the garment spotted with the flesh” (Jude 23). He who would volunteer for this work must fear lest the victim perish ere he get him dragged out, and fear lest himself be scorched by the flame.—Arnot.
Verse 8. We are not to infer, because“wisdom”eludes the scorner, that it is, therefore, something mystic. It fits earth so closely, that it actually carves our“way.”Nay, more closely still, it is actually path-finding itself. She takes a man from her very gate, and tells him all that he must do. She not only discerns paths, but that is all of her; she does nothing else. “The wisdom of the subtle is the making discernible of his way,” while, on the other hand, “the folly of the stupid is(its own)delusion.” All of us having a way, and all of us following it with the great energy of our lives, “The excellency and knowledge is, that wisdom giveth life to them that have it.” Wisdom grasps its end; folly never. Wisdom is the great pathfinder; folly a “delusion.”—Miller.
Every man has afinal destinationbefore him. The way of all is the way to the grave, and to eternity. But in that eternity aretwowidely different states. To the opposite states there aretwoways—“the narrow,” and “the broad.” Oh the infinite value of true wisdom here,—the wisdom that understands both ways, and rightly chooses between!The folly of fools is deceitmay mean that the folly of fools proves to them deceit. Their confidence in it, and their expectations from it, are sheer delusion. Or the sense may be, “deceit is the folly of fools.” “New stratagems,” says Lord Bacon, “must be devised, the old failing and growing useless; and as soon as ever a man hath got the name of a cunning crafty companion, he hath deprived himself utterly of the principal instrument for the management of his affairs,—which istrust.” Policy, therefore, on this as on other accounts, is“the folly of fools.”—Wardlaw.
When men are acquainted with everything but what they ought to know, they are only notable fools. If we had hearts large as the sands upon the sea-shore, and filled with a world of things, whilst we remained ignorant of the way of attaining true happiness, we should resemble that philosopher who was busied gazing at the moon till he fell into the ditch. . . . They are fools who know other people’s business better than their own. Some people, if you will take their own word for it, could reign better than the king and preach better than the minister. They know, in short, how to manage in every condition but their own.—Lawson.
Religion is an orderly thing, as wise as it is warm. Whatever be the excitement of an irregular course, more good is done by steady consistency. To break the ranks in disorder, to be eager tounderstandour neighbour’s way (John xxi. 21, 22), obscures thelight upon our own. The truewisdom is to understandwhat belongs to us personally and relatively (1 Kings iii. 6–9; Eccles. viii. 5). “As God hath distributed to every man, so let him walk, and abide with God” (1 Cor. viii. 17). Let the eye do the work of the eye, and the hand of the hand. If Moses prayed in the mount, and Joshua fought in the valley (Exod. xvii. 10, 11), it was not because one was deficient in courage, and the other in prayer; but because each had his appointed work, andunderstood his own way.—Bridges.
Every one that goeth on in the right way doth notunderstandhis way. Hence it is that many so often wander out of it, hence that so easily they are drawn from it. But he that is prudent looketh into his way, considereth the dangers of it, provideth himself against the enemies that he shall or may meet with, and being well assured of the righteousness of the way, he goeth on with confidence and safety. And this isthe wisdom of the prudent,this proves him to be wise. . . . Again, the folly of fools, though it be folly in themselves, it is deceit to the devil, who maketh them to think that to be the right way, wherein they are clean out of the way.—Jermin.
Verse 9. The word here used signifieth both the fault and the guilt of it, whereby the offender is liable unto wrath and punishment. For they being firmly joined together, the Hebrew joineth them in the same word. Notwithstanding fools not finding the scourge of sin tied immediately unto the act committed, as if they were mocked when they are told of punishment to come, they make a mock at it. The favour, therefore, which the righteous show them is quickly to make them feel the rod of justice. For while they punish the offence they show great love to the offender, not only in stopping the course of his sinning, which is the stopping the increase of his misery, but it may be also working his amendment, which is the salvation of his soul.—Jermin.
The idea of sacrificial offering is that of expiation (seeCritical Notesfor the renderings of the word translated sin): it is a penitential work, it falls under the prevailing point of view of an ecclesiastical punishment, asatisfactionin a church-disciplinary sense. The forgiveness of sin is conditioned by this, (1) that the sinner either abundantly makes good by restitution the injury inflicted on another, or in some other way bears temporal punishment for it, and (2) that he willingly presents the sacrifice of rams or of sheep, the value of which the priest has to determine in its relation to the offence. Fools fall from one offence to another, which they have to atone for by the presentation of sacrificial offerings; the sacrificial offering mocketh them, for it equally derides them on account of the self-inflicted loss, and on account of the errors with which they must make good the effects of their frivolity and madness; while on the contrary, among men of upright character, a relation of mutual favour prevails, which does not permit that the one give to the other an indemnity, and apply the trespass-offering.—Delitzsch.
“Sin makes a mock at fools; but between upright beings there is favour.”Not makes sport, as a fool might, of engaging in his sins. A fool maymake sportof sin, but hardly could be said to make a mock at it. “Sin makes a mock at fools,” but between “upright beings,” or “among the righteous,” we cannot conceive of any mockery. The upright God, and the upright saint; the upright saint and the upright Saviour; grace and judgment; faith, and the scenes of the last day; between these there must begoodwill, i.e.,mutual delight and favour. So 1 John iv. 17, 18, “Herein does the love gain its end between us (that is, between God and us; see ver. 16), that we may have boldness in the day of judgment;because as He is, so are we in this world,” etc.—Miller.
Among the righteous is favour; that is to say, the practice of virtue and uttering of gracious speeches,joined with such goodwill and sweet joy as their meeting is like the precious ointment that was poured on the head of Aaron.—Muffet.
The conduct of the man who makes a mock at sin involves—1.Impiety.To mock at sin is to despise God’s holiness, set at nought God’s authority, to abuse God’s goodness, to disregard and slight God’s glory. 2.Cruelty.The scoffer may pretend to humanity, but there breathes not on earth a more iron-hearted monster. He may profess to feel for the miseries of mankind; for the ravages of disease and death over their bodies; of fire, and flood, and storm over their means of life and comfort; of melancholy, and idiocy, and madness over their minds. But he makes a mock at the prolificcauseof all. There is not an ill that man is called upon to suffer that does not owe its origin to sin. Like the “star called wormwood” in the Apocalyptic vision, it has fallen on very “fountain and river” of human joy, turning all their waters into bitterness. It is the sting of conscience. It is the venom and barb of the darts of the King of Terrors. It is the very life of the “worm that dieth not.” Oh! the miserably-mistaken flattery that can speak of the kind-heartedness of the man who laughs at that which is the embryo-germ of all the sufferings of time, and all the woes of eternity. 3.Infatuation.Sin is the evil that is ruining the sinner himself—the disease that is preying upon his own vitals—the secret consuming fire that is wasting his eternal all. Yet the deluded victim of its power makes a jest of it!—Wardlaw.
