Ralph Wardlaw Lectures on Proverbs - Proverbs 22:17 - 22:29

Online Resource Library

Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | Download

Ralph Wardlaw Lectures on Proverbs - Proverbs 22:17 - 22:29


(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)

This Chapter Verse Commentaries:



LECTURE LXX.



Pro_22:17-29.



"Bow down thine ear, and hear the words of the wise, and apply thine heart unto my knowledge: for it is a pleasant thing if thou keep them within thee; they shall withal be fitted in thy lips. That thy trust may be in the Lord, I have made known to thee this day, even to thee. Have not I written to thee excellent things in counsels and knowledge; that I might make thee know the certainty of the words of truth; that thou mightest answer the words of truth to them that send unto thee? Rob not the poor, because he is poor; neither oppress the afflicted in the gate: for the Lord will plead their cause, and spoil the soul of those that spoiled them. Make no friendship with an angry man, and with a furious man thou shalt not go; lest thou learn his ways, and get a snare to thy soul. Be not thou one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts. If thou hast nothing to pay, why should he take away thy bed from under thee? Remove not the ancient landmark, which thy fathers have set. Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men."



At this point, we enter on the third of the five parts into which, as I stated in the introductory Lecture, this Book has usually been divided. It extends from the first of these verses to the end of the twenty-fourth chapter. It is more of a connected character than the second part, and bears a closer resemblance to the style and manner of the first.



The opening words-"Bow down thine ear, and hear"-enjoin the attitude of earnest, eager listening;-the attitude at times to bo observed in a public assembly, when anything happens to be introduced by the speaker particularly in coincidence with the likings of his audience. There is then a breathless silence; every ear is erect and forward; and where hearing is dull, every aid applied to the organ that may prevent a single word of what is said being lost. But too often, alas! are to be witnessed the listless countenance, and the drowsy eye; and the ear, instead of being bent to a listening posture, is allowed, with all indifference, to catch or to miss the passing sounds, just as it may chance; and thus sounds that convey the most important and solemn truths strike upon the organ, without the mind's being conscious of the least impression. Hence, we have the further injunction-"Apply thine heart." There must be a feeling of interest-a desire to know and understand what is said. The connexion is very intimate between the state of the dispositions and the right exercise of the understanding. Simple ignorance,-ignorance that is involuntary and unavoidable-can never be culpable. The ignorance that is culpable, and that merits punitive retribution, is that which arises solely from moral causes.* There is divine wisdom, divine glory, divine suitableness and consistency, in the truths of God's Word; but from the state of "the heart" there is a film on the eyes of the mind that renders sinners criminally, because wilfully, blind to all their excellence. When by the Holy Spirit's power this film is removed and there is once spiritual illumination and discernment,-a taste and relish of divine "knowledge" imparted,-the eager longing is inspired for a growing measure of attainment in it. Then comes to be realized the truth of the verse which follows:-"For it is a pleasant thing if thou keep them (the words of the wise and the knowledge thence derived) within thee; they shall withal be fitted in thy lips." "Keeping them within" refers not to the memory merely, but to the heart. They must be treasured up there from delight in them and love to them. Like Him who is their subject, they must "dwell in the heart by faith." As there is no kind of knowledge that can be compared in value with the knowledge of God's truth, there is none of which the acquisition is more exquisitely grateful. It introduces a "peace that passeth all understanding,"-a joy before unknown,-a "joy unspeakable and full of glory"-a joy that wakes into fresh life as, in the progress of our inquiries, new light is thrown upon any of the divine discoveries. What believer is there who has not experienced the exquisite nature of the pleasure? And what pleasure so reasonable? The philosopher may scorn it: but if the discovery of a fact, or the solution of a problem, or the establishment of a theory, in science, gives him satisfaction, why should not the Christian be vindicated in the delight he feels on discerning more clearly the mind of God, on points connected, not with time merely, but with eternity? Can anything be imagined more important, more full of interest than this?



* Compare Rom_1:28; Joh_8:43 (where hear means bear): Eph_4:18 (where blindness means more properly callousness or hardness-as in the margin-and as appears from the following verse-"who, being past feeling," &c): and Deu_29:3-4.



