Proverbs 16

1. THE preparations [or, plans] of the heart belong to man:

But the answer of the tongue is from the LORD.

2. All the ways of a man are clean in his own eyes:

But the LORD weigheth the spirits.

3. Commit thy works unto the LORD,

And thy thoughts shall be established.

4. The LORD hath made every thing for its own end:

Yea, even the wicked for the day of evil.

5. Every one that is proud in heart is an abomination to the LORD:

Though hand join in hand, he shall not be unpunished.

6. By mercy and truth iniquity is purged:

And by the fear of the LORD men depart from evil.

7. When a man’s ways please the LORD,

He maketh even his enemies to be at peace with him.

8. Better is a little with righteousness

Than great revenues with injustice.

9. A man’s heart deviseth his way:

But the LORD directeth his steps.

10. A divine sentence is in the lips of the king: His mouth shall not transgress in judgment.

11. A just balance and scales are the LORD’s:

All the weights of the bag are his work.

12. It is an abomination to kings to commit wickedness:

For the throne is established by righteousness.

13. Righteous lips are the delight of kings;

And they love him that speaketh right.

14. The wrath of a king is as messengers of death:

But a wise man will pacify it.

15. In the light of the king’s countenance is life;

And his favour is as a cloud of the latter rain.

16. How much better is it to get wisdom than gold!

Yea, to get understanding is rather to be chosen than silver.

17. The high way of the upright is to depart from evil:

He that keepeth his way preserveth his soul.

18. Pride goeth before destruction,

And an haughty spirit before a fall.

19. Better it is to be of a lowly spirit with the poor,

Than to divide the spoil with the proud.

20. He that giveth heed unto the word shall find good:

And whoso trusteth in the LORD, happy is he.

21. The wise in heart shall be called prudent:

And the sweetness of the lips increaseth learning.

22. Understanding is a wellspring of life unto him that hath it:

But the correction of fools is their folly.

23. The heart of the wise instructeth his mouth, And addeth learning to his lips.

24. Pleasant words are as an honeycomb,

Sweet to the soul, and health to the bones.

25. There is a way which seemeth right unto a man,

But the end thereof are the ways of death.

26. The appetite of the labouring man laboureth for him;

For his mouth craveth it of him.

27. A worthless man deviseth [or, diggeth up] mischief:

And in his lips there is as a scorching fire.

28. A froward man scattereth abroad strife:

And a whisperer separateth chief friends.

29. A man of violence enticeth his neighbour,

And leadeth him in a way that is not good.

30. He that shutteth his eyes, it is to devise froward things:

He that compresseth his lips bringeth evil to pass.

31. The hoary head is a crown of glory,

If it be found in the way of righteousness.

32. He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty;

And he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.

33. The lot is cast into the lap;

But the whole disposing thereof is of the LORD.

1-7. THESE proverbs have, more than any other group, a specially religious character impressed on them. The name of Jehovah as Giver, Guide, Ruler, or Judge meets us in each of them. E. H. P.

1. Preparations of the heart, are what the heart devises or intends. But answer of the tongue, is an answer to that which the tongue utters—viz., its requests. God only can accomplish what is desired. M. S.—To man pertains the disposing, the ordering of his heart; the government of his thoughts; the formation of his purposes; the shaping of his petitions in prayer; but to God pertains the answering of his requests, the successful issue of his schemes. Apparently the sentiment of the proverb may cover both the offering of prayer with its answer from the Lord, and the shaping of man’s plans with their ultimate issues, which are determined through the agencies of God’s providence. H. C.

2. All moralists have recognized the truth of the first clause. We are blind to our own faults, do not see ourselves as others see us. Here, however, there is the true remedy against self-deceit. There is One who tries not the “ways” only, but the “spirits,” a “discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” E. H. P.—The Scriptures do not represent God as a mere spectator, but as a witness and judge, who ponders the thought and action with all their circumstances, and makes a just and righteous estimation of them: “I know, and am a witness, saith the Lord.” “The Lord is a God of knowledge, and by Him actions are weighed.” Nay, “the Lord weigheth the spirits.” He, as it were, puts them into a balance, so exactly poised that the smallest grain will turn the scale. R. W.

3. Commit; literally, “roll,” as a man transfers a burden from his own back to one stronger and better able to bear it. Compare Psalm 22:8; 37:5. Thoughts, or the plans or counsels out of which the works spring. E. H. P.—Having formed your plans in the fear of God, seek the aid of His providence in their execution; so shall they be established. The original is expressive, “Roll your doings over upon the Lord;” devolve upon Him the ordering of all the events which are to affect you. He will make your plans firm, successful. H. C.

