61-Pro_20:10-14
LECTURE LXI.
"Divers weights, and divers measures, both of them are alike abomination to the Lord. Even a child is known by his doings, whether his work be pure, and whether it be right. The hearing ear, and the seeing eye, the Lord hath made even both of them. Love not sleep, lest thou come to poverty: open thine eyes, and thou shalt be satisfied with bread. It is naught, it is naught, saith the buyer; but when he is gone his way, then he boasteth." In the original, as intimated on the margin of our English Bible, the terms of the verse before us are-"A stone and a stone," (or a weight and a weight) "an ephah and an ephah." The meaning is plain. A man, we shall suppose,-would that it were, in no case, more than supposition!-has one set of weights and measures to sell with, and another to buy with; one set for his customers, and another for the inspector; one set for customers that are ignorant and unwary, and another for those who know the trade, and are too shrewd to be easily imposed upon; one set for the poor, the widow, the orphan, the dependent, who cannot, or who dare not, seek redress, and another for persons of influence, with whom it is dangerous to trifle. But under this particular phraseology, are to be comprehended all fraudulent dealings whatsoever, in every department of business, or of mutual transaction between man and man. Nothing can be clearer than that a short yard is as bad as a light weight or a scanty measure:-and that there is the very same sin also, in having different articles at the same prices, or the same articles at different prices, for the purpose of imposing on the ignorant. It is a repetition of the great practical truth-that there ought to be nothing, in any of our transactions, but what is open, straightforward, upright, and impartial; no chicanery; no double-dealing; nothing one hairbreadth aside from the line of the most rigid rectitude;-all as in the sight of that God, whom not the most secret and skilful attempt at imposition can escape, and to whom, as is frequently and solemnly reiterated, everything of the kind is "an abomination." * * For farther illustration, see Proverbs 11:1; Proverbs 16:11. And if, in the dealings of the shop and the market, partiality and unrighteousness are thus severely reprobated, how much more when found in the "seat of judgment." Justice is usually, when personified, represented with bandaged eyes and an evenly poised balance in her hand: intimating that she must shut her eyes fast against every temptation, every bribe to unfairness; must use no false evidence, no false pleas, nor give any one atom of proof greater or less weight, on either side, than belongs to it; nor, in awarding punishment, employ "an ephah and an ephah,"-one measure of recompense for one delinquent, and another for another. Such conduct is worse on the judgment-seat than at the counter, as the sphere is of a higher order; and whether it be in the department of the civil magistracy, or in the administration of the discipline of the house of God, the evil is alike obnoxious to the divine displeasure.
Verse Proverbs 20:11. "Even a child is known by his doings, whether his work be pure, and whether it be right." Few of the verses of this book have been more variously understood and rendered than this.
1. In the first place, we have our own received version just quoted. If here, the "doings" and the "work" mean the same thing, as they seem to do, it may be asked, Where lies the difficulty? The "doings" of the child are supposed to be seen and known, what difficulty can there be in discovering whether these very doings be pure and right? To this the only answer that gives any appropriate meaning to the sentence, must be,-that the expression "whether his work he, pure and whether it be right" has reference to the disposition, the state of mind and Mart, the motive, by which it is prompted. This gives, unquestionably, a true and important sense. A child’s dispositions,-their purity and rectitude, or the contrary,-may be discovered from his "doings." In these there is no little diversity very early apparent. They are kind or cruel; they are open or full of trick and deceit; they are selfish or generous; they are rash or well-weighed and prudent. In "doings" of these various descriptions, dispositions and tempers, of corresponding variety, discover themselves; and by the discovery, parents and guardians should be regulated in their modes of dealing with the subjects of them. The same treatment would never do for all.