Some men are so like their father, the devil, that they will tempt men to sin that they may laugh at them.—Lawson.
To complete the antithesis, the sense must be supplied, fools make a mock at sin (and so incur the wrath of God); but (the righteous regard sin as a serious offence), and therefore among the righteous there is the favour of God.—Fausset.
The fools’ sport—sin.1.Sin,which is so contrary to goodness that it is abhorred of those sparks and cinders which the rust of sin hath not quite eaten out of our nature as the creation left it. 2.Sin,which sensibly brings on present judgments, or if not, is the more fearful. The less it receives here, the more is behind. 3.Sin,that shall at last be laid heavy on the conscience: the lighter the burden was at first, it shall be at last the more ponderous. The wicked conscience may for awhile lie asleep, but this calm is the greatest storm. 4.Sin,which provokes God to anger. 5.Sin,which was punished even in heaven. 6.Sin,which God so loathed that he could not save men because of it, except by the death of His own Son. Oh, think if ever man felt sorrow like Him, or if He felt any sorrow except for sin. Did the pressure of it lie so heavy upon the Son of God, and doth a son of man make light of it? Thou mocked at thy oppressions, oaths, frauds; for these He groaned. Thou scornest His gospel preached; He wept for thy scorn. Thou knowest not, O fool, the price of sin; thou must do, if thy Saviour did not for thee. If He suffered not this for thee, thou must suffer it for thyself.—T. Adams.
They dance with the devil all day, and yet think to sup with Christ. Their sweet meat must have sour sauce, but among the righteous, though they sin of infirmity, yet forasmuch as they are sensible of and sorrowful for their failings, and see them to confession, God will never see them to their confusion.—Trapp.
main homiletics of verse10.
Secrets of the Heart.
I. Opposite dwellers in the same spirit.“Bitterness” and “joy.” The world without us is a type of the world within us. In the world of matter the bitter cold, the desolations of winter, alternates with the brightness and joyous fruitfulness of summer. On the same globe we have at the same time the vine-cladregions of southern latitudes, and the dreary shores of arctic regions. Bitterness in the human spirit is a fact of human consciousness, and so is joy. There are few hearts that have not been at different times possessed by both. There are few in which there does not dwell at the same time a root of gladness and a root of sadness.
II. A possession which its possessor may keep a profound secret.It is within the power of a human soul to keep his sorrow or his joy to himself if he so pleases, and under certain conditions this is a desirable thing to do. A man or woman often finds himself or herself surrounded by those who are entire strangers to the circumstances, or the persons, or the experiences which have given birth to the sorrow or the joy. To speak of it to such would be worse than useless. It is a comfort in such circumstances to be able to lock the secret within one’s own breast. There is a consolation in sorrow, and a sense of increase of joy in not being compelled to lay open our feelings to the inspection of the unsympathetic. There are also sorrows of such a nature as to be entirely beyond the power of the tenderest human love to alleviate. To conceal such from all human ken is a kindness to those who love us. We should inflict sorrow upon them without lightening our own burden; and if we are unselfish, we are glad that it is possible in such a case to keep our bitterness within our own breast.
III. There is One who possesses the secret even more truly than the human possessor, and who should always be invited to intermeddle with our sorrow or our joy.1.We should invite God to intermeddle, because we can do so in the strictest secrecy of the soul.It may be impossible sometimes to put into words our joy or our sorrow, and therefore no human being, even the nearest and dearest,can always“intermeddle” with our deep emotions. But thethoughtisspeechto God. He “knoweth what is in the mind of the spirit.” 2.Because God’s “intermeddling” will bring softening to our bitterness and refinement to our joy.He “knew the sorrows” of Israel in their bitter bondage (Exod. iii. 7). He sent His Son to “bind up the broken-hearted” (Isa. lxi. 1). That Son Himself has known a bitterness that is unknowable by any creature. And as He can lighten sorrow so He can refine and increase joy.
outlines and suggestive comments.
Within the range of human experience there is, perhaps, no expression of the ultimate solitude of each man’s soul at all times, and not merely (as in Pascal’sJe mourrai seul) at the hour of death, so striking in its truth and depth as this. Something there is in every sorrow, and in every joy, which no one else can share. Beyond that range it is well to remember that there is a Divine sympathy, uniting perfect knowledge and perfect love.—Plumptre.
The first half of this proverb treats of life experiences which are too complex a nature to be capable of being fully represented to others, and, as we are wont to say, of so delicate a nature that we shrink from uncovering them and making them known to others, and which, on this account, must be kept shut up in our own hearts, because no man is so near to us, or has so fully gained our confidence, that we have the desire and the courage to pour out our hearts to him from the very depths. If we were to interpret the second clause asprohibitive(seeCritical Notes), then this would stand in opposition, certainly not intended, to the exhortation (Rom. xii. 15), “Rejoice with them that do rejoice,” and to the saying, “Distributed joy is doubled joy, distributed sorrow is half sorrow;” and an admonition to leave man alone with his joy, instead of urging him to distribute it, does not run parallel with the first clause. Therefore we interpret the future aspotentialis.—Delitzsch.
Not to let a man be private in his house is a great injury, but not to let a man be private in his heart is a wrong inexcusable. And yet this is the strange presumption of some. They know theheartof another; they know what troubles it and what pains it. Perhaps by some discoveries thou mayest have some conjectures; but let not a small conjecture make thee a great offender. Wrong not another with unjust surmising. Every key a man meets with is not the right key to this lock; every likelihood thou apprehendest is not a sure sign to make thee know the heart of another.—Jermin.
“A knowing heart is a bitterness to itself; but with its joy it does not hold intercourse as an enemy.”We venture upon this translation. We find no spiritual sense in the one heretofore given. . . . A heart spiritually enlightened is a bitterness to itself on the principle which Christ meant when He said, He “came not to send peace, but a sword” (Matt. x. 34); but with its joy, weak as it may be, and small and easily clouded, “it does not,” as the impenitent do, “hold intercourse as with an enemy.” Hisjoyis like hisbitterness,a friend; and all will work in opposite direction to the joy of the wicked.—Miller.
Eli could not enter into the “bitterness of soul” of Hannah (1 Sam. i. 10, 13, 16): nor Gehazi into that of the Shunamite woman (2 Kings iv. 27). Michal, though the wife of David, was “a stranger to his joy” at the bringing up of the ark to Zion (1 Sam. xviii. 13, 20, with 2 Sam. vi. 12–16).—Fausset.
