before his mind that he utters the injunction, although in the course
of this Book he has glanced at every element of it; nor even as having
so much of it in his mind as is expressed in the law that came by
Moses, although that too includes precepts for the physical and the
political as well as for the moral and religious provinces of human
life. What he meant by bidding us "keep the commandments" was, I
apprehend, that we should take the counsels he has already given us,
and follow after charity, industry, cheerfulness. Every other phrase
in this final "conclusion" is, as we have seen, a repetition of the
truths announced at the close of the previous Section, and therefore
we may fairly assume this phrase to contain a truth--the truth of
Duty--which he there illustrates. Throughout the whole Book there is
not a single technical allusion, no allusion to the Temple, to the
feasts, to the sacrifices, rites, ceremonies of the Law; and therefore
we can hardly take this reference to the "commandments" as an allusion
to the Mosaic table. By the rules of fair interpretation we are bound
to take these commandments as previously defined by the Preacher
himself, to understand him as once more enforcing the virtues which,
for him, comprised the whole duty of man.
Do we thus limit and degrade the moral ideal, or represent him as
degrading and limiting it? By no means: for to love our neighbour, to
discharge the present duty whatever rain may fall and whatever storm
may blow, to carry a bright hopeful spirit through all our toils and
charities; to do this in the fear of God, as in his Presence, because
He is judging and will judge us--this, surely, includes all that is
essential even in the loftiest ideal of moral duty and perfection. For
how are we to be cheerful and dutiful and kind except as we obey the
commandments of God in whatever form they may have been revealed? The
diseases which result from a violation of sanitary laws, as also the
ignorance or the wilfulness or the impotence which lead us to violate
social or ethical laws, of necessity and by natural consequence impair
our cheerfulness, our strength for laborious duties, our neighbourly
serviceableness and good-will. To live the life which the Preacher
enjoins, on the inspiration of the motives which he supplies, is
therefore, in the largest and broadest sense, to keep the commandments
of God.
What advantage, then, is there in saying, "Be kind, be dutiful, be
cheerful," over saying, "Obey the laws of God"? There is this great
practical advantage that, while in the last resort the one rule of
life is as comprehensive as the other, and just as difficult, it is
more definite, more portable, and does not sound so difficult. It is
the very advantage which our Lord's memorable summary, "Thou shalt
love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbour as
thyself," has over the Law and the Prophets. Bid a man keep the whole
Mosaic code as interpreted by the prophets of a thousand years, and
you set him a task so heavy, so hopeless, that he may well decline it;
only to understand the bearing and harmony of the Mosaic statutes,
and to gather the sense in which the prophets--to say nothing of the
rabbis--interpreted them, is the labour of a lifetime, a labour for
which even the whole life of a trained scholar is insufficient. But
bid him "love God and man," and you give him a principle which his own
conscience at once accepts and confirms, a golden rule or principle
which if he be of a good heart and a willing mind, he will be able to
apply to the details and problems of life as they arise. In like
manner if you say: "The true ideal of life is to be reached only by
the man who comprehends and obeys all the laws of God revealed in the
physical universe, in the history of humanity, in the moral intuitions
and discoveries of the race," you set men a task so stupendous as that
no man ever has or will be able to accomplish it. Say, on the other
hand, "Do the duty of every hour as it passes, without fretting about
future issues; help your neighbour to do his duty or to bear his
burden, even though he may never have helped you; be blithe and
cheerful even when your work is hard and your neighbour is ungrateful
or unkind," and you speak straight to a man's heart, to his sense of
what is right and good; you summon every noble and generous instinct
of his nature to his aid. He can begin to practise this rule of life
without preliminary and exhausting study of its meaning; and if he
finds it _work_, as assuredly he will, he will be encouraged to make
it _his_ rule. He will soon discover, indeed, that it means more than
he thought, that it is not so easy to apply to the complexities of
human affairs, that it is very much harder to keep than he supposed:
but its depth and difficulty will open on him gradually, as he is able
to bear them. If his heart now and then faint, if hand and foot
falter, still God is with him, with him to help and reward as well as
to judge; and _that_ conviction once in his mind is there for ever, a
constant spur to thought, to obedience, to patience.
