Sermon Bible Commentary
Ecclesiastes 7:8
The text expresses the general principle or doctrine that by the condition of our existence here, if things go right, a conclusion is better than a beginning. It is on the condition of our existence in this world that this principle is founded. That condition is that everything is passing on toward something else in order to, and for the sake of, that something further on, so that its chief importance or value is in that something to be attained further on. And if that ulterior object be attained, and be worth all this preceding course of things, then "the end is better than the beginning." We have to consider the year on the supposition of our living through it. And it is most exceedingly desirable that in the noblest sense "the end" should be "better than the beginning." Consider what state of the case would authorise us at the end of the year to pronounce this sentence upon it.
I. The sentence may be pronounced if at the end of the year we shall be able, after deliberate conscientious reflection, to affirm that the year has been in the most important respects better than the preceding.
II. The sentence will be true if during the progress of the year we shall effectually avail ourselves of the lessons suggested by a review of the preceding year.
III. The text will be a true sentence if then we shall have good evidence that we are become really more devoted to God.
IV. It is but putting the same thing in more general terms to say, The end will be better than the beginning if we shall by then have practically learnt to live more strictly and earnestly for the greatest purposes of life.
V. If we shall have acquired a more effectual sense of the worth of time, the sentence will be true.
VI. It will, again, be true if with regard to fellow-mortals we can conscientiously feel that we have been to them more what Christians ought than in the preceding year.
VII. Another point of superiority we should hope the end may have over the beginning of the year is that of our being in a better state of preparation for all that is to follow.
VIII. It will be a great advantage and advancement to end the year with if we shall then have acquired more of a rational and Christian indifference to life itself.
J. Foster, Lectures; 1st series, p. 1.
References: Ecclesiastes 7:8. J. Hamilton, The Royal Preacher,p. 165; Spurgeon, Morning by Morning,p. 366.