The two extreme experiences of a human heart, which comprehend all others between them, are “bitterness” and “joy.” The solitude of a human being in either extremity is a solemnising thought. Whether you are glad or grieved, you must be alone. The bitterness and the joyfulness are both your own. It is only in a modified sense, and in a limited measure, that you can share them with another, so as to have less of them yourself. . . . Sympathy between two human beings is, after all, little more than a figure of speech. A physical burden can be divided equally between two. If you, unburdened, overtake a weary pilgrim on the way, toiling beneath a load of a hundred pounds weight, you may volunteer to bear fifty of them for the remaining part of the journey, and so lighten his load by half. But a light heart, however willing it may be, cannot so relieve a heavy one. The cares that press upon the spirit are as real as the load that lies on the back, and as burdensome; but they are not so tangible and divisible. . . . There are, indeed, some very intimate unions in human society, as organized by God. . . . The closest of them all, the two “no longer twain, but one flesh,” is a union of unspeakable value for such sympathy as is compatible with distinct personality at all. . . . The wife of your bosom can, indeed, intermeddle with your joys and sorrows, as no stranger can do, and yet there are depths of both in your breast which even she has no line to fathom. When you step into the waters of life’s last sorrow, even she must stand back and remain behind. Each must go forward alone. The Indiansutteeseems nature’s struggle against that fixed necessity of man’s condition. But is a vain oblation. Although the wife burn on the husband’s funeral pile, the frantic deed does not lighten the solitude of the dark valley. One human being cannot be merged in another. Man must accept the separate personality that belongs to his nature.—Arnot.
It is true, observes a philosophic essayist, that we have all much in common; but what we have most in common is this, that we are all isolated. Man is more than a combination of passions common to his kind. Beyond them and behind them, an inner life, whose current we think we know within us, flows on in solitary stillness. Friendship itself is declared to have nothing in common with this dark sensibility, so repellent and so forbidding, much less may a stranger penetrateto those untrodden shores. We may apply Wordsworth’s lines,—
To friendship let him turnFor succour; but perhaps he sits aloneOn stormy waters, tossed in a little boatThat holds but him, and can contain no more.
—Jacox.
By this thought the worth and the significance of each separate human personality is made conspicuous, not one of which is the example of a species, but each has its own peculiarity, which no one of countless individuals possesses.—Elster.
Who but aparentcan fully know the “bitterness” of his grief who “mourneth for an only son”—of him who is “in bitterness for his first-born.” Who but a parent can sympathise with the royal mourner’s anguish over a son that has died in rebellion against his father and his God! Who but awidowcan realise the exquisite bitterness of a widow’s agony when bereft of the loved partner of her joys and sorrows! Who but apastorcan know, in all its intensity, the bitterness of soul experienced in seeing those on whom he counted as genuine fruits of his ministry, and on whom he looked with delighted interest, as his anticipated “joy and crown” in “the day of the Lord,” falling away—going back and walking no more with Jesus.—Wardlaw.
The principal thought of verse 11 has been treated before. See on chapterii. 21, 22, etc.
outlines and suggestive comments.
The wicked build houses on the earth; the earth is their home, where they desire to be, and they imagine to settle themselves in it. The upright do set up tabernacles only, seeking another country, and as knowing the uncertainty upon which the world standeth. For though the habitation of the wicked be ahouse,and rooted in the earth, yet it shall not only beshaken,butoverthrown,and though the abiding of the upright be but atabernaclepinned to the earth, yet shall it stand so safely that it shallflourishlike a rooted tree. Wherefore, when in the Revelation we read “Woe to the inhabitants of the earth” (chap. viii. 13), St. Jerome understands it of the wicked only. For a godly man is not an inhabiter of the earth, but a stranger and a sojourner. And his tabernacle doth so flourish, that it reacheth to heaven, for he hath his dwelling in heaven to whom the whole world is an inn.—Jermin.
The “house of the wicked” may be a most prosperous one, and may seem to be full of peace; but it is doomed. It must become “desolate,” literallyastonished;which is the eastern way of describing great downfalls. “But the tent of the upright” (another intensive clause) his slenderest possessions; like a sprout; like some poor tender plant, shallbloom forth.Such is the meaning of“flourish.”—Miller.
main homiletics of verse12.
What Seems to Be, and What Is.
I. Human nature needs more light than is found in the human conscience.The way which “seems right unto a man” may be “the way of death.” A mariner who has insufficient light to observe correctly the needle in the compass, may think he is steering for the haven when he is taking the vessel straight upon the rocks. He may be very sincere in his conviction that he is going right, but his thinking so will not make it so. He needs more light than he has. So the light of conscience is not enough to guide a man with certainty in the true andright way. If conscientious sincerity was an infallible guide Paul would not have “delivered to prison” men and women for being followers of Jesus of Nazareth (Acts. xxii. 4). The way that in his ignorance seemed right to him, was felt by him to be a “way of death” when his conscience was enlightened. Conscience may be deadened by sin, or warped by prejudice or self-interest; it is not a reliable and certain guide. If it were, it was needless for the Son of God to visit the earth and make known the will of His Father—the revelation of God’s will in the books of the Old and New Testaments is a superfluity. The existence of the Bible is explained by the fact which is found to be true by all God-taught men, that “the way of man is not in himself: it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps” (Jer. x. 23). God, by speaking unto men in “sundry times and in divers manners,” and especially “in these last days by His Son” (Heb. i. 1) declares plainly that man needs something outside of himself to guide him into that path of righteousness which alone is a way of life. The history of the world confirms this truth. Observation of every-day life tells the same tale.
II. The need of human nature has been fully met.All that the mariner needs in order to keep the vessel’s head right is light to see the compass. God in Christ is a sufficient light to man. Paul says:“God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ”(2 Cor. iv. 6). Christ Himself tells us that it is those only who “follow Him” who have the “light of life” (John viii. 12). That the way thus revealed is fully adapted to meet man’s need is proved by the results which follow from walking in it. The progress which a sick man makes towards health is the most convincing proof of the efficacy of his physician’s treatment. The light which is shed upon men by the revelation of God, and especially by the Gospel, has been proven by its result upon individuals and upon nations, to be all-powerful to turn men from “darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God” (Acts xxvi. 18). The way of sin is the way of death—death morally, socially, and physically. The way of holiness is the only way of spiritual life to the soul and to the community, and ensures victory over the penalty of bodily death.
illustration.
