“Liberal” and “bountiful” were conventional names. The Hebrew word for “liberal” originally meant exactly that--open-hearted, generous, magnanimous. In the East it is the character which, above all, they call princely. So, like our words “noble” and “nobility,” it became a term of rank--“lord” or “prince”--and was often applied to men who were not at all great-hearted, but the very opposite: even to the “vile person.” “Vile person” is literally the “faded,” or the “exhausted,” whether mentally or morally--the last kind of character that would be princely. The other conventional term used by Isaiah refers to wealth, rather than rank. The Hebrew for “bountiful” literally means “abundant”--a man blessed with plenty--and is used in the Old Testament both for the rich and the fortunate. Its nearest English equivalent is, perhaps, “the successful man.” To this, Isaiah fitly opposes a name, wrongly rendered in our version “churl,” but corrected in the margin to “crafty”--the fraudulent, the knave. When moral discrimination comes, says Isaiah, men will not apply the term “princely” to “worn-out” characters, nor grant them the social respect implied by the term. They will not call the “fraudulent” the “fortunate,” nor canonise him as successful who has gotten his wealth by underhand means. “The worthless character shall no more be called princely, nor the knave hailed as the successful.” But men’s characters shall stand out true in their actions, and by their fruits ye shall know them. In those magic days the heart shall come to the lips, and its effects be unmistakable. (Prof. G. A. Smith, D. D.)
