Ecclesiastes 1

Ecclesiastes 1:1-18

THE WOULD-BE WISE MANEcc_1:1-18.THE word “Ecclesiastes” means “Preacher” or “Convener of Assemblies.” The Book of Ecclesiastes seems to be a sermon, delivered, according to its own testimony, by Solomon, son of David, King of Jerusalem (Ecclesiastes 1:1; Ecclesiastes 1:12). Upon first reading it, it impresses one as the pessimistic utterances of a dyspeptic spirit; but when one has gone over these pages again and again, new light and truth break forth from them, and he finds himself instructed by a sage in the most serious concerns of life. The evident purpose of the preacher is to prove that the world cannot satisfy the heart of man. He draws upon his own experience to illustrate his position, as we shall see when we come to study the second chapter of this volume, under the theme, “The Would-be Happy Man.”The first chapter falls naturally into the main divisions—The Acquisition of Knowledge, The Evidence of Knowledge, and the Anguish of Knowledge.THE OF Solomon makes three things clear concerning the acquisition of knowledge. 1. It requires earnest application. 2. It involves severe mental exercise. 3.

It incites an insatiable appetite.It requires earnest application. After declaring, “Vanity of vanities; ail is vanity”, he says, “What profit hath a mm of all his labour which he taketh under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 1:3).

Later he tells us the sort of labor in which he has been engaged. “I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven” (Ecclesiastes 1:13). It is sometimes said, “There is no royal road to learning.” Let it be understood that the ancient traveled an even more difficult way in coming to the same than the modern man is compelled to take. And yet, notwithstanding all who have gone before us, and the well-beaten paths they have made into the realms of knowledge, the man who walks there, still does it with difficulty. The educational process is a process of sacrifice and suffering. Benjamin Franklin was a printer’s apprentice. He yearned to know, but books were expensive.

Casting about for a way to acquire them he concluded that he would abstain from meat in the interest of his mind, and the apprentice lad got his master to consent to give him the difference in the expense of his board, and by living upon rice, hominy and potatoes, made himself the proud possessor of some valuable volumes. One reason why some of our forefathers were uncrowned kings, is found in the fact that they had surmounted almost impassable obstacles in their search for knowledge.The acquisition of knowledge involves severe mental exercise.

The Preacher of Ecclesiastes says, It is a “sore travail hath God given to the sons of man to be exercised therewith”. When man sinned and was dismissed from the Garden of Eden, he went out with the information that he should henceforth earn his bread in the sweat of his brow. His knowledge comes after the same manner. Dr. P. S.

Henson once said that lots of men, aspiring to be public speakers, trust to the inspiration of the hour, but he had found that “perspiration” was more likely to produce desired results.We are told that Daniel Webster, in the prime of his fame as an orator, was invited to speak at the Annual Meeting of the New England Agricultural Society. He arrived, was received with honors, and spoke for two hours on “The Coming Importance of the United States as the Greatest Food Producing Nation in the World.” When he had finished and was being banqueted, a simpering young man said to him, evidently intending a compliment: “Why, Mr.

Webster, you spoke with such fluency and accuracy your words sounded as if you had prepared your speech. I have always understood orators spoke by inspiration.” “Young man,” replied Webster, fixing his piercing eye on him, “the only true inspiration God ever gave man is to be found in work. I gave two days and three nights to the preparation of that speech. The theme deserved it.” A “sore travail hath God given to the sons of man to be exercised therewith”.The acquisition of knowledge incites an insatiable appetite. The preacher says, “The eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing” (Ecclesiastes 1:8). A little later in the sermon he says, “All the labour of man is for his mouth, and yet the appetite is not filled” (Ecclesiastes 6:7).But the mouth of man is not more insatiable than his mind.

In his Book of Proverbs, Solomon writes, “Hell and destruction are never full; so the eyes of man are never satisfied” (Proverbs 27:20). That text might have reference either to the lust of the eyes or to the love of knowledge, for it is alike applicable to both.

Boswell quotes Samuel Johnsonas having said, “All knowledge is of itself of some value. There is nothing so minute or inconsiderable that I would not rather know it than not. A man would not submit to learn to hem a ruffle of his wife’s, but if a mere wish could attain it, he would rather wish to be able to hem a ruffle.” To be sure he would like to know how to rule a kingdom, and he ever craves to sound the mysteries of the whole universe. The starry heaven has an irresistible fascination to the mind. The wide earth is its challenge. The depths of the sea excite its desire to know, until we are compelled, to a man, to consent that our seeing only increases our desire to see more and our hearing our desire to hear more.