The understanding and retaining of "the words of wisdom" are necessary qualifications for the right imparting of them. This seems, substantially, the lesson of the latter part of the verse:-"They shall withal be fitted in thy lips:" that is, thou shalt be able to communicate them fitly-in an appropriate, intelligent, and effective manner. In proportion as God's word is "kept within"-in the understanding with intelligence and discrimination, in the memory with clearness and readiness, and in the heart with experience and affection-will be the degree of capability to teach others, and of probable efficiency and success.



There is another benefit that may be connected with "keeping them within." When we have the word "hidden in our hearts," it is the means of progressive sanctification. It works with a leavening influence amongst all our affections, desires and passions, purifying the whole inner man.* And hence arises a further peculiar fitness of the words of wisdom in the lips. Most unfitting and incongruous are they in the lips of the ungodly. It is only when a holy life makes it manifest that they are in the heart, that they are appropriately "fitted in the lips."



* Psa_119:11; 1Jn_3:9.



Verse Pro_22:19. "That thy trust may be in the Lord, I have made known to thee this day, even to thee." On this verse observe the following things:-



1. The particularity of address,-"to thee, even to thee." In the days of prophetic inspiration, it was no unusual thing for the servants of God to receive express commissions to individuals, in which they alone were concerned. But the whole Book of God,-the entire "word of His testimony,"-should be considered by every one as addressed to him;-as much so as if there were no other human being besides himself, and as if it had been "given by inspiration" to himself alone. There is no room for any saying, as Jehu did of old,-"To which of all us?" The answer would, in every case, be-to each of you all-to thee-to thee-to thee. Not that there is no such thing as "rightly dividing the word of truth;" not that there are no portions of it that have a special appropriateness of application to the characters and circumstances of individuals. Still, the great truths of the Word are alike to each and to all. And speedily a man may be placed in one or other of the peculiar situations to which the different portions of it are adapted! I know of nothing more important than for every individual to bring divine lessons home to himself. Too often, alas! we forget personal amidst general application of particular truths. We think of them as intended for men, and forget that they are designed for us. Would you then profit by what you hear?-keep in mind, that what is addressed to ail is addressed to each-"to thee, even to thee."



2. Mark the emphasis on the time-"this day." We set a mark, in our minds, on days that have been rendered memorable by events of special interest. Would Noah, think you, ever forget the day of the year on which he and his family entered the ark, and when "the Lord shut him in?"-or the day on which he again stepped out of it upon the green earth, to be the second father of mankind? Would the shepherds ever forget on what night of the year the angelic messengers, amidst the light of the glory of the Lord, announced to them the divine Saviour's birth, and when "the multitude of the heavenly host," bursting on their sight, "ascended jubilant," saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men?" Or would Cornelius ever forget the day and the hour when the angelic visitant directed him to that instruction whereby he and all his house should be saved? You, it is true, have many times heard the words of truth. Let me, however, remind any of you who have thus often heard, and who still neglect them, of the importance to you of each day that you enjoy the privilege. Every time you thus hear them, your eternal all depends on the reception you give to the message of God. This day may be important indeed, for it may be the last on which divine truth shall sound in your ears. O that it may be a day to be sacredly and joyfully remembered by every sinner now present, as the day on which he first felt its inestimable preciousness to his soul! If you thus hear, and thus improve the opportunity, the day will not be obliterated from your memory by the lapse of eternity. There is one thing of which with emphasis it may be said to each individual sinner-It is "to thee, even to thee:"-I mean the message of the Gospel-the message of free mercy through the divine Mediator. There is no exception; there is no difference. The Law speaks to each-"to thee, even to thee"-its sentence of condemnation. The Gospel speaks to each-"to thee, even to thee"-its offer of free, full, immediate, irrevocable, pardon on the ground of the universal atonement. To every fellow-creature we can say-An adequate atonement has been made for all; therefore for thee-"for thee, even for thee;" and on the ground of that atonement does divine mercy come near to thee-"to thee, even to thee"-with the offer of forgiveness, acceptance, and life. "This day" is the message of life again "made known! unto thee, O sinner; and there is no obstacle to thine acceptance and enjoyment of it, but what is in thyself;-none in God; none in Christ; none in the atonement; none in the divine offer of its virtue to mankind. "To thee is the word of this salvation sent;" and "now is the accepted time, now the day of salvation."