The Last Words of Hildebrand.—One of the greatest of the sons of earth (if we measure greatness either by posthumous fame or posthumous influence) lay on his death bed. Prelates, princes, priests, devoted adherents and attendants stood around. Anxious to catch the last accents of that once oracular voice, the mourners were bending over him, when, struggling in the very grasp of death, he collected, for one last effort, his failing powers, and breathed out his spirit with the indignant exclamation, “I have loved righteousness and hated iniquity, and therefore I die in exile.” . . . That he went into the unseen world consciously and deliberately with a lie in his right hand, is a supposition utterly inadmissible. Passionate earnestness and intense conviction were stamped upon all his words and works. . . . He had climbed the slippery steps of intrigue to the Papal throne, and to set that throne above all thrones of the earth, and to cause everyone, “both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond,” to bow down in the dust before it, was thenceforward his sole aim and object. . . . It was for this that he enforced that celibacy of the clergy which has ever since been the law of the Church. He found thousands of married priests ministering at her altars in innocence of heart, thinking no sin, and fearing no dishonour. . . . He commanded them to put away their wives on pain of excommunication, which meant deprivation of all rights, spiritual, social, and human. . . . One cry of indignation, one prolonged and bitter wail of agony, arose throughout Europe, from the Apennines to the Baltic Sea. . . . Wives were torn from their husbands, children from their fathers. Popular fanaticism allied itself with Papal tyranny. . . . There was no pity for worse than widowed wives, and worse than orphaned children flung out upon the cold world to starve. The Pontiff trod his stern, remorseless way over broken hearts. . . . But he had a dangerous antagonist to encounter. . . . The Holy Roman Empire and the Holy Roman Church were together to dominate the world. But which of them was to dominate the other?Hildebrand’s long contest with Henry IV. may be said to have decided the question. But with what weapons was it fought? We see the gallant Saxons tempted by bribes and promises to revolt, and then, in their hour of distress, treacherously abandoned by him who was at once their ally and “spiritual father,” and to whom they addressed in vain those noble and pathetic remonstrances which, even to this day, cannot be read without emotion. Thus Hildebrand “loved righteousness.”. . . But the Pontiff, so stern to his antagonists, could be mild to his allies. Keen swords in strong hands were necessary to support his power, the heaviest swords in Europe were borne by Norman knights. Robert, the conqueror of Sicily, William, the conqueror of England, were the representative men of this fierce and fiery race. . . . They were bloody, avaricious and unscrupulous. No more cruel conquerors ever turned a fruitful land into a waste, howling wilderness. No more remorseless oppressors ever trod down the poor with a heel of iron. . . . But their crimes were unrebuked by Hildebrand. . . . William was “addressed in the blandest accents of esteem and tenderness,” while Robert, the tyrant of Sicily, “was embraced and honoured as the faithful ally of Rome.” Thus Hildebrand “hated iniquity.” That “way” in which he walked all his life long with a consistency of purpose and intensity of energy that moves our admiration, seemed “right unto himself,” nay, it seemed to be pre-eminently the way of righteousness, but what shall we say of “the end thereof.”—Etchings from History,by Miss Alcock. SeeSunday at Home,February 15th, 1879.
outlines and suggestive comments.
Souls perish always with surprise. . . . But yet theseeinghere noted must be takencum grano.Deep in the lost heart of the knowledge of its“end,”rather its “afterpart.” The way lasts for ever, and itsafterward“is the ways of death!” Deep in the lost man’s heart he knows all this, and this makes a dark ground for his gaieties. (Seenext verse.)—Miller.
There are some ways which can hardly “seem right” to any man—the ways, namely, of open and flagrant wickedness. But there are many ways, which, under the biassing influence of pride and corruption, “seemright,” and yet their“end”is“death.”I. The way of the sober, well-behaved worldling.He thinks of the law as if it had been only one table, the first being entirely overlooked. He passes among his circle for a man of good character, and flatters himself, in proportion as he is flattered by others, that all is right. . . . But his way is not the way of life, for God is not in it.II. The way of the formalist.He follows, strictly and punctually, the round of religious observance. . . . But his heart has not been given to God. The world still has it. He compromises the retention of its affections for the things of sense by giving God the pitiful and worthless offering of outward homage. But it will not do. Those services cannotterminate in life,whichhave no life in them.III. The way of the speculative religionist.From education, or as a matter of curiosity, he has made himself an adept in religious controversy. He holds by the creed of orthodoxy, and imagines that this kind of knowledge is religion. But speculative opinion is not saving knowledge—is not the faith which “worketh by love” and “overcomes the world.”—Wardlaw.
Good intentions are not a justification for wrong doing (2 Sam. vi. 6). Judges xvii. 6 gives an awful illustration of the end of “every man doing that which is right in his own eyes.” (Cf. the prohibition of this, Deut. xii. 8.)—Fausset.
This may be hiseasily besetting sin,thesin of his constitution,thesin of his trade.Or it may behis own false views of religion:he may have animperfect repentance,afalse faith,avery false creed.Many of the Papists, when they were burning the saints of God in the flames of Smithfield, thought they were doing God service.—A. Clarke.
The self-delusion of one ends in death by the sentence of the judge, that of another in self-murder; of one in loathsome disease, of another in slow decay under the agony of conscience, or in sorrow over a henceforth dishonoured and distracted life.—Delitzsch.
Sin comes clothed with a show of reason (Exodus i. 10); and lust will so blear the understanding, that he shall think there is great sense in sinning. “Adam was not deceived” (1 Tim. ii. 14), that is, he was not so much deceived by his judgment—though also by that too—as by his affection to his wife, which at length blinded his judgment. The heart first deceives us with colours; and when we are once a-doting after sin, then we join and deceive our hearts (James i. 26), using fallacious and specious sophism, to make ourselves think that lawful to-day which we held unlawful yesterday. . . . But it falls out with us as with him that, lying upon a steep rock, and dreaming of good matters befallen him, starts suddenly for joy, and breaks his neck at the bottom. As he that makes a bridge of his own shadow cannot but fall into the water, so neither can he escape the pit of hell who lays his own presumption in the place of God’s promise.—Trapp.
Some say, surely God will not punish a man hereafter who conscientiously walks up to his convictions, although these convictions be in point of fact mistaken. They err, knowing neither the inspired Word of God nor natural laws. Do men imagine that God, who has established this world in such exquisite order, and rules it by regular laws, will abdicate, and leave the better world in anarchy? This world is blessed by an undeviating connection between cause and effect; will the next be abandoned to random impulses, or left to chaos? . . . It is not even conceivable that the direction of a man’s course could not determine his landing-place. . . . Perhaps the secret reason why an expectation so contrary to all analogy is yet so fondly entertained, is a tacit disbelief in the reality of things spiritual and eternal. We see clearly the laws by which effects follow causes in time; but the matters upon which these laws operate are substantial realities. If there were a firm conviction that the world to come is a substance, and not merely a name, the expectation would naturally be generated, that the same principles which regulate the Divine administration of the world now, will stretch into the unseen, and rule it all. . . . Truth shines like light from heaven; but the mind and conscience within the man constitute the reflector that receives it. Thence we must read off the impression, as the astronomer reads the image from the reflector at the bottom of his tube. When that tablet is dimmed by the breath of evil spirits dwelling within, the truth is distorted and turned into a lie.—Arnot.