Roll thy works upon the Lord, roll the burden of thy care from thyself upon God; not only the works of thy hand, but the workings of thy heart; and then leave it with Him by faith and dependence upon Him, submission and resignation to Him; the will of the Lord be done. We may then be easy when we resolve that whatever pleases God shall please us. H.—Duties are ours; events are the Lord’s. It is our part to see how we may be approved of Him; and how we may roll the weight of our weak souls, in well-doing, upon Him who is God omnipotent. When what we thus pursue miscarries, it shall neither be our sin nor our cross. Gurnall.

Committing our works to the Lord is to leave them trustfully in God’s hand. If a man has made good conscience of his work in the sight of the Searcher of hearts, and has spared no honest endeavor, he may then with a quiet heart resign the result to God. It may be something in your business—some step in life of the greatest importance to your own welfare and to that of your family. It may be the health or hazard of the life of some dear friend. You are to go to the edge of your own efforts, both in thinking and doing, and then you are to hand over your work to His keeping who has the blessing that makes rich and adds no sorrow. And then there are cases where the work can be left in God’s hand only by our trying to forget it. There are some things which fasten on us with such absorbing interest that they unfit us for everything else. We have done all we can, and yet we brood over the past; we cannot take a step forward, and yet we torment ourselves with the future. It becomes us then to make a resolute effort to cast away the thought of it. There is no better way than to occupy ourselves with something else till the time comes for God to ripen the result. Ker.

It is the will of God that we should in everything make our requests known to Him by prayer and supplication; not to inform or move Him, but to qualify ourselves for the mercy. The waterman in the boat, that with the hook takes hold of the shore, doth not thereby pull the shore to the boat, but the boat to the shore; so in prayer we do not draw the mercy to ourselves, but ourselves to the mercy. H.—We should try to make our daily prayers bear pointedly on our everyday life—on its duties and temptations, its trials and mercies—not praying into the vague and indefinite, but shooting at a mark—“I will direct my prayer to Thee.” Ker.—We ought not to think little things of no importance, and not to be afraid to pray to God about little things as well as great. There are two reasons which prove that God does not disdain to attend to little things: First, He has made many more little things than great, and has made the greatest things to depend on the least; and second, God is so great, that the difference between what we call great and little is to Him as nothing; and He is so wise, that nothing—not a thought or atom—is small enough to escape His eye. E. R. Conder.

Commit your way, without reserve, to the great Guide who counts the steps of every single day: not seeking active work when He commands us to sit still, nor yet desiring a continuance of rest when He is beckoning on us to mount the hill—such is the patience and the perseverance of the saints! Cling more closely to the unseen One, just in proportion as you find less satisfaction with that which is seen; and look more longingly to heaven, the less you find on earth—whether around you or before—that promises but little good. Thank God—although it may not be without many tears—for everything that makes you hang more loosely to this earth; and pray that, whatsoever else may disappear, faith may not fail—that patience, too, may have her perfect work. And above all, never let your peace and comfort hang on the fulfilment of a single wish, or look for something quite unusual when life goes smoothly onward in its wonted course, monotonous and slow. Judge of your progress less by any joy which you experience than by the fruit you bear; and let your next great test be whether these two things grow daily dearer to your heart—the cross which God appoints you on this earth, the crown which He reserves for you in heaven! Van O.

4. The Lord hath wrought everything for its own end. “Hath ordered all things well,” and this includes the appointment of an “evil day” for “the wicked,” who deserve it. E. H. P.—Everything is made in accordance with its correspondence, i.e., with the design or purpose to which it answers. The wicked are fitted, by their temper and conduct, for the day of retribution. It is an ordinance of God that they shall receive that retribution which is the answer, or that which corresponds, to their conduct. That “God made everything and every man, to answer the purposes which it or he does actually answer,” cannot be denied, unless we maintain that things and men are what they are, contrary to His will. When the text says that God made the wicked for the day of evil, I understand it as meaning that God has so arranged things that punishment will certainly follow the commission of sin unless averted by repentance. He has connected together sinning and suffering, so that there can be no escape for the impenitent sinner. M. S.