3. Mark the design:-"That thy trust may he in the Lord." Can there be a design more gracious? It is connected with the sinner's present and eternal happiness. "They that know thy name," says David, "shall put their trust in thee:" then it follows-"for thou, Lord, hast never forsaken them that seek thee." No. God "keeps them by His power, through faith unto salvation." God is revealed, to be trusted in: and He is worthy of all confidence. To trust in God is to trust in His perfections, as made known in the gospel,-in His mercy as it there appears in union with the justice and holiness of His character and government, and in His faithfulness to all the "exceeding great and precious promises" of His covenant, which are "yea and amen in Christ Jesus." All may thus trust in Him. I say to each hearer-"To thee, even to thee" is God in Christ made known, that thou mayest trust in Him. This trust arises from the knowledge of him as in Christ the God of salvation. Mark the testimony-"Who verily was fore-ordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you, who by him do believe in God, that raised him up from the dead, and gave him glory; that your faith and hope might be in God" 1Pe_1:20-21. A blessing is ever represented as accompanying and flowing from it; while the language dictated by it is that of unmoved tranquillity, and fearless joy-"O Lord, I will praise thee: though thou wast angry with me, thine anger is turned away, and thou comfortedst me. Behold, God is my salvation; I will trust, and not be afraid: for the Lord Jehovah is my strength and my song; he also is become my salvation," Isa_12:1-2.



Verses Pro_22:20-21. "Have not I written to thee excellent things in counsels and knowledge; that I might make thee know the certainty of the words of truth; that thou mightest answer the words of truth to them that send unto thee."-There are differences among critics and translators about tho exact meaning of the original word translated, in the former of these verses, "excellent things." Yet I know not that it could be altered for the better. In all the views given of it there is still the idea, more plain or more covert, of superiority or excellence. If, with the Vulgate and Septuagint, we take up the sense "thrice repeated"*1-why are things thus repeated but for their excellence? If with the French translation, we render-"things relating to rulers or governors," this, when analysed, may yield the meaning of princely or royal things,-which is but a figurative way of expressing their transcendent superiority. And even the simple rendering-rules or directions (Parkhurst) must be taken, according to the etymology of the term, as implying their having in them a kind of royal authority or commanding excellence.*2 The discoveries of the Bible-its truths and precepts alike, are in the highest sense "excellent things." The word of God bears, like His works, the impress of His name and character. There is in it a self-evidencing power. It is its own witness. It meets all our consciousnesses, and is adapted to all our felt exigencies; and, though there are many things in it which our reason could never have discovered, yet they are such as, when discovered, are none of them contrary to reason, although above it: and those-that are within the compass of our understanding, recommend themselves to all our convictions, as worthy of the divine Being, and suited to us. There is impressed upon it throughout infallible proof of its divine original,-in its infinite superiority to all that unassisted human effort had ever been able to discover of God and of divine things. All is the harmony of perfect excellence. In this very Book of Proverbs-what a fund of practical wisdom!-all holy-all divine; all recognizing man's relation to God, as every system of virtue ought to do; all founded in "the fear of the Lord" as "the beginning of wisdom!" And this divine "excellence" of the contents of the Sacred Volume is one of the evidences by which our faith in its certainty may reasonably be confirmed:-"that I might make thee know the certainty of the words of truth."



*1 This rendering is based on a different reading of the Hebrew.

*2 Stuart renders (perhaps rightly) "Have I not written to thee heretofore" &c.; and remarks that the Hebrew word ùìùøﬦ , while meaning " literally the day before yesterday, has also a more general meaning, viz. formerly, in time past;" and considers Solomon as alluding to "the previous portions of this Book."