There is no way which doth not seem right in his eyes who liketh to go in it. For man is led in all things by a seeming good; and such is the foulness of doing amiss, that it must put on the painted colours of doing right, or else it cannot draw the eyes of man’s mind unto it. But it is the not seeing the end which causeth the seeming rightness of the way, and it isto manthat it seems so, who is so apt to be deceived. He that hath a long fight, and in the beginning can see the end, he maketh the shortest journey and speedeth the best in it. If the beginning be a due consideration of the end, the end will be a beginning of true joy and comfort. It is not so in the way which seemeth to be right. For being buta way,it is passed and ended, and then beginthe ways of death,which are said to be many, because there is an endless going on in them.—Jermin.
main homiletics of verse13.
True and False Mirth.
This proverb, as it stands in our English version, cannot be taken as universally true. The first clause is rendered by some translators—“Even inlaughter the heartmay besorrowful” (seeCritical Notes), and experience and Bible teaching both necessitate our giving a limitation to the second clause also.
I. Whether mirth will end in heaviness depends upon its character—therefore upon the character of the man who is mirthful.There is an innocent and right mirth, there is an ill-timed, guilty mirth. The end of lawful mirth is not heaviness. It is good for thebody.A physician is glad to see his patient mirthful. He knows that it will act most beneficially, and assist his recovery to health. A mirthful man will not suffer so much physical injury from the wear and tear of life as one who is always sombre and melancholy. Lawful mirth is good for themind.It is the unbending of the bow which breaks if it is kept always at its extreme tension. A man who is naturally mirthful—who is ever disposed to see men and things in their brightest colours, must be a creature of hope, and hope has power to surround those who possess her with a paradise of their own creation, which is very independent of outward circumstances. Natural, wholesome mirth will make a man much stronger to do and to bear all the duties and trials of life. But natural, lawful mirth is only proper to godly men. Christians are the only people in the world who have reason to be glad. All those who are worthy of the name ought to be able, amidst all the saddening influences of life, to hold fast such a confidence in God as shall leave room for the play even of mirth. But the man who is in a state of alienation from God has no reason to be mirthful, his mirth must be either feigned or the result of a thoughtless disregard of his own relations to God and eternity. The “end” of such mirth must be “heaviness.”
II. Laughter is not always an index of feeling.There is doubtless much that passes for mirth among the ungodly that is merely a blind to conceal intentions or feelings deeply hidden in the soul. The seducer laughs at the fears and misgivings of his victim, but his laugh is not the laugh of the light-hearted, God-fearing man. Its very ring tells any unprejudiced hearer that there is a flaw somewhere, and it is only assumed to enable him to effect his purpose. In such laughter there may not be present actual sorrow, but there is an entire absence of gladness of heart. But laughter often veils the deepest and most heartfelt misery. The poor drunkard will laugh at the debauchery of the past night while he feels a bitter consciousness of his degradation. Many a man laughs with his gay companions, and all the while sees a dread future rising up before him which he trembles to meet. Thecharacterof him who laughs will afford the best clue by which to determine whether or not the laughter is the outcome of genuine mirth.
outlines and suggestive comments.
Already the wise king was beginning to experience what he more fully states in Eccles. ii. 2; vii. 6. Men’s very pleasures turn into their opposites.—Fausset.
Not of its own nature, of course; for a proverb has already said that there is a“joy”which is not our foe. Not this is always the case; but there is such a case. Because the wicked get nothing really but their “ways” (verse 14).—Miller.
The sun doth not ever shine: there is a time of setting. No day of jollity is without its evening of conclusion, if no cloud of disturbance prevent it with an overcasting. First God complains, men sing, dance, and are jovial and neglectful; at last man shall complain, and “God shall laugh at their calamity.” Who should God be conjured to receive that spirit dying which would not receive God’s Spirit living?—T. Adams.
As soon might true joy be found in hell as in the carnal heart. As soon might the tempest-tossed ocean be at rest as the sinner’s conscience (Isa. lvii. 20,21). He may feast in his prison, or dance in his chains. . . . But if he has found a diversion from present trouble, has he found a cover from everlasting misery? It is far easier to drown conviction than to escape damnation. . . . But the end of that mirth implies another with a different end. Contrast the prodigal’s mirth in the far country with his return to his father’s house when “they began to be merry.”—Bridges.
Every human heart carries the feeling of disquiet and of separation from its true home, and of the nothingness, transitoriness of all that is earthly; and in addition to this, there is many a secret sorrow in everyone which grows out of his own corporeal and spiritual life, and from his relation to other men; and this sorrow, which from infancy onward is the lot of the human heart, and which more and more deepens and diversifies itself in the course of life, makes itself perceptible even in the midst of laughter, in spite of the mirth and merriment, without being able to be suppressed or expelled for the soul, returning always the more intensely, the more violently we may for a time have kept it under, and sunk it in unconsciousness. From the fact that sorrow is the fundamental condition of humanity, and forms the back-ground of laughter, it follows that it is not good for man to give himself up to joy, viz., sensual (worldly), for to it the issue is sorrow.—Delitzsch.
There are two sorts of joys—the joy natural and the joy spiritual; the joy of vanity and the joy of verity; a joy in the creature and a joy in the Creator; a joy in a mutable thing and a joy in a matter immutable. The spiritual joys are the joys of the palace. The natural joys are the joys of prisoners. These are to worldlings that are without God seeming joys, because they know no better. They cannot get Penelope, they will be suitors to her maidens. . . . The godly are like the ant, they are first weary, then merry; but the ungodly are like the grasshopper, first they sing and then they sorrow.—Bishop Abernethy,1630.
main homiletics of verse14.
Satisfaction and Dissatisfaction.
I. The position and character of the backslider.The word suggests that there has been a time in the past when his moral standing was high. There must have once been a going forward, if there is now a sliding backward. Up to a certain time progress was made. Of many followers of our Lord it is written that from a certain period “they went back and walked no more with Him” (John vi. 66). They had walked with Him in outward discipleship at least, and it is probable that their hearts had been more or less influenced for good. Their “walking no more” was a going back probably in outward life, certainly in right disposition towards the Christ of God. The man of our text is “a backslider in heart.” Then there must once have been a going forward of his soul towards God and goodness, and outward movement towards righteousness and peace, and joy in the Holy Ghost. But the forward movement has ceased—the retrograde movement has set in within the man, although it may not immediately be seen in his outward conduct. Solomon was himself a sad example of a backslider. In his early days his heart was turned towards his God, his desires after righteousness were strong, his moral progress a reality. No one can read his dedication prayer without feeling that the man who offered it stood in right relations with his God—that his aspirations were after righteousness of heart and life. He is himself a proof of the certain fact that a man can terribly deteriorate in character even after he has given evidence of a progression in the good and the right way.