This text may be rendered, “God hath ordained everything to that which is fit to it, and the wicked hath He ordained for the day of evil”—that is, the wisdom of God hath fitted one thing to another, punishment to sin, the evil day to the evil-doer. Archbishop Tillotson.—Though God made man He did not make evil; sin is no part of His creation. But although He be not the author of sin, yet He controls and overrules the effects of it, making even the wicked themselves to be instruments of His will, to correct His offending servants or to try their patience; or else to be the executioners of His justice in punishing the ungodly and impenitent. Thus it is that “the Lord hath made all things for Himself,” and His own glory: good men to glorify Him as objects of mercy; the wicked as instruments or examples of His “justice in the day of evil.” Wogan.

It is doubly important to understand this proverb: First, because it does teach a great truth; and second, because it does not teach a certain great error which has been sometimes imputed to it. The word “made” cannot be restricted to creative work, but legitimately includes all the doings of God—works of providence more specifically than works of creation. The Lord works all things in the sense of shaping events and determining issues with special reference to retribution for moral good or evil done by His moral subjects. The Lord works everything for its own purpose, i.e., He makes results and issues correspond to the human agencies involved in them. He makes the final result of every earthly life correspond to what that life has been. The sense of the proverb is that simply in accordance with the great, eternal law of fitness, God brings upon the wicked the destiny of suffering. There is a just and righteous correspondence between the moral activities of His creatures and the reward which a just God will bestow therefor. This has its special manifestation as between sin and suffering; the moral evil that is wickedly, rebelliously done by His creatures, and the evil of suffering righteously inflicted by their Supreme King and Judge. Unfortunately this proverb has sometimes been tortured to say that God has created the wicked for the sake of punishing them, i.e., in order to secure the good results of it in His moral universe. This doctrine has been made specially objectionable by associating it with a practical denial of free moral agency—by assuming that, to accomplish His ends in creating sinners for perdition, God holds them to a life of sinning by a law of necessity which they cannot break. Nothing can be wider from the truth than this, or more repugnant to every sentiment of benevolence or even of justice. We need to remember that God punishes the wicked for their voluntary rebellion against His authority—for their purposed antagonism toward all righteousness, goodness, and truth. We need to distinguish broadly between God’s supposed creating of sinners in order that they may sin, that so He may damn them for the good to come from it; and, on the other hand, His actually creating them that they might be obedient and so be blest, and then punishing them only because they will not obey Him, but will perversely scorn their Maker, disown His authority, abuse His love, and set at nought all His efforts to reclaim and save them. Our proverb affirms that in this sense God shapes the destiny of the wicked to their just doom of suffering. When they absolutely will consecrate themselves to sinning and to rebellion, the only use God can make of them is to give them their just doom of woe, and make them an example to His moral universe. The only issue that can bear a just relation of correspondence to their horribly wicked life is this awful doom of suffering. H. C.

5. See 11:21.

6. See here, First, how the guilt of sin is taken away from us; by the mercy and truth of God, mercy in promising, truth in performing; the mercy and truth which kiss each other in Jesus Christ the Mediator; by the covenant of grace, in which mercy and truth shine so bright; by our mercy and truth, as the condition of the pardon, and a necessary qualification for it; by these, and not by the legal sacrifices (Micah 6:7, 8). Second, how the power of sin is broken in us; by the principles of mercy and truth commanding in us, the corrupt inclinations are purged out; so we may take the former part; however, by the fear of the Lord, and the influence of that fear, men depart from evil; they will not dare to sin against God who keep up in their minds a holy dread and reverence of Him. H.

7. A truly good man will be blessed of God and have peace even on the part of his enemies. They will find little to censure, and have little or no pretext for injury. Of course, this is only a general truth, to which are not a few exceptions. Such are the cases of persecution for righteousness’ sake. M. S.—Not that the enemies are simply kept quiet through their knowledge that the good man is under God’s protection, but that goodness has power to charm and win them to itself. E. H. P.

8. Wealth obtained in violation of justice brings with it the curse of the Almighty; sooner or later the bitterest self-condemnation, and the detestation of all the good. With stinging words of terrible truth the Apostle James puts this case (5:1-5). H. C.—Be careful rather of what thou dost than of what thou hast; for what thou hast is none of thine, and will leave thee at thy death. But what thou doest is thine, and will follow thee and plead for thee or against thee at thy resurrection. Quarles.

9. It is for man to lay his plans, the Lord only can confirm them. This rests in His good pleasure. H. C.—If men devise their way so as to make God’s glory their end and His will their rule, they may expect that He will direct their steps by His Spirit and grace, so that they shall not miss their way nor come short of their end. But let men devise their worldly affairs ever so politically, and with ever so great a probability of success, yet God has the ordering of the event, and sometimes directs their steps to that which they least intended. H.