According to what has just been said, the more we know what the word of God is,-the more we study it, and become acquainted with its contents, and the more, in consequence, we experience of its holy power, and of the happiness arising from conformity to its dictates,-the greater will be our assurance of its truth. We shall have "the witness in ourselves" of its divinity,-the experimental evidence of its heavenly origin,-the proof of its being from God in its tendency to God-in its influence, (according to the degree in which it is prized, and felt, and followed, its spirit imbibed and its principles obeyed,)-over human character, in assimilating man to his Maker, in the beauty of holiness. There is a certainty as to facts, which rests upon the nature and amount of the testimony by which they are affirmed.* But besides this, and besides all the variety and force of external proof of the genuineness, authenticity, and inspiration of the Sacred Volume, there is, in its doctrinal discoveries and holy precepts, and in the adaptation of its provisions to the state and the need of man, an internal evidence;-and there is, in the realized efficacy of the doctrine here taught, in changing the heart and bringing the whole man under the power of new principles and new affections,-all working out a holy and a happy life,-an experimental evidence of its truth and divinity not less valuable and satisfactory, than they are, in their nature, in perfect harmony with the soundest reason. O! it is a blessed thing, to perceive clearly the one, and to possess largely the other!-a blessed thing thus to "know the certainty of the words of truth." It is thus that we "have peace with God," and that we "go on our way rejoicing."



* See Luk_1:1-4.



And from an intimate and experimental acquaintance with revealed truth arises another advantage, here mentioned by Solomon-"that thou mightest answer the word of truth to them that send unto thee." "Them that send unto thee," is most naturally explained-them that consult thee, or apply to thee for instruction. This may be the case, not with public teachers alone, but with private Christians. And, as we have already seen, on verse 18th (Pro_22:18), (of which the sentiment is similar,) it is a clear, familiar, discriminative, and experimental acquaintance with the contents of the inspired volume, that imparts fitness for this important duty. A professed believer in the Bible cannot but feel embarrassed and awkward, when inquiries are made by any desirous of instruction in its great truths, and they are constrained from the want of this, to "send them away empty." See then, beloved, that you seek to make yourselves more and more intelligently and extensively familiar with the varieties of divine communication in the Sacred Scriptures,-that you may be able to "instruct the ignorant and them that are out of the way," and "ready always to give an answer, with meekness and fear, to every one that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you."



Verses Pro_22:22-23. "Rob not the poor, because he is poor; neither oppress the afflicted in the gate: for the Lord will plead their cause, and spoil the soul of those that spoiled them."-O the condescending kindness of God-the God of love, to the poor! to those who are most in danger of being overlooked and despised. Old and New Testaments are full of the repetitions of it. Frequently have we had the subject before us. We do not-we dare not pass it. Where there is repetition in the Word of God, it is right that there should be repetition on the part of those who teach it;-that its lessons may be impressed the more deeply, and never allowed to slip out of mind. In the midst of the sameness too, there is variety.-"Robbery" of the poor may be practised directly or indirectly;-by taking from him, or by keeping from him; or by making his poverty a temptation to him to part with what he ought to retain. Few may think of "robbing the poor" in the first of these ways. Robbers generally seek better game. Yet even the little of the poor does not always escape the hand of covetous rapacity. But many there are, who "rob the poor" in the second of the ways mentioned. They deprive the poor of their due-keeping back from them what they are in fairness entitled to, and taking advantage of their urgent necessities to effect this; screwing them down to the very least for which, by the dread of starvation, they can be prevailed upon to work. And not seldom too has the poor been tempted to surrender his rights and privileges by being made to feel, for the purpose of extorting it from him, his helpless, unprotected, friendless condition. This has been done by private extortion; and it has been done, as Solomon here hints, "in the gate"-that is, by an undue advantage taken of the law, against the man who has no means of selfdefence, and who has thus cruelty and unrighteousness added to his affliction. Every way in which the poor is robbed "because he is poor,"-that is, in which advantage is taken of his indigent and dependent condition,-provokes the indignation of Heaven: "For the Lord will plead their cause, and spoil the soul of those that spoiled them." We are here reminded, that the poor are not friendless. The words "will plead their cause" have an immediate reference to judicial proceedings, alluded to in the previous phrase-"in the gate"-the place of such proceedings. At human tribunals, we sometimes find disinterested and benevolent counsel, who step forward to the protection of the poor, and gratuitously offer themselves to "plead their cause." JEHOVAH HIMSELF is the counsel of the poor. He "will plead their cause." He will interpose by his providence for their protection; or if here they are allowed to suffer, He will not permit their oppressors to pass with impunity, when He rises up to final judgment. He will show himself their friend and patron by avenging them on their adversaries. He will "spoil the soul of those that spoiled them."