In nothing, indeed, does the wisdom of the Hebrew sages show its
superiority over that of the other sages of antiquity more decisively
than in its adaptation to the practical needs of men busied in the
common affairs of life, and with no learning and no leisure for the
study of large intricate problems. It comes straight down into the
beaten ways of men. If you read Confucius, for example, and still more
if you read Plato, you cannot fail to be struck with their immense
grasp of thought, or their profound learning, or even their moral
enthusiasm; as you read, you will often meet with wise rules of life
expressed in beautiful forms. And yet your main feeling will be that
they give you, and men like you, if at least you be of the common
build, as most of us are, little help; that unless you had their rare
endowments, or could give yourself largely and long to the study of
their works, you could hardly hope to learn what they have to teach,
or order your life by their plan. And that this feeling is just is
proved by the histories of China and Greece, different as they are. In
China only students, only literati, are so much as supposed to
understand the Confucian system of thought and ethics; the great bulk
of the people have to be content with a few rules and forms and rites
which are imposed on them by authority. In ancient Greece, the wisdom
to which her great masters attained was only taught in the Schools to
men addicted to philosophical studies; even the natural and moral
truths on which the popular mythology was based were hidden in
"mysteries" open only to the initiated few; while the great mass of
the people were amused with fables which they misapprehended, and with
rites which they soon degraded into licentious orgies. No man cared
for _their_ souls; their errors were not corrected, their license was
not rebuked. Their wise men made no effort to lift them to a height
from which they might see that the whole of morality lay in the love
of God and man, in charity, diligent devotion to duty, cheerfulness.
But it was far otherwise with the Hebrews and their sages. Men such as
the Preacher confined themselves to no school or class, but carried
their wisdom to the synagogue, to the market-place, to the popular
assemblies. They invented no "mysteries," but brought down the
mysteries of Heaven to the understanding of the simple. Instead of
engaging in lofty abstract speculations in which only the learned
could follow them, they compressed the loftiest wisdom into plain
moral rules which the unlettered could apprehend, and urged them to
obedience by motives and promises which went home to the popular
heart. And they had their reward. The truths they taught became
familiar to all sorts and conditions of Hebrew men; they became a
factor, and the most influential factor, in the national life.
Fishermen, carpenters, tent-makers, sandal-makers, shepherds,
husbandmen, grew studious of the Divine Will and learned the secrets
of righteousness and peace. During the wonderful revival of literary
and religious activity which followed the exile in Babylon--a revival
mainly owing to these Sages--every child was compelled to attend a
common school in which the sacred Scriptures were taught by the ablest
and most learned rabbis; in which, as we learn from the Talmud, the
duty of leading a religious life in all outward conditions, even to
the poorest, was impressed upon them, and the virtues of charity,
industry, and cheerfulness were enforced as the very soul of religion.
Here, for example, is a legend from the Talmud, and it is only one of
many, which illustrates and confirms all that has just been said.--"A
sage, while walking in a crowded market-place suddenly encountered
the prophet Elijah, and asked him who, out of that vast multitude,
would be saved. Whereupon the Prophet first pointed out a
weird-looking creature, a turnkey, 'because he was merciful to his
prisoners,' and next two common-looking tradesmen who were walking
through the crowd, pleasantly chatting together. The sage instantly
rushed after them, and asked them what were their saving works. But
they, much puzzled, replied: 'We are but poor working-men who live by
our trade. All that can be said for us is that we are always cheerful
and good-natured. When we meet anybody who seems sad, we join him, and
we talk to him and cheer him up, that he may forget his grief. And if
we know of two people who have quarrelled, we talk to them, and
persuade them till we have made them friends again. This is our whole
life.'" It is impossible that such a legend should have sprung up on
any but Hebrew soil. Had Confucius been asked to point out the man
whom Heaven most approved, he would probably have replied, "The
superior man is catholic, not sectarian; he is observant of the rules
of propriety and decorum; and he does not do to others what he would
not have done to himself:"[58] and he would certainly have looked for
him in some state official distinguished by his wise administration.