We lay our plans and set about our projects exactly as though we were our own masters, without any reference to God or any suspicion whatever of His interference with us. But what takes place? Events that we did not foresee suddenly rise up and baffle us. They first hamper our schemes and then demolish them. We find out that we have been calculating in the dark. We are forced to feel that we are not our own masters nor the authors of our own destinies, that there is a hand which overrules us and all that befalls us. Our ignorance of the future brings our best-laid schemes to ruin; our ruined schemes tell us of our dependence on the world’s great Master. The truth comes out—we are “under the mighty hand of God.” C. Bradley.—When our eye is keenest we see but a little of the great whole even of our own life, and that little imperfectly. The unseen hand casts the shuttle its own way, and the loom clanks and yields its many-colored threads in its own time and fashion. ‘Tis true that we can affect the weaving of our own life; we can brighten the colors; we can change the very pattern in a measure. But never by criticism on the process itself; only by living, and thus furnishing better materials to Him who is making the web. The deep truth is, that what we call “things” are not much in themselves at all. The substance of things really lies partly in ourselves. We make them this or that, much or little, things of help or things of hindrance, by what we are in ourselves, and by the manner in which we receive them. Raleigh.

The greatest events of our lives are those in which we have no option. It is not left to man’s determination in what age of the world he shall be born; whether in Christian or in savage land; whether poor or rich; whether feeble or hardy; whether a genius or a fool; whether he shall enjoy parental care or be an orphan; whether he shall dwell in a realm of peace or have his whole character and actions moulded by revolution and war. And we might carry out the enumeration to a thousand particulars, each bearing directly on his happiness. J. W. A.

Every agent in society, every element in nature, and even the angels of God are charged with some office affecting us. The connections we form, our prosperity and adversity, and every circumstance relating to our condition are of the Divine choosing. It must be so, and if it were not, we could never be conducted safely through such a world as this. None but God, having control of every influence affecting us, and adapting everything with foresight of what we are and what we need, could secure our spiritual advancement and bring us at last to glory. How suitable then that we should commit to Him the choosing of all things for us. H. H.

This morning’s waking was the touch of His hand. Last week’s plan of life or study was looked down upon with His sympathizing notice. When you left your home the other day, your heart devised your way, but the Lord did really direct your steps. When you prayed that God would keep those you left there, your prayer was verily heard, and whether by granting or denying, it will be God Himself that answers you, the personal, listening, loving God. No God that is hid away in heartless laws, but the friendly God of each separate soul now, as of the elders and prophets, of John and James, of Peter and Simeon, of Mary Magdalen and Jairus’s daughter. Judæa did not exhaust His love. He is the God of our houses and streets and schools as well; of our parents’ solicitude, of our children’s happiness, of our own frail feet. The Christian’s God is a reality. No reality on earth so real! F. D. H.

10. Solomon thought of civil government as ordained of God, and of the king therefore as ruling under God, and, while standing in his proper relations toward God, as divinely guided in his decision. This proverb was not intended as a history of the kings of the earth. It is rather a view of their relations to God and of their consequent responsibilities and duties. If you may assume that they are acting honestly and truly for God, then these things will be true.

11. A just weight and balance. These are the Lord’s in the sense that He requires them and enjoins the fair dealing which they provide for and were intended to secure. “His work,” seems to imply that He enjoined their use as a safeguard against the inherent human selfishness which would otherwise develop itself in fraud or injustice. The Hebrew word for “weights” is stones, suggesting the ancient usage of small stones for weights. The dealer carried them in a bag. Hence the greater facility for deceit, since he might and sometimes did carry one set of stones to buy with and another to sell with. See 20:10 below, where this form of fraud is condemned. H. C. —God requires exact justice in all our dealings, and therefore it is our duty to take care that the weights and balance be just. Wells.

15. In the previous verse the wrath of a king has been, by a striking metaphor, represented as messengers of death. In this verse “the light of His countenance,” and “His favor” supply the antithesis to his wrath; and in these is life, for the object of the royal complacency is in no danger from the messengers of death. Apply this to the King of kings, and what a sublime lesson on life! Here we have suggested the blessedness of reconciliation and the conditions of serviceableness. A holy life in its ideal combines two elements: abiding in the light and love of God and yielding fruit in service. He who is reconciled to God in Christ abides in the light of His smile. He walks in light and dwells in love, and so every condition of holiness and happiness is assured. And the same Divine favor bestows the abundance of the Spirit, the latter rain which brings fertility, which insures fruitfulness as well as holiness. Pierson.