Verses Pro_22:24-25. "Make no friendship with an angry man; and with a furious man thou shalt not go; lest thou learn his ways, and get a snare to thy soul." In this wise and prudent admonition, it is evident, that by "friendship" is to be understood intimacy,-the alliance of mutual trust and confidence, and unbosoming familiarity and interchange of mind and heart; and by "an angry man," a man of hot, fiery, passionate temperament.



For the comfort of personal and domestic life, there are few things more important than looking carefully to the tempers of those whom we choose as intimates, either with ourselves, or at our firesides, in the circle of family privacy and love. Whatever other qualifications a man may have that are fitted to make his society agreeable and tempt us to court it,-they may be many and attractive,-temper may more than neutralize the whole. Nothing can be more painful than a state of incessant apprehension of waking slumbering fires,-kindling to sudden ignition some latent combustibles; so that, instead of unreserved and open freedom, which is the very life and soul of "friendship," every word must be carefully weighed ere it is uttered, lest it should prove a spark, and cause an explosion. It is insufferably irksome, to be ever under such restraint, and ever in the midst of such risks of touching the secret springs of hasty passion. And the consequences are mischievous. Not only will the intimacy of such men, men who are thus choleric and quarrelsome, endanger our getting involved in numberless factions and feuds with themselves, and, what is worse, with others through their means,-so that we shall not be able, how desirous soever we may be, to live in peace,-that first and best of blessings in social life to a good man:-but another and a greater hazard is mentioned in the latter verse-"lest thou learn his ways." It may seem strange that we should be supposed in danger of learning what we feel to be so very disagreeable. And yet we may. As already hinted, a passionate man may have interesting and attractive qualities otherwise. Now, in proportion as we either admire or love him for these, will be the hazard of our thinking the less evil of his one defect, and trying to palliate and to smile at it. And there is no little truth in the saying, that we either are like our friends and intimates, or will soon be. But more than this. The sudden and often unreasonable heats of the passionate man are ever apt to fret and irritate our spirits and thus to form a habit of resemblance by the very reaction upon ourselves of his hot and hasty temper. And thus, from being good-natured and agreeable, we may gradually become very much the reverse.



This is "a snare to the soul." It not only affects the comfort and tranquillity of our own minds and our social enjoyment-but our spiritual interests. Angry passions "war against the soul." They are inconsistent with the principles of the truth of God, and with the precepts and example of our divine Master-and consequently with the evidence of true godliness, and of our relation to Christ as his subjects, and to God as his children. "The fruit of the Spirit is Love."



Verses Pro_22:26-27. "Be not thou one of them that strike hands, or of them that are sureties for debts. If thou hast nothing to pay, why should he take away thy bed from under thee." On all subjects, we require "line upon line, and precept upon precept, here a little, and there a little."-You may think the subject in these verses is one on which we hardly require much urgency:-that there is enough in general of self-love in the heart to prevent any great excess of readiness in "striking hands and becoming sureties for debts." But there are some dispositions that are generous and obliging; and there are those who are young and unexperienced in the ways of the world, who do stand in need of having such cautions repeated and urged.*



* See on this subject Pro_6:1-5; Pro_11:15; Pro_17:18.