II. His portion.“He shall be filled with his own ways.” Retribution will flow from both his past and present character. The remembrance of what he once was will embitter the present. To think of whatmight have beenis in itself a hell when a man feels that by his own act he is now far lower in the moral scale than he once was. How it must embitter the misery of the fallen angels to remember that they once stood sinless before God’s throne, and, but for their own act, would stand there still. In one of the writings of Lucian, he represents the ghost of a man who has left the world coming up for judgment before the bar of Rhadamanthus. He had lived so depraved a live that his judge exclaims that a new punishment is needed that will be in some degree adequate to his unparalleled villany. A poor cobbler, standing by, suggests that it will be enough if the cup of Lethe, which was supposed to obliterate all remembrance of the past, and which each shade was permitted to drink as he passed from the dread tribunal, should, in this instance, be withheld. And the criminal was therefore condemned to remember for ever what he had done in life, and this was held to be retribution sufficient for the worst of crimes. And if this is true of every wicked man, surely to be filled with the remembrance of what he once was will be the bitterest cup that can be the portion of every backslider.
III. The portion of the godly man.He, too, shall be filled with his own ways, but it will be the fulness of satisfaction. The foundation of real happiness is in character alone. The blessedness of the Eternal God comes from nothing outside of Himself. It has its foundation in His own perfect character. So nothing outside a man can yield him satisfaction. It must come from what he is—from his partaking of some degree of the character of the ever-blessed God. In proportion as he approaches that—in proportion as he brings forth the fruits of righteousness—will he be conscious of a well-spring of satisfaction which is quite independent of outward circumstances. This well-spring has the advantage of being always at hand. A man may often find himself shut out from external sources of joy, death may part him from those who have largely ministered to his happiness, but wherever he is—whether in this world or another—a “well of water” which is “within him” (John iv. 14) is always at hand. It is needless to remark that this well-spring does not originate with man, but is the outcome of relationship and communion with God.
outlines and suggestive comments.
Temporarybacksliding may take place in the true children of God; but the “backslider”hereis evidently he who, in the language of the apostle, “goes back into perdition.” Solomon alludes to suchperpetualbacksliding on the part of those who thus prove themselves to have been no more than professors—“having the form of godliness, but denying the power thereof.” Such characters, whatever appearances they present to the eye of men,—even of the people of God, with whom they associate, never were vitally and savingly one with Christ, and one with true believers in Him. This is as plainly affirmed as it is in the power of language to affirm it.“They went out from us but they were not of us; for if they had been of us they would no doubt have continued with us; but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us”(1 John ii. 19).—Wardlaw.
Every spot is not the leprosy. Every mark of sin does not prove a backslider. “A man may be overtaken in a fault” (Gal. vi. 1); or it may be the sin of ignorance (Lev. iv. 2; Heb. v. 2) or sin abhorred, resisted, yet still cleaving (Rom. vii. 15–24).Backslidingimplies awilfulstep; not always open, but the more dangerous, because hidden. Here was no openapostasy, perhaps no tangible inconsistency. Nay, the man may be looked up to as an eminent saint, but he is abackslider in heart.—Bridges.
The upright is satisfied from his own conscience, which though it be not the original spring, yet is the conduit at which he drinks peace, joy and encouragement.—Flavel.
The wicked are travelling; and they seek an end; and they confidently expect it, but they never get it. What they do get, therefore is their journey. The old man has got about enough of travelling, but enough, if he be an impenitent man, of nothing else, in either world, whatever. The saint may have very little on the earth, but he has made more than his own journey.“The backslider in heart.”Not a Christian. A Christian never really backslides. Not, therefore, what our usage means, but aheart sliding back,as every lost heart does. The writer has but written a fresh name for the impenitent. Such a sliding heart will just have its journey at last, and nothing for it.—Miller.
What a world of sound theology lies in the deliverance of this verse—telling us much how the rewards and punishments of the Divine administration lie in the subjective state, apart from the objective circumstances.—Chalmers.
Good menknow within themselvesthat they have in heaven a better and more enduring substance (Heb. x. 34);within themselves,they know it not in others, not in books, but in their own experience and apprehension. They can feelingly say that “in doing God's will”—not onlyfordoing it, orafterit was now done, but evenwhilethey were doing it—“there was great reward” (Psa. xix. 11). Righteousness is never without a double joy to be its strength: “Joy in hand and in hope, in present possession and in certain reversion” (Bernard).—Trapp.
All engineering proceeds upon the principle of reaching great heights or depths by almost imperceptible inclines. The adversary of men works by this will. When you see a man who was once counted a Christian standing shameless on a mountain-top of impiety, or lying in the miry pit of vice, you may safely assume that he has long been worming his way in secret on the spiral slimy track by which the old serpent marks and smooths the way to death. . . . Whatever the enormity it may end in, backsliding begins in the heart. . . . There is a weighing beam exposed to public view, with one scale loaded and resting on the ground, while the other dangles high and empty in the air. Everybody is familiar with the object, and its aspect. One day curiosity is arrested by observing the low and loaded beam is swinging aloft, while the side which hung empty and light has sunk to the ground. Speculation is set on edge by the phenomenon, and at rest again by the discovery of its cause. For many days certain diminutive but busy insects had, for some object of their own, been transferring the material from the full to the empty scale. Day by day the sides approached an equilibrium, but no change took place in their position. At last a grain more removed from one side and laid in the other reversed the preponderance, and produced the change. There is a similar balancing of good and evil in the human heart. The sudden outward change proceeds from a gradual inward preparation.—Arnot.
Every man, both good and bad, shall feel himself sufficiently recompensed for his service.—Dod.
“A good man shall be satisfied from himself.”I. He can bear his own company, his own thoughts.What is it that makes solitude so irksome to mankind? They cannot bear reflection. . . . Generally, we know, all is not right. Men do not like to look steadily at themselves, because, like the bankrupt tradesman who dreads striking a balance, they have a secret suspicion that their lives will not bear a rigid scrutiny. . . . The good man does not fear to probe his wound to the bottom.II. He is independent, as other men are not, of earthly vicissitudes.Men who have their portion here are never safe. The world is a disappointing world, but the good man’s eyes are opened to the glories of a better. . . . It is a doomed world, but his treasure is safe. . . . Let other men be suddenly driven from the pleasures, occupations, and companions with which habit has made them familiar, and they are like shipwrecked voyagers whose wealth has all gone down in the vessel in which they sailed. He is like a man who has escaped to shore with a casket of jewels in which his whole fortune is invested.III. He stands for judgment, not at the world’s bar, but at the tribunal of his own conscience.“It is a small thing,” said St. Paul, “that I should be judged of you, or of man’s judgment.” Was he, then, a morose man who cared nothing about his neighbours? No, but his conscience was ruled by God’s law, and in the very act of submitting himself to Christ as the Lord of his life and soul, he became comparatively independent of all besides.—J. H. Gurney.
main homiletics of the paragraph.—Verses15–18.