16. How much better is it to get wisdom than gold! Better than gold! But gold is good, and he who would put forward with success the far higher worth of wisdom had better not begin his argument by putting too low an estimate on gold. Gold is full of service; has in it wondrous potencies for smoothing life-travel, lightening burdens, cheering the poor, helping the needy, and glorifying God. Yet “how much better is it to get wisdom than gold!” Gold can be but an external possession, a mere accessory of life. Wisdom is a well, a fountain, in the Christian’s soul. It is fed by secret channels direct from the river of life, clear as crystal, which proceedeth from the throne of God and of the Lamb. The joy of the Lord is his strength, the strength of the Lord is his joy; and, filled from that perennial Fount of good, he lives, thrives, rejoices, utterly independent of the lack of gold. Wray. —Heavenly wisdom is better than worldly wealth and to be preferred before it. Grace is more valuable than gold. Grace is the gift of God’s peculiar favor; gold only of common providence. Grace is for ourselves; gold for others. Grace is for the soul and eternity; gold only for the body and time. Grace will stand us in stead in a dying hour, when gold will do us no good. H.

17. The upright will not wittingly go in the path of evil, and therefore they turn away into another and safer way. Whoever means to remain secure must look well to the way which he takes, and adhere constantly to it. The participles here are employed to designate what is habitual and constant. M. S.—Very noticeably the way of the upright is here a highway, raised and made smooth and dry for perfect travel; not rough, or low and miry as in the state of nature. Such is the way of life which belongs to the upright. The thing said of it here is that it turns squarely away from evil—leads off to avoid all sin and so all ill. He who carefully keeps this way will preserve not merely his strength from waste and himself from weariness, but his soul from the evils that imperil human souls in this world of sin.

18. According to all social and moral law, destruction follows close upon foregoing pride. Who does not know that a proud and haughty spirit betrays folly, forfeits esteem and love, provokes the social and moral retribution that is itself destruction and a fall? If this be true in human society and under its moral laws, how much more under the righteous retributions of Jehovah’s administration! H. C.—In the course of Providence it is a general rule that “pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” Nebuchadnezzar was spared while he went on ravaging kingdoms and shedding blood; but when he forgot God in his pride, then he was condemned to grovel in the dust as a brute. When Rabshakeh came defying the God of Israel, it was then that he was blasted in his pride. Herod was suffered to go on in his evil and bloody deeds; it was not until he made an oration and received the idolatry of his audience, and gave not God the glory; it was not until that hour of impious pride that God smote him with death. R. Hall.

19. As the preceding proverb gives us the ruinous results of pride, this gives the worth of humility. “Dividing the spoil,” in a country for ages but too familiar with the ways of savage robbery and plunder as well as of war, was naturally significant of victory, booty, and exuberant joy. But better are the humble of heart who have sympathy with the lowly than they who associate with the proud even in their hours of most exultant hilarity.

20. “Handleth wisely,” translates a Hebrew word which means simply to consider attentively, wisely, intelligently. “Matter” represents the very common Hebrew term for word, which may, however, bear the sense of thing. Hence we may choose between referring it to God’s revealed Word, or to things in general that are proper subjects of consideration. Probably the latter sense should be taken, the proverb commending serious, careful thought on all important subjects Blessed are they who add to such diligent consideration a real and hearty trust in the Lord. H. C.

Faith grounds itself, solely and wholly, on an inner and vital relation of the soul to its source. . . . We stand, by the necessities of our existence, in the relationship of sons to a Father. Unless this relationship actually exists, there could be no faith; if it exists, then faith is bound to appear. . . . It is in a spirit of sonship that faith reveals and realizes itself. Faith is the spirit of confident surrender, which can only be justified by an inner identification of life. Its primary note, therefore, will be trust. Faith will ever discover, when its reason for action or belief are traced to their last source, that it arrives at a point where its only and all-sufficient plea will be “God is my Father; I am His child.” And the growth of faith means the gradual increase of the personal contact, the spiritual intimacy between Father and child. H. S. Holland.

21. Sweetness of the lips means gentle and persuasive language. This sweetness attracts listeners and so increases knowledge.