Had any of the Greek sages been asked the same question, they would
have found their perfect man in the philosopher who, raised above the
common passions and aims of men, gave himself to the pursuit of an
abstract and speculative wisdom. Only a Hebrew would have looked for
him in that low estate in which the one truly Perfect Man dwelt among
us. And yet how that Hebrew legend charms and touches and satisfies
us! What a hope for humanity there is in the thought that the poor
weird-looking jailer who was merciful to his prisoners, and the
kindly, industrious, cheerful working-men, living by their craft, and
incapable of regarding their diligence and good-nature as "saving
works," stood higher than priest or rabbi, ruler or philosopher! How
welcome and ennobling is the conviction that there are last who yet
are first--last with men, first with God; that turnkeys and artisans,
publicans and sinners even, may draw nearer to Heaven than sophist or
flamen, sage or prince! Who so poor but that he has a little "bread"
to cast on the thankless unreturning waters? who so faint of heart
but that he may sow a little "seed" even when the winds rave and the
sky is full of clouds? who so solitary and forlorn but that he may say
a word of comfort to a weeping neighbour, or seek to make "two people
who have quarrelled friends again"? And this is all that the Preacher,
all that God through the Preacher, asks of us.
[58] This partial anticipation of the Golden Rule will be found in the
Confucian _Analects_, book xv., chap. xxiii. "Tsze-kung asked, saying,
'Is there one word which may serve as a rule of practice for all one's
life?' The Master said, 'Is not _reciprocity_ such a word? What you do
not want done to yourself, do not do to others.'" The same rule is
given in another form in book v., chap. i of the _Analects_. The other
phrases put into the sage's mouth are quoted from Dr. Legge's
translation of this work.
_All_--yet even this is much; even for this we shall need the pressure
of constant and weighty motives: for it is not only occasional acts
which are required of us, but settled tempers and habits of goodwill,
industry, and cheerfulness; and to love all men, to rejoice alway, to
do our duty in all weathers and all moods, is very hard work to our
feeble, selfish, and easily-dejected natures. Does the Preacher supply
us with such motives as we need? He offers us two motives; one in the
present judgment, another in the future judgment of God. "God is with
you," he says, "taking cognizance of all you do; and you will soon be
with God, to give Him an account of every secret and every deed." But
that is an appeal to fear--is it not? It is, rather, an appeal to love
and hope. He has no thought of frightening us into obedience--for the
obedience of fear is not worth having, is _not_ obedience in the true
sense; but he _is_ trying to win and allure us to obedience. For
whatever terrors God's judgment or the future world may have for us,
it is very certain that these terrors were in large measure unknown to
the Jews. The Talmud knows nothing of "hell," nothing of an
everlasting torture. Even the "Sheol" of the Old Testament is simply
the "under-world" in which the Jews believed the spirits of both good
men and bad to be gathered after death. And, to the Jews for whom
Coheleth wrote, the judgment of God, whether here or hereafter, would
have singular and powerful attractions. They were in captivity to
merciless and capricious despots who took no pains to understand their
character or to deal with them according to their works, who had no
sense of justice, no kindness, no ruth for slaves. For men thus
oppressed and hopeless there would be an infinite comfort in the
thought that God, the Great Ruler and Disposer, knew them altogether,
saw all their struggles to maintain his worship and to acquaint
themselves with his will, took note of every wrong they suffered, "was
afflicted in all their afflictions," and would one day call both them
and their oppressors to the bar at which all wrongs are at once
righted and avenged. Would it affright _them_ to hear that "God taketh
cognizance of all things," and has "appointed a judgment for every
secret and every deed"? Would not this be, rather, their strongest
consolation, their brightest hope? Would they not do their duty with
better heart if they knew that God saw how hard it was to do? Would
they not show a more constant kindness to their neighbours, if they
knew that God would openly reward every alms done in secret? Would
they not carry a blither and more patient spirit to all their labours
and afflictions if they knew that a day of recompenses was at hand?