2. Another translation is-" Even a child, by his behaviour, will discover, (or make it known,) whether what he hath done be innocent and right." * It is curious, and in some cases amusing, to observe this. Symptoms of conscience begin to show themselves; but it is often in such a way, that the very means they use for concealment become the means of detection. There is, perhaps, when they know they have done something wrong, a want of their usual frankness and openness, a timidity and shrinking from observation, looks of apprehensive jealousy, and an interpretation of everything in the looks and words of others, as if it had a meaning that bore upon them, and upon what they have done; and at times,-where there is much of the artless simplicity of childhood, blending itself with that natural disregard of truth which manifests itself wherever self-interest or fear requires falsehood,-an over-eagerness to deny what, but for the denial, might never have been known; a lie thus bewraying the truth. A close observer of the behaviour of children may see a vast deal of this self-detecting behaviour on the one hand, where evil has been done; and of that open, undisguised artlessness on the other, by which innocence becomes its own witness.
* Hodgson.
3. Another considers the present indications as having reference to the future:-"Even a youth makes himself known by his doings, whether his work-that is, his future work, his course of life-will be pure, and whether it will be right."*
* Schulz. This is a very important meaning in regard to its practical utility. Moral depravity is the sad birthright of our fallen nature. But this betrays itself in a great variety of modes. Every one "goes astray;" but still, "each in his own way." According to peculiar circumstances and particularities of temperament, the common corruption assumes various aspects, and takes different directions. Here then is an important lesson for parents. They should feel the propriety and necessity of watching over specially strong tendencies to particular evils; of bending a peculiarly vigilant eye on the sin which, in early life, seems most easily to beset the childish mind; and, on the other hand, of cherishing, with an assiduous and constant care, every symptom of good which, by the blessing of God, presents itself. If it be right for parents to note the diversity in the natural and early apparent talents, turns of mind, and genius of their children, for the purpose of directing them in their choice of a business or a profession in life, surely their dispositions-their moral tendencies, are much more to be watched, and guarded, and guided. It is well when mental superiority exists in union with moral worth. But Christian parents, I say anew, should hold and act upon the principle, that the slenderest intellect, with a heart on the side of God, is incomparably more desirable in any of their children, than powers of mind of even colossal greatness associated with a heart under the sway of the world and sin; that a weak saint is better than an accomplished devil.-And in dealing with the good and evil symptoms of future character that discover themselves in childhood, let parents beware of a species of partiality to which they are exceedingly prone,-the partiality which treats the evil symptoms as if they were only the indications of a childish ignorance and thoughtlessness which time will, as a matter of course, correct, and which need not therefore occasion much alarm, and need not the application of any very careful or solicitous restraint,-while every symptom of good that appears is trusted to, applauded, flattered, and everything expected from it; as if, in a world such as ours, there were not imminent danger every moment of its suffering deterioration and even extinction,-of its being nipped in the bud or the blossom; and therefore requiring the most vigilant and anxious care in its shelter and cultivation. O let not believing parents, who know from their Bibles what human nature is, act, in the education of their children, as if the evil were exotic and the good indigenous,-as if the evil had slight hold of the soil and were sure to wither, and the good firmly rooted and sure to thrive.
4. The senses I have mentioned, proceed on the assumption that the Hebrew word rendered "is known," or make* himself known, is derived from a particular root that has the signification of knowing, knowing again, or recognizing. By some eminent critics, however, this is more than doubted. The word is considered as belonging to another root, of which the signification is to make one’s self strange, to pretend to be other than one is, to dissemble. In support of this are quoted-Genesis 42:7; 1 Kings 14:5-6. In these passages we have the same word-rendered "made himself strange;" "feigned herself another." The verse has therefore been translated:-"Even a youth will, in his doings, act the dissembler,-that in truth his work is pure, that in truth it is right." * This not only seems to agree with the right meaning of the word; but harmonizes naturally with the connexion in which it occurs-following a verse that so directly relates to deceit.