Revelations of Character.
I. Four marks of a foolish man.When a piece of ground is left to itself—left in the hand of nature alone, without the intervention of the hand of man—there will be a variety in its productions, but there will be no wheat—no grain to give seed to the sower and bread to the eater. When human nature is left to itself there will of necessity be a variety in its productions, but, however unlike they may be in many respects, they are all alike in this, that they are equally unprofitable to God and injurious to man. We have here—1.The man who believes too much in others.“The simple believeth every word.” It is possible to have too much faith. The blessedness of having it in abundance depends entirely upon the foundation upon which it rests—upon the objectinwhich a man trusts—in the person in whom he believes. Those who have faith in the words of men and women of worthless character—like the young man of chap. vii. 7—will find their ruin will be in proportion to the confidence. We stigmatise as a fool the man who shows his purse to any wayfarer whom he meets upon the high road; we know that his fellow-traveller may be only seeking a fitting time and place to rob him. In this world of fallen men and women we must withhold our faith until we have some knowledge. There are many now in the world whose foolish credulity has led to the other extreme of universal scepticism. From believing everybody and everything they have come to believe nothing, and to brand “all men” as “liars.” He who begins by being a “simple one,” and believeth every word, will most likely end in being a disbeliever and a scoffer. We are not required to believe in God without ground for our belief. He does not demand from us an unreasoning credulity, but an intelligent faith. 2.The man who believes too much in himself.He “rages,” or is presumptuous, and is “confident.” As the foolishness of the first man took the form of over-confidence in others, so this man shows his want of wisdom by undue confidence in himself. (On this character see Homiletics on chap.xii. 15, page 271.) 3.The man who is easily offended.Such a man reveals his folly by the insignificance of the matters which generally arouse his passion. The man who is “soon angry” is generally more angry about trifles than about things of importance. A parent who is easily vexed by his children’s transgressions is generally more severe in punishing those that really least deserve punishment. Such a person does not take into account the amount of moral wrong done, but the amount of immediate and personal inconvenience which he suffers. For if a man is “soon angry” he has no timeto put things in their right light—to weigh the offence in the balance of right and of reason. The man who is soon angry shows that his mind is not filled with high and noble aspirations; if it were, there would be no room for vexation at small offences. God is “slow to anger,” because only things worthy of His notice can arouse it—because He is filled with high and holy purposes of good towards the human race. (See also on chap.xii. 16, page 272.) 4.The man who, by wicked plots against his fellow-men, incurs their hatred.This man possesses more mental activity than the others. But he uses it against himself, because he uses it against his fellow-men. “He is of wicked devices,” and “is hated.” A man cannot devise plans of evil any more than of good without mental labour. Probably Satan is the most active creature in the universe. He is ever “going to and fro in the earth, and walking up and down in it.” And many of his human children imitate him in this respect. This man has not the simplicity of him who “believeth every word,” nor of him who haughtily rejects the counsel of others, nor of him who allows his feelings to carry him away. He sets about his plans with cool deliberateness, but he is a fool for all that. He is a fool, because, as we have seen over and over again, his plans of wickedness will not only fail, but will overthrow himself (see chap.xii. 3,5 and 7). But the special element of foolishness in the man of wicked devices which is here noted is that his way of life is sure to bring him the hatred of his fellow-creatures. No man can afford to set at nought the good-will of his fellow-men. To be an object of universal execration is only the lot of a man who lives to injure others, and it is a very poor investment of life to put it to a use which will only bring such interest.
II. The marks of a wise man.1.He walks through life with caution.To say that a man “looketh well to his going” is only saying that he acts like a rational and responsible creature. Even the animals, in obedience to the instinct of self-preservation, look to their goings, and avoid many dangers which beset them. The smaller birds, though apparently flying about without any care, have a quick eye for the hawk soaring above them, or for the cat crouching beneath. All creatures, whether brutes or men, instinctively look to their goings so far as regards their bodily life. The traveller on a dangerous road instinctively picks his way—does not set down his foot without looking to see where there is firm ground to tread upon. The man whose lot is cast in a city where a pestilence is raging naturally takes all possible precautions to avoid the infection. A mariner does his best to guide his vessel clear of rocks and quicksands. The prudent man extends this caution to every act of his life. As a merchant, he weighs probabilities before he embarks in any enterprise. He does not enter into speculations as men engage in a game of billiards. He considers the results of his actions in relation to others as well as to himself. Above all, he looks to his goings in relation to their morality; he frames his life, as we have before seen (chap.xiii. 14), according to the law of God within him in his conscience, and without him, in the revealed word. 2.He walks thus cautiously because he recognises moral danger.He“fears.”This makes all the difference in the lives of men. Some recognise the fact that they are in a world full of moral pit-falls and rocks which will be their ruin unless they take heed to their ways, and others do not. Some know the moral atmosphere is laden with moral pestilence, but others do not discern its impurity. The wise man “departs from evil” as he would involuntarily turn aside if he saw a deadly serpent lying in his path, or would parry a sword-thrust made at him by an adversary. His main business is, not to take care of hislife,but of hischaracter.
III. The respective reward of the wise and foolish.The first arecrownedby an increase of knowledge, the second have aninheritance;but it is only to be given over to their foolishness. The wise man’s moral sense becomes more developed “by reason of use” it is more and more able “to discern good and evil” (Heb. v. 14). He is more and more removed from that simplicity which “believeth every word”—he can “try the spirits, whether they are of God” (1 John iv. 1), while the foolish man is more and more the dupe of his own credulity, or of his own self-conceit, and becomes more and more the slave of uncontrolled passion.
illustration of verse17.
Socrates, meeting a gentleman of rank in the street, saluted him, but the gentleman took no notice of it. His friends, observing what passed, told the philosopher that they were so exasperated at the man’s incivility that they had a good mind to resent it. But he calmly made answer, “If you meet any person in the road in a worse habit of body than yourself would you think you had reason to be enraged with him on that account. Pray, then, what greater reason can you have for being incensed at a man for a worse habit of mind than any of yourselves?”
outlines and suggestive comments.
Verse 15. He who applies himself to wisdom takes heed of his own ways, foreseeing dangers, preparing remedies, employing the assistance of the good, guarding himself against the wicked, cautious in entering on a work, not unprepared for a retreat, watchful to seize opportunities, strenuous to remove impediments, and attending to many other things which concern the government of his own actions and proceedings. But the other kind of wisdom is entirely made up of deceits and cunning tricks, laying up all its hope in the circumventing of others, and moulding them to its pleasure, which kind verse 8 denounces as being not only dishonest, but also foolish.—Lord Bacon.
