_The words of the Preacher._ THE GREAT DEBATE This book has been called the sphinx of the Bible, a not unapt name, for the book is grave, majestic, mysterious. Whatever its meaning be, it contradicts itself in the most flagrant way, looked at from every standpoint bug one. The book is clearly the... [ Continue Reading ]
_Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities, all is vanity _ THE VANITY OF THE WORLD Certainly, he, who had riches as plentiful as the stones of the street (1 Kings 10:27), and wisdom as large as the sand of the sea (1 Kings 4:29), could want no advantages, either to try experiment... [ Continue Reading ]
_One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh._ THE LAW OF CIRCULARITY, OR RETROGRESSION, AN ESSENTIAL ELEMENT OF PROGRESS The circle is the archetype of all forms, physically as well as mathematically. It is the most complete figure, the most stable under violence, the most economica... [ Continue Reading ]
_All the rivers run into the sea, yet the sea is not full._ THE TURN OF THE YEAR There is a truth underlying the old conceit which pictured the universe as moving in cycles. History repeats itself. Our individual experience--which is only history in its minuter detail--shows us how little of origi... [ Continue Reading ]
_The eye is not satisfied with seeing._ THE UNSATISFIED EYE This fact is selected as an instance of man’s profitless curiosity, as a symbol of the insatiable-ness of the human mind. My remarks will, I think, prove applicable to two cases,--to the dreary doctrine that man is virtually nothing, and... [ Continue Reading ]
_The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be._ OLD THINGS IN NEW TIME One of the things which strike an observer of human beings is the disposition they perpetually betray to imagine and expect something in the future, different from all that has been in the past. We not only anticipate fut... [ Continue Reading ]
_Is there anything whereof it may be said, See, this is new?_ SOMETHING NEW You remember that when Paul visited Athens his attention seems to have been especially attracted by two things: that the city was so full of idols; that the people who dwelt there were so given to change and novelty. “For a... [ Continue Reading ]
_I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven._ THE MYSTERIES OF HUMAN LIFE Now, there has never been any book which can be compared to this marvellous book of Ecclesiastes. It is the laboratory in which the penitent gathers bitter herbs, the gar... [ Continue Reading ]
_All is vanity and vexation of spirit._ THE VANITY OF A WORLDLY LIFE The tone of these words is intensely sad, and perhaps some of us are inclined to think that they embody a morbid conception of human life, for they seem to lack the healthy inspiration of hope. However, we shall understand this de... [ Continue Reading ]
_That which is crooked cannot be made straight._ MAKING THE CROOKED STRAIGHT (with Isaiah 40:4):--Both these men gaze upon the affairs of human kind, and are afflicted with the sense of crookedness. It does not require much insight to perceive that much in human nature is marred and crooked, and li... [ Continue Reading ]
_I communed with mine own heart._ THE WISDOM, OF SELF-COMMUNION “I communed with mine own heart.” Solomon, by self-communion, by questioning his own consciousness, and by contemplating the facts of his career, guided by the Spirit of his God, evolved a theory of morals concerning the highest good f... [ Continue Reading ]
_And he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow._ THE HERITAGE OF KNOWLEDGE I. How is the increase of knowledge also an increase of sorrow? The affirmation of the text is not that knowledge is not intended for men, but that the highest intention and the greatest gift carry with them also a corr... [ Continue Reading ]