* Parkhurst and Schultens. No one can have watched the tendencies of childhood, without observing how early and how strong, whenever there is the least tempting occasion for it, is the propensity to dissembling; to deny the wrong they have done, and to affirm the good they have not done; concealing, by artifice and falsehood, what they know will be condemned and subject them to punishment; and pretending the contrary, what they know will get them safety from punishment and the smile of approbation. This natural disposition grows by success. It becomes habitual. It is the commencement-the germ-of all the dishonesties, the lies, and the frauds of the subsequent life. The opposite disposition and practice,-openness and candour,-frankness and simplicity of confession, with the sinfulness and the danger of all dissimulation,-should be carefully and constantly impressed on the youthful spirit. And example ought ever to be in accordance with the instructions and admonitions given. Children are often a great deal more sharp-sighted than foolish parents give them credit for. If they ever hear their parents saying, though it may not be to themselves, what they know not to be strictly true, or if they see them do what they have sense enough to discern not to be strictly honest,-what can those parents reasonably expect?-to have their counsels attended to and obeyed? and their corrections taken in a spirit likely to render them of any service? The expectation were folly. Their corrections, in such circumstances, are unjust and cruel. On themselves ought the chastisement to be inflicted. Their backs should bear the stripes. Parents, and servants entrusted with the care of children, should be exceedingly cautious in avoiding everything approaching to simulation in their treatment of them. I know nothing more pernicious. It should never be resorted to, even for a good purpose. Be assured that the detection of the dissimulation will do much more harm than that which is avoided by the dissimulation itself. There are many common practices, in the management of children, which it would be well for all who have the care of them to shun. How often are children, when they cry or are fractious, quieted,-or the attempt at least made to quiet them,-by telling them what is not true! This is done in different ways. What is told is something frightful, and is meant to alarm them; or it is something pleasing, that is meant to soothe them; but neither the one thing nor the other has any existence. Something is promised, which is not to be given,-which, it is known perhaps, cannot be given:-or something is threatened, which is not to be executed. The things themselves may be trifling; but there is nothing trifling to a child:-they may be the thoughtless figments of fancy, but the child has not learned to distinguish between fancy and. reality. It is all bad; initiating children in habits of light estimation of truth, and the harmlessness of dissembling for a present purpose. And allow me to say to nursery servants, who have so much in their power in regard to the early impressions on the minds of children,-that they ought to be specially on their guard against making children parties with themselves in any acts of dissembling with their parents. This is the most shocking of all lessons. O let no consideration of preventing their own detection in what is wrong, ever tempt them to put children, who have seen and known their fault, on the practice of concealment, prevarication, and falsehood, with their own father or mother. The thing is fearful. Let all be openness, sincerity, candour, truth, at every hazard:-no sporting with evil; no equivocation; no laughing at successful artifice; nothing but what the God of truth, who "desireth truth in the inward parts," will mark with approbation.
Verse Proverbs 20:12. "The hearing ear, and the seeing eye, the Lord hath made even both of them."-Our whole frame is of divine contrivance, and divine workmanship; and truly it is a structure of most complicated and exquisite mechanism; a little world of wonders; where, the longer and the more closely we examine, the more we are confounded, and lost in admiration. The man who can inspect it, and doubt of a God, is beyond the reach of argument. The Psalmist utters the language of sound reason, as well as of piety, when he says-"I will praise thee; for I am fearfully and wonderfully made: marvellous are thy works; and that my soul knoweth right well." And of the human frame, there are no parts more wonderful, in their contrivance and execution, and the delicate and intricate nicety of their adaptation to their respective functions,-than "the seeing eye and the hearing ear."