The language evidently implies, not a universal prohibition of suretiship, as of a thing wrong in itself and under whatever circumstances, but an advice and admonition to special caution and circumspection. There may, as I have before said, be cases in which it is more than justifiable,-in which every claim of necessity and mercy renders it an imperative duty. But still, we are not entitled, for the sake of one, to expose others to risk. We are not entitled to overlook and disregard either the risks and rights of other creditors, or the interests of a dependent family.



The reason too assigned here for the caution shows us, that in our dealings with others, a prudent regard to our own interests is a perfectly legitimate motive;-"if thou hast nothing to pay"-that is, if, on the failure of the party for whom you have become responsible, you have not enough to make good your suretiship,-"Why should he take away thy bed from under thee?" This may seem a very rare case. Yet such creditors there have been, and may still be, whom selfishness and resentment drive to the extreme of harshness:-and whose irritation, perhaps, is exasperated by their seeing, that but for the said suretiship the party would have come to a stand and to a settlement earlier, and with so much the less loss to those whom he has involved. We are commanded to "love our neighbour as ourselves:" but to do for him what might expose us to having our very bed sold from under us, is to love him better than ourselves, which is a step beyond the divine injunction. And so many are the cases in which it is most difficult for us to get at the precise state and prospects of the person-friend though he may be-who makes the application, that there is hardly anything that calls for greater care, or warrants, in the eyes of all sensible and candid people, a larger measure of reserve, and even, generally speaking, of steady refusal.



Verse Pro_22:28. "Remove not the ancient land-mark which thy fathers have set."-This is in correspondence with the express statutes of the Mosaic law.* The act is one of detestable deceit and fraud. A man may by this means, if he goes about it cautiously and by degrees, and chooses carefully his opportunities,-and especially when he has to do with one who is somewhat careless and unobservant in such matters,-add to the border of his own inheritance, and thus benefit himself and his family. But it is in a way which the God of truth and righteousness abhors. O let every one bear in mind, that how cleverly, ingeniously, and successfully soever this may be effected, and how secretly soever "from the eyes of all living," eluding the detection of the defrauded himself, of his relations, and friends, and creditors, and of those public authorities to whom it is given in charge to search out frauds and to right the injured,-yet is it not unknown. The eye sees it, to which "the darkness and the light are both alike." Every inch of land, every fraction of wealth, so acquired, has the curse of the Just One upon it.



* See Deu_19:14; Deu_27:17.



The words have been sometimes applied in a very different department-even to the danger and the criminality of intermeddling with old and long-established articles of doctrine in religion, and principles and statutes of civil polity. On this subject there are two extremes. There is, in the first place, an apprehensiveness and jealousy of all that bears the aspect of innovation, which is absolutely morbid, and becomes a weakness; and there is, in the second place, an excessive fondness for whatever has the charm of novelty to recommend it,-and a restless inquisitiveness after everything of the kind,-an incessant propensity to change, and to list for every shifting wind of doctrine. It may at once be admitted, that the latter is the more dangerous of the two:-and really when we see persons getting hold of principles which to them are new, becoming enamoured of them, pushing them to extremes, and perverting everything else into conformity with them,-hasty to question whatever is old, and as hasty to embrace whatever is novel,-so that, with minds unsettled and roving, it is impossible to predict to what lengths they are to go, and where they are to land,-we hardly wonder that others should run to the contrary extreme, be frightened from inquiry altogether, and speak, with grave apprehension, of the danger of "removing the old landmarks which our fathers have set." It is clear, however, that there can be no period of prescription for truth,-or rather for falsehood,-no length of time, that is, by which error that has passed for truth can become anything else than error. No time can transmute wrong into right. Changes, no doubt, should be made with caution. The longer anything has been received as a truth, the improbability of its being found an error becomes ever the greater. But if any dogma in any human system of Christian doctrine is proved, from a full and careful investigation of the word of God, to have been set down and held as a truth by mistake,-it would be a most strange and mischievous attachment to antiquity for its own sake, that would resist its being expunged and the truth discovered substituted in its room. Never must we forget, that the most ancient land-marks of truth and duty are those which have been fixed here-in the Bible-by the hands of prophets, apostles and evangelists, under the immediate direction of the "Spirit of the Lord." There are none so old as these. From the Bible human standards have been formed. Their land-marks profess to be in agreement, in the bounding lines of truth and error marked out by them, with those which are set down there. But when, on a careful survey, any of them are found to have been misplaced, and to bring any part of the region of error within the boundary of the territory of truth,-their removal becomes a duty of imperative obligation. All that has been introduced, in the form of doctrine or of practice, inconsistent with the statements and prescriptions of the Inspired Volume, has been unwarrantable innovation; and to be charged with innovation for returning to the original and only authoritative test of truth and error, of duty and sin, would be most unreasonable. "The traditions of the elders," among the Jews had great antiquity; yet they were innovations. "To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it is because there is no light in them." And then, as to innovations in the institutes of civil polity,-while hasty changes are admitted to be dangerous and undesirable, there is a clinging to things as they are that is little less than fatuous. To err is human. What system of human polity ever existed, that was perfect, and unsusceptible of improvement? While, therefore, in all that regards the constitution, and laws, and precedents of our national policy, every approach to a revolutionary spirit is greatly to be deprecated, yet the puerile dread of innovation ought not to prevent either the correction of abuses, or the introduction of improvements, corresponding with the advance of knowledge and experience. It should be laid down as a maxim that "final measures" belong only to God; that in all human administrations, the very phrase is presumption. Old customs cannot always suit new times and new circumstances. The occasions in which they originated pass away; the state of things is altered and reversed; and when change of condition requires change of law and practice, adherence to the old is folly.