The Preacher thought they would; and hence he bids them "rejoice,"
bids them "banish care and sadness," _because_ God will bring them
into judgment, and incites them to "keep the commandments" _because_
God's eye is upon them, and because, in the judgment, He will not
forget the work of their obedience, the labour of their love.
This, to some of us, may be a novel view whether of the present or of
the future judgment of God. For the most part, I fear, we speak of the
Divine judgments as terrible and well-nigh unendurable. We would
escape them even here, if we could; but, above all, we dread them when
we shall stand before the bar at which the secrets of all hearts will
be disclosed. Now we need not, and we must not, lose ought of the awe
and reverence for Him who is our God and Father which, so far from
impairing, deepens our love. But we need to remember that fear is
base, that it is the enemy of love; that so long as we anticipate the
Divine judgments only or mainly with dread, we are far from the love
which gives value and charm to obedience; and that, if we are to be
good and at peace, we must "shut out fear with all the strength of
hope." What is it that we fear? Suffering! But why should we fear
that, if it will make us perfect? Death! But why should we fear that,
if it will take us home to our Father? God's anger! But God is not
angry with us if we love Him and try to do his will; He loves us even
when we sin against Him, and shows his love in making the way of sin
so hard to us that we are constrained to leave it. Ought we, then, to
dread, ought we not rather to desire, the judgments by which we are
corrected, purified, saved?
"But the future judgment--that is so dreadful!" _Is_ it? God knows us
as we are already: is it so very much worse that we should know
ourselves, and that our neighbours should know us? If among our
"secrets" there be many things evil, are there not at least some that
are good? Do we not find ourselves perpetually thwarted or hindered in
our endeavours to give form and scope to our purest emotions, our
tenderest sympathies, our loftiest resolves? Do we not perpetually
complain that, when we would do good, even if evil is not present to
overcome the good, it is present to mar it, to make our goodness poor,
scanty, ungraceful? Well, these obstructed purposes and intentions and
resolves, all the good in us that has been frustrated or deformed, or
limited, by our social conditions, by our lack of power, culture,
expression, by the clogging flesh or the flagging brain,--all these
are among "the secret things" which God will bring to light; and we
may be sure that He will not think less of these, his own work in us,
than of the manifold sins by which we have marred his work. We are in
some danger of regarding "the judgment" as a revelation of our
trespasses only, instead of every deed, and every secret, whether good
or bad. Once conceive of it aright, as the revelation of the whole
man, as the unveiling of _all_ that is in us, and mere honesty might
lead us to desire rather than to dread it. One of the finest and most
devout spirits of modern France[59] has said: "It seems to me
intolerable to appear to men other than we appear to God. My worst
torture at this moment is the over-estimate which generous friends
form of me. We are told that at the last judgment the secret of all
consciences will be laid bare to the universe: _would that mine were
so this day, and that every passer-by could read me as I am!_" To seem
what we are, to be known for what we are, to be treated as we are,
this is the judgment of God. And, though this judgment must bring even
the best of us much shame and much sorrow, who that sincerely loves
God and truth will not rejoice to have done at last with all masks and
veils, to wear his natural colours, and to take his true place, even
though it be the lowest?
[59] Maurice de Guerin in his _Journal_.
"In the corrupted currents of this world
Offence's gilded hand may shove by justice,
And oft 'tis seen the wicked prize itself
Buys out the law: but 'tis not so above;
_There_ is no shuffling, there the action lies
In its true nature, and we ourselves compell'd
Even to the teeth and forehead of our faults
To give in evidence."
To have got out of "the corrupted currents" of which audacious and
strong injustice so often avails itself to our hurt; to be quit of all
the shuffling equivocations by which we often pervert the true
character of our actions, and persuade ourselves that we are other and
better than we are; to be compelled to look our faults straight and
fairly in the face; to have all the latent goodness of our natures
developed, and their fettered and obstructed virtue liberated from
every bond; to see our every "secret" good as well as bad, and our
every "deed" good as well as bad, exposed in their true colours: is
there no hope, no comfort for us, in such a prospect as this? It is a
prospect full of comfort, full of hope, if at least we have any real
trust in the grace and goodness of God; and if, through his grace, we
have set ourselves to do our duty, to love our neighbour, and to bear
the changes and burdens of life with a patient cheerful heart.