-The eye, by its admirable combination of coats, and humours, and lenses, produces on the retina, or expansion of nerve at the back of the socket or boney cavity in which it is so securely lodged, a distinct picture of the minutest or largest object; so that, on a space that is less than an inch in diameter, a landscape of miles in extent, with all its variety of scenery, is depicted with perfect exactness of relative proportion in all its parts! And how complex and delicate is "the hearing ear!"-by no means less wonderful than the eye, though less exposed to human observation, lying deep, except its outer part, in the bones of the head. What the eye is to light, the ear is to sound. And how divinely perfect its construction! so strong, as not to be painfully affected by the burst and roll of the loudest thunder; and yet so delicately sensitive as to receive impressions of sound from those undulations of the air that are produced by the very softest whisper! But "the hearing ear and the seeing eye" include something more than this-and still more wonderful. What I have mentioned, is but the mechanism. We can, by attending to the laws of vision and sound, produce something that, in structure and in mechanical or physical effect, bears some analogy to them. But this is not sight; this is not hearing. These imply perception. And to perception there are requisite an auditory and an optic nerve, that convey the sensations of sound and vision to the brain; and a perceiving mind,-an immaterial, spiritual, thinking substance, essence, element-or what else shall we call it? that thus receives its perceptions of things heard and things seen!-O! this is the highest and deepest wonder of all! The mechanical structure we can trace out and demonstrate. We can show how, by the laws of transmission and refraction, the picture is made on the retina of the eye; and how, by the laws of sound, the yielding, tremulous, undulating air affects the tympanum, or drum, of the ear. But we can get no farther. How it is that the mind receives its perceptions,-how it is that it is affected,-what is the nature of nervous influence, or of the process by which, through the medium of the nerves and the brain, thought is produced in the mind.-of all this we are profoundly ignorant. But although the mention of "the hearing ear and the seeing eye" has naturally led to such remarks,-it is not, certainly, for the purpose of setting forth the skill of the Maker, that Solomon, in tins place, introduces them. The verso seems to bear a very intelligible connexion with the two preceding, though to some it may not be apparent. Dishonesty and dissimulation, whether practice by old or young, might escape the detection of men, but not of God. He who made both "the hearing ear and the seeing eye"-shall He not hear and see 1 Remember, then, all, this deeply solemn fact: God sees you, God hears you.-Further, let those who possess, in healthy soundness, the "hearing ear and the seeing eye," be thankful to God for the blessing. There are "ears which hear not, and eyes which see not." Ponder well the question, intended to engender at once humility and gratitude,-" Who maketh thee to differ?"-and let this consideration impress all, the young especially, with the criminality of either mocking, or taking advantage of, the deaf or the blind. The Lord will avenge them.* Be ye, as far as lieth in you, "ears to the deaf, and eyes to the blind!"-Further, strive to make a right use of these precious organs of hearing and of sight, remembering that to the divine Maker of them you are answerable for the use to which you turn them.-Lastly, the hearing ear and the seeing eye, in a far more important meaning of the terms, are from God. Spiritual hearing and spiritual sight are His gift. "The hearing ear" is the obedient ear-the disposition to do God’s will:-the seeing eye is the understanding-the spiritually understanding mind. Both come from "the God of all grace." There are, in Scripture phrase, "the blind people that have eyes, and the deaf that have ears,"-who "having eyes see not, and having ears hear not." This is their guilt. It is the depravity of the heart that is the only obstructing film on the eye of the understanding in regard to the things of God. It is this that disposes the sinner, like "the deaf adder," to shut his ear to the "voice of the charmer."
* See Leviticus 19:14. In the next verse we have the recurrence again of an oft repeated maxim, that sloth brings ruin; diligence prosperity:-"Love not sleep, lest thou come to poverty; open thine eyes, and thou shalt be satisfied with bread."