The world may be satisfied with the attainments of great scientists, but the scientist himself grieves his short-comings and sorrows over his superficial knowledge.THE OF This chapter contains indisputable evidence of the Preacher’s superior wisdom. I confess I stand before its revelations amazed.His scientific information is a marvel.

It is only within recent years that I ever thought of the great, splendid scientific discoveries which Solomon in this chapter anticipates by thousands of years. Let me call your attention to them.He voices here in accurate language, the basis of our Weather Bureau:“The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits” (Ecclesiastes 1:6).One of the very modern discoveries is this sure circuit of the winds. It is just about three thou-sand years now since Solomon penned these words, and it is less than seventy years since the Weather Bureau was conceived.And yet men glorify the discoveries of scientists and discredit inspiration.The seventh verse contains an equally marvelous revelation of Solomon’s knowledge. He puts into it as perfect a statement of the law of evaporation as the scientists of today could phrase. Two hundred years ago not a scientist in the world understood why seas did not fill and overflow. They saw the rivers pouring into them from every side, yet for some strange reason, they kept substantially the same level.

And today Hally, Le Roy, Franklin, Desagualiers, Desaussure, and Dalton are praised for their investigations and instructions on the subject of evaporation. But hear Solomon while he tells it clearly:“All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again”.Men now are prating about the uniformity of natural law, and parading it as the shibboleth of modern scientific discovery.

Thousands of years before the eyes of Solomon’s critics ever opened to the light of this world, the great man of God was saying, by inspiration:“The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.“Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us” (Ecclesiastes 1:9-10),The longer one studies the Bible the more he is disposed to say with the great Dr. Gaussen,“There is no physical error in the Word of God. ‘God is not a man, that He should lie’; nor the son of man that He should be mistaken. He, no doubt, in order to His being understood, stoops to our weakness, but not in the least partaking of it; and His language will always be found to witness to His condescension, never to His ignorance.” “A glory gilds the Sacred Page, Majestic like the sun;It gives a light to every age, It gives but borrows none.”His philosophy was free from any error. These are days when we are discussing the inerrancy of the “Word.” Men have talked about “the mistakes of Moses,” and “the unscientific philosophies of the Scriptures.”Point to an error in this man’s philosophy if you can. Will you dispute him when he declares concerning earthly things, “All is vanity”?Will you take issue with him when he says, “One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth for ever”?Will you condemn him for using common language, the very language which you use today, “The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hast eth to his place where he arose”? Dare you dispute him when he says, “There is no new thing under the sun”?One reason why I have had no sympathy with the critics of the Scriptures, nor yet any with other persons who institute comparisons with the Bible and other so-called sacred books, is at this very point. Every instructed man knows perfectly well that the ZendAvesta, the Shaster, the Chonking, and all the rest of the hoary systems of the East which we now hear glorified, are filled with false philosophies. Their philosophy of the heavens is childish.

Their idea of the earth upon the heads of elephants is an ignorant explanation. Their triangular, seven-stage world, containing a circle of honey, one of sugar, another of wine, and so forth, has long since been proven false.The Greek and Roman philosophers have done little better. Who now would follow Aristotle and Pliny, or Plutarch, or Cicero? Who would accept the cosmogony of Buff on, or Voltaire’s vaporizings of natural law? Even the great Christian teachers of yesterday blundered in their opinions and opposed the theory that the world was round, and laughed at the idea that it was “hung on nothing”; but God’s Word never fell into any such blunder, and God’s Prophets never voiced a one of them. Their philosophies are as sound as their science is secure; and of the Book, it has been justly written by the poet: “The hand that gave it still supplies The gracious light and heat:Its truths upon the nations rise; They rise, but never set.”Yet again, He was not enamored of novelties. Athenianism did not profoundly impress this wisest of men. Had you brought to him your “New Theology,” he would have said, “New?” and with scorn, “Is there any thing whereof it may be said, See, this is new? it hath been already of old time, which was before us”, and history confirms his speech.There is not a declaration of the modern critic that did not pass the lips of some unbeliever thousands of years before the former was born. In Jesus’ day, the unregenerate Gentile disputed the inspiration of the Old Testament Prophets, and the unregenerate Jew the inspiration of the Apostles. In Jesus’ day, certain men mocked the notion that He was begotten “of the Holy Ghost”. Scarce one of His miracles, but men both denied them and derided them.