25. See 14:12 for the same. In other words, “A man may come to regard a thing as right, which in the end will prove to be destructive and fatal.” How often is this maxim still verified! M. S.—It mainly applies to the man who, however many virtues he may possess, however upright he may be in the duties of life, however carefully he may attend to the outward duties of religion, does not receive it into his heart nor act on its considerations as a motive. This way of life usually seems right unto a man. He wins esteem from without, and has no accusing conscience within. But he has not the fear of God before his eyes. This approved way must end in the way of death. Improbable as it may seem that the correct liver, the blameless and upright man, should perish at last, it is but a necessary consequence from his having put by and rejected the only remedy which God has provided for the universal taint of our nature. Alford.

Morality, taken as apart from religion, is just that negative species of virtue which consists in not doing what is scandalously depraved or wicked. But there is no heart of holy principle in it, any more than there is in the worst of felonies. It is the very same thing, as respects the denial of God, or the state of personal separation from God, that distinguishes all the most reprobate forms of character. A correct, outwardly virtuous man is the principle of sin well-dressed and respectably kept—nothing more. And what can we know of sin, or how can we feel our deep spiritual need, when we are living so respectably and maintain in the outward life a show of so great integrity, and even so much of refinement often in what is called virtue. True conviction of sin, how difficult is it, when its appearances and modes of life are so fair, when it twines itself so cunningly about or creeps so insidiously into our amiable qualities, and sets off its internal disorders by so many outward charms and attractions! And even if the delicate, always correct sinner keeps to his decency here, the proper end will show itself hereafter, and then it will be seen how dark, after all, how deep in criminality, how bronzed in guilty thought, is every soul becoming under even the fairest shows of virtue, coupled with neglect of God, and separated from His personal love. How necessary is it, then, that every man out of Christ, not living in any vicious practice, should make a study of this subtle, cunningly veiled character, the state of reputable sin, and study it long enough to fathom its real import. Look into the secret motives and springs of your character; inspect and study long enough to really perceive the strange, wild current of your thoughts; comprehend the deep ferment of your lusts, enmities, and passions; hunt down the selfish principle which instigates and misdirects and turns off your whole life from God, setting all your aims on issues that reject Him; ask, in a word, how this respectable sin appears when viewed inwardly; how, if unrestrained by pride and the conventional rules of decency and character, it would appear outwardly. Fathom the deep hunger of your soul, and listen to its inward wail of bondage, its mournful, unuttered cry of want after God. Ask it of the enlightening Spirit of God, that He will open to your view yourself, and make you to know all that is inmost, deepest, most hidden in the habitually veiled enormity of your sin! H. B.

27. Digs up evil—that is, obtains it as the reward of his efforts. The worthless man here seems to be described in the second clause, as a detractor, calumniator. On his lips (the words which hang upon his lips) is that which resembles a scorching fire, i.e., heated calumnious speeches. M. S.—A burning fire on his lips betokens slander—malign, Satantic slander—as if every word were hot shot, or a poisoned arrow for the bosom of friend or foe, almost without discrimination. Of such sin, what language, what figures of speech can over-paint its vileness! H. C.

30. As in 6:13, we have the physiognomy of the slanderer brought before us—the half-closed eyes that never look you straight in the face, the restlessness or cunning of which biting the lips is the surest indication. E. H. P.—Slander is diabolical. Its essence is hatred of good, and envy of those who possess it. James makes this specially heinous by declaring that to slander men is to slander God, for “man was made in the image of God.” Slander does not often employ gross methods. The terrors of the law prevent that. The medieval princes found subtle poisons that could diffuse their deadly venom through the fragrance of roses; so men offer the fragrance of praise with malevolent reservations. These are the modes of polite society, but they all spring from the same state of heart, and cannot be condemned in words stronger than the apostle’s, for he says this state of mind is “earthly, sensual, and devil-possessed.” H. W. Warren.

31. Under every dispensation the hoary head is a crown of glory to the righteous. Longevity, which in the case of the wicked only aggravates sin and its awful reckoning, affords to true believers a longer term of useful service and holy example, increased proficiency in gifts and graces, and a corresponding recompense. Old age has its appropriate beauty no less than youth. To the eye which can wisely discern there is a mature loveliness in the “shock of corn that cometh in its season.” J. W. A.

