Even in Job, theoldest book in the world, we read that the bitter in soul dig for death more earnestly than for hid treasures (Job_3:21). There is not another comparison within the whole compass of human actions so vivid as this. I have heard of diggers actually fainting when they have come even upon a single coin. They become positively frantic, digging all night with desperate earnestness, and continue to work till utterly exhausted. There are, at this hour, hundreds of persons thus engaged all over the country. Not a few spend their last farthing in these ruinous efforts. I heard a respectable man in Sidon declare that if he had been one of those fortunate diggers in the garden he would have killed all the rest and fled with the treasure out of the country. These operations are carried on with the utmost secrecy, accompanied with charms and incantations against the jan and other spirits which are said to keep guard over hid treasures. The belief in the existence of these guards, and of their dangerous character, is just as prevalent now as in the time of the Thousand Nights. Intelligent and respectable people have assured me that they have come upon slabs of stone, closing up doors to secret chambers, which nopower on earth could remove, because the proper password or charm is lost. Others soberly assert that they have been driven away by terrible men, who threatened them with instant death if they attempted to force the doors. The secret deposits are always found by accident. (W. M. Thomson, D.D.)
The great life-quest
Wisdom, or the intellectual adoption of good and pious principles, and the practical application of such principles to the ordering of life and conduct and relations, is personified. The writer has dealt with Wisdom’s call to the young, and with her warning to the negligent; now he presents her instructions to those who show a disposition to give heed to her. She addresses those who take a serious view of life. Life is, for every man, full of sublime possibilities. There must be some great life-quest, something that we should live to seek, something that we may hope to win.
I. What does it seem to be? It is called “knowledge,” “understanding,” “wisdom.” The desire to know was never more absorbing. The pursuit of knowledge never seemed more encouraging. Facilities for the search never so abounded. Rewards for those who attain never were so rich. And yet the grave mysteries of life never so thickened and darkened round the human spirit as they do to-day. The pursuit of knowledge can never stop with things, it must concern itself with moral questions. Since the time of Bacon there has grown up an extravagant demand for the sense-verification of everything. Man’s supreme question is: “Good, what is it? Where is it? How can it be attained?” Appeal: You would know as books can teach; as science-leaders can teach; as experience can teach. But none of them, nor all together, will ever satisfy you. You must know as God, and God alone, can teach you.
II. What does it prove to be? The knowledge and fear of God. If a man’s quest be sincere and thoroughly earnest, it leads to that; it cannot rest short of that.
1. A life-quest may not be carried far enough. It may stop at what only seems to be.
2. A life-quest may be turned aside. “Ye did run well, who did hinder you?” Young souls may be attracted aside by worldly pleasure; driven aside by worldly cares; or cast aside by false teachings. “Then shall ye know, if ye follow on to know the Lord.” When you have found what is the chief good for the sons of men, follow it on, through riches, learning, pleasure, still unresting, ever unresting, until the soul is led to the feet of Jesus, and finds in Him the true knowledge and the true fear of God. (Weekly Pulpit.)
Seek, and ye shall find
The matter of this whole passage consists in a command to seek and a promise to bestow. A father speaks, and he speaks to children, lie demands a reasonable service, and promises a rich reward. In the fourfold repetition of the command there seems an order of succession.
I. “receive my words.” Practical instruction begins here. The basis of all religion and morality is the Word of the Lord, taken into the understanding and the heart. The Word of God is a vital seed, but it will not germinate unless it be hidden in a softened, receptive heart. The place and use of providential visitation in the Divine administration of Christ’s kingdom is to break up the way of the Word through the incrustations of worldliness and vanity that encase a human heart, and keep the Word lying hard and dry upon the surface.
II. “incline thine ear.” The entrance of the Word has an immediate effect on the attitude of the mind and the source of the life. The incoming of the Word makes the ear incline to wisdom; and the inclining of the ear to wisdom lets in and lays up greater treasures of the Word. Those who hide the Word in their hearts acquire a habitual bent of mind toward things spiritual. The great obstacle to the power and spread of the gospel lies in the averted attitude of human hearts. A man inclines his ear to those sounds which already his heart desires. To turn the ear to the word of wisdom by an exercise of will, is the very way to innoculate the heart with a love to that word passing the love of earthly things. The ear inclined to Divine wisdom will draw the heart; the heart drawn will incline the ear.
III. “cry after knowledge.” This represents the bent heavenward of the heart at a more advanced stage. The longing for God’s salvation, already begotten in the heart, bursts forth now into an irrepressible cry. Men may be offended with the fervour of an earnest soul, God never. Compression will only increase the strength of the emotion struggling within.
IV. “seek her as silver.” Another and a higher step. The last was the earnest cry; this is the persevering endeavour. Fervent prayer must be tested by persevering pains. “Strive to enter in.” The search of wisdom is compared to another search with which we are more familiar. The zeal of mammon’s worshippers rebukes the servants of the living God. We are invited to take a leaf from the book of the fortune-seeker. Will not the far-reaching plans, and heroic sacrifices, and long-enduring toil of Californian and Australian gold-diggers rise up and condemn us who have tasted and known the grace of God? Two things are required in our search--the right direction and the sufficient impulse. Those who seek thus shall not seek in vain. None fail who seek according to the prescription of the Word, and after the example of the world. (W. Arnot, D.D.)
Meditation in searching
Solomon, speaking of knowledge and understanding, bids us to “search for her as for hidden treasure.” You know jewels do not lie upon the surface of the ground, but they are hid in the receptacles of the earth; you must dig for them before you can enjoy them. Truth is in profundo, and our understandings are dark. He that rides post through a country is never able to make a full description of it; and he that takes but a transitory view of the truths of the gospel will never come to the full knowledge of them. ‘Tis meditation makes them appear to our eye in their beauty and lustre. (H. G. Salter.)
A penetrating search
Some years ago the scientific world was startled by the announcement that far down in the abyss of waters, below the seeming limits of life and light, a new world of animal organisms had existence. Fish and mullusc, sponge and coral were there, though man had vainly imagined no living creature could be found. He had not dredged deep enough. A longer line brought new wonders to light. And so with the Scriptures. They can never be exhausted. It is we who fail to search, and searching, never find. (W. H. Groser.)