Now that we have once more heard the Preacher's final conclusion, we
shall have no difficulty in fitting into its place, or valuing at its
worth, the partial and provisional conclusion to which he rises at the
close of the previous Sections of the Book. In the First Section he
describes his quest of the Chief Good in Wisdom and in Mirth; he
declares that, though both wisdom and mirth are good, neither of them
is the supreme good of life, nor both combined; and, in despair of
reaching any higher mark, he closes with the admission (ch. ii., vv.
24-26) that even for the man who is both wise and good "there is
nothing better than to eat and to drink, and to let his soul take
pleasure in all his labour." In the Second Section he pursues his
quest in Devotion to Business and to Public Affairs, only to find his
former conclusion confirmed (ch. v., vv. 18-20): "Behold, that which I
have said holds good; it _is_ well for a man to eat and to drink, and
to enjoy all the good of his labour through the brief day of his life;
this is his portion; and he should take his portion and rejoice in his
labour, remembering that the days of his life are not many, and that
God meant him to work for the enjoyment of his heart." In the Third
Section, his quest in Wealth and in the Golden Mean conducts him by
another road to the same bright resting-place which, however, for all
so bright as it looks, he seems to enter every time with a more rueful
and dejected gait (ch. viii., ver. 15): more and more sadly he
"commends mirth, because there is nothing better for man than to eat
and to drink and to rejoice, and because _this_ will go with him to
his work through the days of his life which God giveth him under the
sun." To my mind there is a strange pathos in the mournful tones in
which the Preacher commends mirth, in the plaintive minors of a voice
from which we should naturally expect the clear ringing majors of joy.
As we listen to these recurring notes, we feel that he has been
baffled in his Quest; that, starting every day in a fresh direction
and travelling till he is weary and spent, he finds himself night
after night at the very spot he had left in the morning, and can only
alleviate the unwelcome surprise of finding himself no farther and no
higher by muttering, "As well here perhaps as elsewhere!" No votary of
mirth and jollity surely ever wore so woebegone a countenance, or sang
their praises with more trembling and uncertain lips. What can be more
hopeless than his "_there is nothing better_, so you must even be
content with this," or than the way in which he harps on the brevity
of life! You feel that the man has been passionately seeking for
something better, for a good which would be a good not only through
the brief hours of time but for ever; that it is with a heart saddened
by the sense of wasted endeavour and cravings unsatisfied that he
falls back on pleasures as brief as his day, as wearisome as his
toils. Yet all the while he feels, and makes you feel, that there is a
certain measure of truth in his conclusion; that mirth is a great
good, though not the greatest; that if he could but find that
"something better" of which he is in quest, he would learn the secret
of a deeper mirth than that which springs from eating and drinking and
sensuous delights, a mirth which would not set with the setting sun of
his brief day.
This feeling is justified by the issue. Now that the Preacher has
completed his circle of thought, we can see that it _is_ well for a
man to rejoice and take pleasure in his labours, that God did mean him
to work for the enjoyment of his heart, that there is a mirth purer
and more enduring than that which springs from knowledge, or from the
gratification of the senses, or from success in affairs, or from the
possession of much goods,--a mirth for this life which expands and
deepens into an everlasting joy. Throughout his Quest he has held fast
to the conviction that "it is a comely fashion to be glad," though he
could allege no better reason for his conviction than the
transitoriness of life and the impossibility of reaching any higher
good. Before he could justify this conviction, he must achieve his
Quest. It is only when he has learned to regard our life--
"as a harp,
A gracious instrument on whose fair strings
We learn those airs we shall be set to play
When mortal hours are ended,"
that his plaintive minors pass into the frank, jocund tones
appropriate to a sincere and well-grounded mirth. _Now_ he can cease
to "trouble heaven with his bootless cries" on the indiscrimination of
death and the vanity of life. He can now say to his soul,
"What hast thou to do with sorrow
Or the injuries of to-morrow?"