Verse Proverbs 20:14. "It is naught, it is naught, saith the buyer: but when he is gone his way, then he boasteth." The word rendered "the buyer" has also the signification, very naturally, of the possessor. Hence two views have been taken of the meaning of the verse.-One critic of eminence * renders thus:-"Worthless! worthless! says the possessor: but when the thing is gone from him (is lost) then he praises it!" According to this view, the sentiment expressed is, the comparatively light value we attach to what is actually in our possession; whereas, when we can no longer command the possession, we immediately perceive, feel, or fancy its preciousness. Good in possession appears less in value; good in expectation, greater-like objects seen at a distance, through a particular medium. We praise the absent, we depreciate the present good.-Then there is the more ordinary sense; which appears also to be the true one. The reference is to the acts of the "buyer" to procure a good bargain; and the disposition to boast of his success. In this sense, the case, as it appears to have been common in the days of Solomon, is certainly no less so now. It occurs every day, and every hour, in all the departments of business,-in every market. "Bad-bad-very bad! You never surely can think of asking, far less of getting, such a price for this! It is far from being an article worth anything like the money." Thus the buyer goes on, running down what he wants to purchase; yet, all the while, he is perfectly satisfied that the article is one of the best of its kind, and the price put upon it exceedingly reasonable. Now, what, I ask, is this but lying?-plain downright lying? It is saying what I’ve do not think: and wherein does that differ from lying?-In thus cheapening and underrating the value of what we are about to purchase, we tell a lie, or a tissue of lies, to get a bargain! And all that we may afterwards have a good story to tell of our skill and success in gaining our end:-"When he is gone his way, then he boasteth!" But of what does he "boast?" Does he not glory in his shame?-glory in what it were easy for any man even of the meanest modicum of intellect to do, if he could only satisfy his conscience so far as to say what he did not think; or could muster up hardihood enough to put upon the falsehood a face of sincerity?
* Schultens. And the principle of the verse has the very same force of application on the side of the seller; when he seeks to make a good bargain for himself by over-praising and over-valuing his article,-representing it as possessing qualities that do not belong to it, or real qualities in a greater degree than truth warrants;-and demanding for it, as its bond fide value, a higher price than he knows it to be really worth. It is evident, that in these two cases, the evil is the very same. It is the evil of violating truth for self interest, or for the credit of skill in bargain-making. The "boasting" is, in every case, "glorying in our shame." I apprehend that the same evil is committed, though less directly, by the common practice of concealing the known defects and faults of the article we sell. What is the great difference between the seller concealing faults which do exist, and the buyer alleging faults which do not exist? It will not do, in the estimate of strict integrity, to say-"He saw his article; he had full opportunity to inspect and examine it; he need not have taken it unless he chose." All true: but the plain and palpable fact still stands-you have taken a price for your article which you knew it was not worth, and which the purchaser, with your knowledge, would not have given. Is this honesty? Is this practical truth? Is this the spirit, or is it capable of being at all reconciled to the spirit of the golden rule? No, my brethren:-the divine principles of Christianity must not be made to bend to the customs of a market,-or to the loose and conventional morality which the buyers and sellers of this world may, in any case, choose to impose upon themselves. All must be daylight-nothing in the dark-nothing even in the dimness and twilight of dubious principle. The conscience must be kept clear without misgiving. How would you relish the thought, while you were chuckling over your success in getting so good a price for your article,-that the buyer on whom you had succeeded in imposing, should curse you for a swindler, and load your religion with revilings, and blaspheme the blessed name by which you are called?-or, if you have succeeded, as a buyer, in getting from the seller an article far below what you knew to be its real value,-by taking advantage, for example, of his exigency at the time for ready money compelling him to part with it,-that he should post you as a hard iron-hearted extortioner, that took advantage of a man’s necessities to drive an iniquitous bargain?
O for more, amongst Christians, of sterling practical consistency! There may be a great deal of talk about sanctification, where, alas! there is sadly little of truly sanctified conduct. Some men seem as if they thought religion consisted in being able to talk well about the gospel mystery of sanctification; and they will go far deeper into it, and make much more mystery of it, than the Bible itself; for there, there is no mystery in the subject. But the great matter is-.practical sanctity of life:-and that, consisting, not in any regular routine of religious exercises, private or public, or even the unwonted multiplication of these; but in "doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God." It will not do for a man to have prayers morning and evening in his family, while he makes little scruple of dishonesty and dirty trickery in his business through the day. Away with the miserable inconsistency! Better, far better, no prayers, than prayers of Which the devotion is belied by the conduct. An avowed infidel is a far less mischievous character than such a professor. Let every professing Christian be the same in the market that he is upon his knees; the same in his dealings with men, that he seems to be in his intercourse with God.