“The simple believeth every word,” whether true or false, useful or injurious. Charity, indeed, “believeth all things” (1 Cor. xiii. 7), but not things that are palpablyuntrue.It is thetruthwhich it readily believes. It believes all that it can with a good conscience to the credit of another, but not anything more. Epicharmus says, “The sinews and limbs of faith are not rashly to believe” (Acts xvii. 11). “The prudent man looketh well to his going”—whether it tends to grace and salvation, or to sin and perdition; he “believeth not every word”—as, for instance, the flattering words of seducers, who commend to him false doctrine or licentious practice (Eph. v. 15).—Fausset.
We may apply the verse in all its emphasis of meaning toeternal concerns.The simple hear different persons on the subject of religion, and take for granted that all they hear is right. They are easily bewildered by sophistical arguments; led away by appeals to feeling; swayed and mastered by false eloquence; seduced by flattery. They are the sport of all that is novel—“tossed to and fro, and carried about with every wind of doctrine.” On the contrary, when interests so vast are at stake the prudent man will feel his way, taking nothing upon trust. He first bends his earnest thought to the question of the Divine authority of the Bible—a question next in importance to that of the being of God; and having ascertained its authority, to learn its lessons. Having the map he will examine for himself the way to heaven. Having a Divine directory, he will trust no human guide.—Wardlaw.
History is full of examples of men who have lost their lives by means of their credulity, amongst whom werethose great men, Abner and Amasa. . . . Some have been betrayed into the worst of sins, by believing groundless reports of others, as Saul in the case of David, and we might also add, David himself in the case of Mephibosheth. The nation of the Jews was threatened with desolation by the easy temper of Ahasuerus, who believed without examination the malicious suggestions of the wicked Haman. . . . The whole world was ruined by the simplicity of Eve, and the easy credit she gave the serpent.—Lawson.
Tobelieve every wordof God isfaith.Tobelieve every wordof man iscredulity.Admit only the one standard; like the noble Bereans, who would not believe even an apostle’s word, except it was confirmed by the written testimony (Acts xvii. 11).—Bridges.
We are not willing to be blindfolded at our meat, nor to eat our supper without a light, especially in strange places, where we neither know well the fidelity of our host, nor what dishes are set before us, and shall we be more provident for the outward man, than for the inward? Shall we keep out of our bodies such food as is not wholesome and savoury, and receive into our souls such food as will poison us? . . . No wrong is thus done to any man. We used to tell silver and weigh gold, and yet we prejudge not them at whose hands we receive them.—Dod.
Trust is a lovely thing, but it cannot stand unless it get truth to lean on. . . . It is a well-known characteristic of the little child to believe implicitly whatever you tell him. . . . It remains a feature of the child until it is worn off by hard experience of the world. . . . In this world a man is obliged to be suspicious. Man suffers more from man than from the elements of nature or the beasts of the field. A time is coming when this species of prudence will be no longer needed. When the people shall be all righteous, there will be no deception on one side, and no distrust on the other.—Arnot.
A prudent man looks forward to the consequences of things, and particularly to the consequences of his own conduct. O, how much misery and mischief might be avoided or prevented by attending only to this single principle, for what are most of the calamities we see in the world owing to but this—that men will not look before them? To the want of this wise foresight Moses attributed all the rebellions and enormities of the Jewish people, and therefore breathed forth this ardent prayer on their behalf, “Oh, that they were wise, that they understood this, that they would consider their latter end” (Deut. xxxii. 29).—Mason.
Verse 16. The “evil” from which the “wise man departeth” may mean eithersufferingorsin.Both may with propriety be included, the one being the cause of the other.—Wardlaw.
Fearis sometimes thought to be an unmanly principle. But look at the terrible extent ofthe evildreaded. Without it is vanity and disappointment (Rom. vi. 21). Within it is the sting of guilt (1 Cor. xv. 56). Upward we see the frown of God (John iii. 36). Downward everlasting burnings (Mark ix. 44). . . . Thefool,however, neverfearstill he falls. . . . Such afoolwas theragingAssyrian, blindlyconfidentin his own might, till the God whom he despised turned him back to his destruction (2 Kings xix. 28–37).—Bridges.
He (the good man) can nevertrust in himself,though he is satisfiedfrom himself(verse 14). He knows that his sufficiency is of God; and thefearthat causes him todepart from evilis a guardian to thelovehe feels. Love renders him cautious; the other makes him feel confident. Hiscautionleads himfrom sin,hisconfidenceleads himto God.—A. Clarke.
They which are in greatest safety are farthest from carnal security. The godly have not so many sins as the wicked, and yet they feel them more, and fear them more, and flee from them faster. And the wicked have not more valour than the godly nor so much freedom from punishment,and yet go beyond them in audacity and fleshly confidence. When David was dealt with by Nathan, he confessed his fault, he craved pardon, he set his heart to seek help from heaven against his sin; but when Ahab was spoken to by Macaiah, he persecuted the prophet, he proceeded in his purpose, he promised himself a safe return. Josiah, hearing the law of the Lord read by Shaphan, rent his clothes in grief and fear, but Jehoiakim hearing the words of God read by Baruch, in regard of the curses therein denounced, did tear the book and burn it in wrath and fury.—Dod.
A wise man knows that the enemy is strong, and that his own defences are feeble. His policy therefore is, not to brave danger, but to keep out of harm’s way. He seeks safety in flight. The fool’s character is mainly made up of two features; he thinks little of danger and much of himself. He stumbles on both sides alike. That which is strong he despises, and that which is weak he trusts. The dangers that beset him are great, but he counts them as nothing; the strength that is in him is as nothing, but he counts it great. Thus he is on all hands out of his reckoning, and stumbles at every step.—Arnot.
As a foolish fear is a betrayer of the strength of man, so a wise fear is the safety of him. Wherefore Cyprian saith, the Divine wisdom hath found out an excellent policy that by the help of fear we should be delivered. Great is the benefit of God’s providence, that sometimes fear is made both a virtue and a victory. A wise man departeth from evil before he cometh to it, for then the parting, as most easily, so is most happily made.—Jermin.
Fear a religious principle.The beginning of religion in the heart is a subject of curious inquiry and of great practical importance. There is no sufficient reason for supposing that it is in all men alike, we have no rule for saying that religion must either necessarily, or that it does usually proceed from the same cause. Different men are affected by different motives; and what sinks deep into the heart of one, makes little impression upon another. . . . Thus it is, that religion sometimes, not seldom indeed, has aviolentorigin in the soul, and begins in terror: “A wise manfearethand departeth from evil.”—Paley.
Verse 17. Some pettish spirits are like fine glasses, broken as soon as touched, and all on fire upon every slight and trifling occasion; when meek and grave spirits are like flints that do not send out a spark but after violent and great collision;feebleminds have ahabitof wrath, and, like broken bones, are apt to roar with the least touch: it argues a very unsanctified spirit to be so soon moved. Let it be like the fire of thorns, quickly extinct.—Salter.