It is one of the happy facts in our life that old age can be postponed. The wheel of time cannot be stopped, but the spirit can find the long-sought fountain of youth. Who can doubt that the Christian temper, manifesting itself in sweet charity, in reverence for the body as the temple of the Holy Ghost, in the expulsion of selfishness and the whole brood of un Christly tempers, in the welcome admission of whatever is of good report and in submission to the will of God—who can doubt that these preserve the youth of the spirit? No sad experience can break down the buoyancy of such a spirit. With all ages, knowledges, pure pleasures, growths, and activities, it is in sympathy. To have this is to be always young. No artist has ever painted an old angel. The fulness of the eternal life keeps them young, as it keeps those who know something of it in the life which now is. Christian Advocate.

Disraeli puts these words into the mouth of one of his characters: “Youth is a blunder; manhood a struggle; old age a regret.” A sad and cheerless view of life’s progress that! It may be true, in measure, of a life separated from godliness; it certainly is not true of a life allied with godliness. Let there be “life and godliness,” and then youth is not a blunder, but a wise purpose and a glowing hope; manhood is not a struggle only, but a conquest and a joy; old age is not a regret, but a rich memory and a glorious prospect. R. P. Macmaster.

32. Moderation of one’s own passions is better than deeds of valor; and subjugation of one’s own mind, than the conquest of a city. Clearly there is a high and noble moral tone in this. M. S.—Man has no capacity for power more noble than that by which he holds every passion in due self-control; no ruling is greater or better than self-ruling H. C.—He that gets and keeps the mastery of his passions, he is better than the mighty, better than he that by a long siege takes a city or by a long war subdues a country. Behold, a greater than Alexander or Cæsar is here! H.—Behold thy trophies within thee, not without thee. Lead thine own captivity captive, be Cæsar unto thyself, and enjoy that empire which every man gives himself. He who is thus his own monarch contentedly sways the sceptre of himself, not envying the glory of crowned heads and Elohims of the earth. Browne.

The will is strengthened by obedience. Many suppose that real strength of the will is secured by giving it free play. Not a bit of it. You weaken it in that way. Obedience to a legitimate law is a source of moral strength and power. What is obedience? Is it submission to a power superior to your own? No. Is it weakness bowing to strength? No. Obedience is submission to an authority whose claims are admitted. If man is royal when he rules over nature, he is most royal, most imperial, when he rules himself—when he has the courage, the power, the kingly courage and power to crush himself in the presence of an authority which he has ascertained has a right to his obedience. Liddon.

Spiritual strength consists of two things: power of will and power of self-restraint. It requires two things, therefore, for its existence: strong feelings and strong command over them. We mistake strong feelings for strong character.

A man who bears all before him is the weak man; it is his passions that are strong; he, mastered by them, is weak. You must measure the strength of a man by the power of the feelings which he subdues, not by the power of those which subdue him. He who with strong passions remains chaste; he who, keenly sensitive, with manly power of indignation in him, can be provoked, and yet refrain himself, and forgive—these are strong men, spiritual heroes. Spiritual strength is reached by successive steps. Fresh strength is got by every mastery of self. In the spiritual warfare every sin you slay, the spirit of that sin passes into you transformed into strength; every passion, not merely kept in abeyance by asceticism, but subdued by a higher impulse, is so much character strengthened. The strength of the passion not expended is yours still. F. W. R.

The strongest characters are the gentlest, and a thousand-fold more strength is shown by maintaining a meek and quiet spirit, than by giving way to rage and anger. The sweetest-tempered men in the world—those who show forth the glory of a meek spirit—are not “good-natured men,” but those who have triumphed over pain, and irritability, and fiery temperaments. To indulge or excuse anger on account of natural temperament or infirmity is simply to foster and feed a malignant temper, until at last it will rage and rule within like the devils in the demoniac of Gadara. There is nothing pleasurable, or great, or noble, in anger, that any one should seek to keep or cherish it. It is the foe of health, of soul-peace and social comfort. The irritable man is a discomfort to himself as well as an annoyance to others. But disastrous as are the effects of anger in the natural and social life, they are still worse in a spiritual life. How many Christians are cursed with barrenness and leanness of soul because of infirmities of temper which they never seek to subdue. When such dispositions abound, the Holy Spirit is grieved. He will not brood over such souls, for He is the Spirit of love, tenderness, and gentleness. The spirit of prayer is wanting in such hearts; the angry man cannot pray. We cannot see God face to face in the communion of the closet when the sullen gloom of anger hangs like a cloud on our hearts. It also drives out all spiritual joy and brotherly love. It dulls the affections and makes the heart cold and dull. Surely God who loves His children and desires their happiness, has not meant that they should remain here under the dominion of this evil passion. He who mourns over an undisciplined, unsanctified temper may rest assured that the victory is attainable, and that he may be adorned with and enjoy the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit. Niccolls.