The general principle laid down in the closing verse, is the tendency of diligence,-of activity, promptitude, and cleverness, quickness in apprehension, and dexterity and perseverance in execution,-to advancement in the world,-to the attainment of its wealth and its honours. It implies also, that wise and prudent princes will select for their own service and that of the state, men who have given proof of vigorous, intelligent, enterprising, and steadily persevering character in the departments in which they have been engaged:-"Seest thou a man diligent in his business? he shall stand before kings; he shall not stand before mean men."



Reverting for a moment to the language of a former verse, let me, in conclusion, press earnestly upon all THE CERTAINTY OF THE WORDS OF TRUTH. The evidence of the divinity of the Bible, instead of ever being shaken by all the efforts of infidelity, has been augmenting from the beginning hitherto. Its external evidence has grown in the fulfilment of its predictions. Its internal evidence, though in one sense ever the same, has, in another, been increasing also; inasmuch as it has stood its ground amidst all the advances of human knowledge, and men have never been able to improve upon it or to get before it:-and it is the one only book of which this can be affirmed. And its experimental evidence,-the manifestation of its truth in its saving influence,-in its power to dislodge and change the evil passions and habits of the worst of men,-has multiplied by thousands and tens of thousands of dead and living witnesses. In our own days, we have but to point, not only to cases of revival in our own land, in which the gospel has proved itself "mighty through God" to the pulling down of the strongholds of worldliness and corruption, and turning hearts long alienated to God,-but to the lands of Heathen idolatry and cruelty and vileness, wherever Gospel truth has found its way and has been embraced. There, in the marvellous changes that have been effected,-in the contrast between previous stupidity, and pollution, and heartless and murderous ferocity, to intelligence, and purity, and virtue, and peace, and harmony, and happiness, we have the triumphs of the Cross, and the manifestation of the "certainty"-the divine certainty-"of the words of truth." They have thus shown themselves to be indeed "excellent things " by the excellence of their effects. We call upon all to examine for themselves. The Bible courts examination. It is the unwillingness and refusal to examine, that is most to be deplored. The genuineness of its writings, the authenticity of its histories, the reality of its recorded miracles, the fulfilment of its prophecies, the sublimity and consistent harmony of its doctrines, the purity of its precepts, the origin of its commemorative ordinances, and its tendency to personal and social virtue and happiness,-all court examination. The testimony of the celebrated earl of Rochester, when converted from infidelity and profligacy to Christianity and virtue, will be found the truth. Laying his hand on the Bible, he would say-"This is true philosophy. This is the wisdom that speaks to the heart. A bad life is the only grand objection to this Book."