The lowliest man who employs his love and gratitude, the best of his affections, upon God, the best of beings; who has a particular regard and esteem for the virtuous few, compassion for the distressed, and a fixed and extensive good-will for all; who strives to subdue his greatest enemy, his unruly passion; who promotes a good understanding between neighbors, composes and adjusts differences, does justice to an injured character and acts of charity to distressed worth; who cherishes his friends, forgives his enemies, and even serves them in any pressing exigency; who abhors vice and pities the vicious person; such a man has juster pretensions to the title of heroism, as heroism implies a certain nobleness and elevation of soul breaking forth into correspondent actions, than he who conquers armies or makes the most glaring figure in the eye of an injudicious world. Seed.

The right self-control is the handmaid of self-denial. Self-control is the dominion of the will over our nature, over inclination and temperament, and therewith likewise over all that is meant to be the will’s ministering instrument, bodily as well as spiritual. But self-control in itself may still be in the service of egoism, whereas the essence of self-denial consists in killing egoism in its root, not merely this or that inclination, but making a sacrifice of the whole natural man, while the will entirely submits to the Divine will, and the man himself dies with Christ to live with Him. Self-denial, in its deepest root, is obedience, is the practical strengthening of humility, and the actual death of pride. Martensen.

Plainly, there are two kinds of self-denial: the one from fear—formal, slavish, barren; the other from love—blessing the spirit and strengthening it in virtue. So far as Christianity requires self-denial, it is uniformly and only of this latter kind. Utterly do they misapprehend the religion of Christ who regard it as gloomy and austere—as a system of formal prohibitions and restraints. No; its self-denial is from love. It is a system of prohibition and restraint only as it is a system of excitement and guidance. Let Christians be fully inspired with the great positive ideas and motives of their religion, and it is impossible there should be in their deportment anything austere, or sanctimonious, or gloomy, more than there was in the deportment of Christ and of His apostles. It is only under the influence of self-denial from love that the highest character can be formed. M. H.—Self-denial, for the sake of self-denial, does no good; self-sacrifice for its own sake is no religious act at all. If you give up a meal for the sake of showing power over self, or for the sake of self-discipline, it is the most miserable of all delusions. You are not more religious in doing this than before. This is mere self-culture, and self-culture being occupied forever about self, leaves you only in that circle of self from which religion is to free you; but to give up a meal that one you love may have it is properly a religious act—no hard and dismal duty, because made easy by affection. To bear pain for the sake of bearing it has in it no moral quality at all, but to bear it rather than surrender truth, or in order to save another, is positive enjoyment as well as ennobling to the soul. So sacrifice alone, bare and unrelieved, is ghastly, unnatural, and dead; but self-sacrifice, illuminated by love, is warmth and life. F. W. R.

33. Into the lap. The process seems to have been that the lots were thrown into the gathered folds of a robe and then drawn out. Disposing; better, the judgment or sentence which depends upon the lot. Where all human influence was excluded, where everything seemed the merest chance, there the faith of the Israelite teacher recognized the guidance of a higher will. E. H. P.—This is obviously the sacred lot—a method of appealing to God for His decision. The reader may see cases of this in Lev. 16:8-10; Josh. 15-19; 1 Chron. 24:5, 7. It must not be inferred that this appeal to God can be properly made without special direction from Himself. Such direction preceded its use in the cases referred to. It cannot be well to presume upon God’s interposition to express His will by the lot unless He has authorized it in the special case. H. C.

The Divine providence orders and directs those things which to us are perfectly casual and fortuitous. Nothing comes to pass by chance, nor is any event determined by a blind fortune, but everything by the will and counsel of God. What man has neither eye nor hand in God is intimately concerned in. All the disposals of Providence concerning our affairs we must look upon to be the directing of our lot, the determining of what we referred to God, and must be reconciled to them accordingly. H.—He who recognizes the unfailing supervision and control of all the forces of nature, and of all the courses of history, by the wise and loving sovereignty of Him in whom “we live, and move, and have our being,” realizes

that all chance and happening and accident are subject to both the knowledge and the consent of God, and that the falling of every leaf and the turning of every card or die, happen alike

by God’s will and favor. In this light it is that every chance, or accident, or happening, is a special or a particular providence; a signal exercise of God’s directing power. S. S. T.