When He rose from the grave they spread abroad the report that His body had been stolen. Not a hundred years had passed when they were saying, “Where is the promise of His Coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation “The veracity of the Book,” “the Virgin Birth,” “the exercise of supernatural power,” “the resurrection from the grave,” “the sure Return”—to deny these is nothing new. “It hath been already of old time, which was before us”.I think that the Preacher means to say that the men who prated their infidelities are no more, and even the remembrance of them is forgotten.

Their successors will soon be in their graves and neither shall there be any remembrance of them.THE ANGUISH OF One reading Solomon will find that he makes a clean distinction between worldly knowledge and the wisdom “that is from above”. To the latter he pays his tribute, urging upon his son to “get wisdom”, affirming:“Wisdom is the principal thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding”,promising,“Exalt her, and she shall promote thee: she shall bring thee to honour, when thou dost embrace her.“She shall give to thine head an ornament of grace: a crown of glory shall she deliver to thee” (Proverbs 4:7-9),Concerning purely secular, or worldly knowledge, he makes three remarks: it results in much weariness of the flesh, it reveals many irreparable wrongs, and its increase often adds sorrow, to sorrow.It results in much weariness to the flesh. It involves “labour”. It is a “sore profit.” Some years ago I noticed in the newspapers a statement to the effect that a man’s thoughts emit color; and that an instrument had been invented which would photograph that color and tell whether your thoughts were pure or not; whether you were contemplating some good thing, or a bad one; or whether you were thinking at all. The invention was attributed to Prof. Elmer Gates, of Washington, D.

C., and was said to be especially accurate in recording melancholia.It is fairly certain that a man who comes into knowledge suffers sufficiently in the process to have blue thoughts; and yet it is equally understood that that same suffering is at the basis of any success. John Watson declares: “The cross is the condition of every achievement.

Modern Europe has emerged from the Middle Ages, Christianity from Judaism, Judaism from Egypt, Egypt from barbarism, with throes of agony. Humanity has fought its way upwards at the point of the bayonet, torn and bleeding, yet hopeful and triumphant, As each nation suffers, it prospers. England was begotten in the sore travail of Elizabeth’s day; and the American nation sprang from the sons of its martyrs.”The truth obtains no less in the individual life. “Whosoever will save his life shall lose if”. And he that would escape folly must suffer weariness of the flesh.But the Preacher reminds us of the fact that the way of knowledge is not flower-strewn. Instead of disclosing to our eyes beauty-bewitching scenes—It will reveal irreparable wrongs. You will come to see that “that which is crooked cannot be made straight”, and the undesirable things cannot be numbered (Ecclesiastes 1:15).It is unquestionably a fact that the knowing man enjoys more than any other; it cannot be successfully disputed that he suffers more than any other.

The Scotchman found a scientific man tramping across his fields. The professor brought out his magnifying glass and laid it against the moss and beckoned the farmer to look.

When once he had peered into the bosom of the moss and had seen the myriads of delicate, tender little flowers blooming in beauty there, flowers too tiny for the naked eye to detect, he broke into sobs, and said, “I wish you had never shown me that. I will never again be able to walk these hills without grieving to crush such beauty under my feet.” The old King of Belgium did not care to have brought to his ears the atrocities of his soldiers in Africa. He could be happier without that knowledge. Fifty years ago the Gzar of Russia was doing his best to escape the persistent reports of bad government and oppression in the different parts of his realm. He felt his inability to right them, and would fain escape the knowledge of the same.Jesus Christ Himself declared that one reason why men were condemned was because of the light which they had. When they had both heard and seen, their sin was established.

Paul, writing to the Romans, said:“I had not known sin, but by the Law: for I had not known lust, except the Law had said, Thou shalt not covet. * *“For I was alive without the Law once: but when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.“And the commandment, Which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death.“For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me” (Romans 7:7-11).You have read Hawthorne’s “Twice Told Tales,” and will remember his definition of “the unpardonable sin.” Ethan Brand is the spokesman. He is talking to the old lime-burner; and he affirms it is not in some overt act, not in some outburst of passion or temper, but adds, “It is a sin that grew in my own breast.

A sin that grew nowhere else. The sin of an intellect that trampled over the sense of brotherhood with man and reverence for God, and sacrificed everything to its own mighty claims. The only sin that deserves a recompense of immortal agony. Freely, were it to do again, would I incur the guilt. Unshrinkingly I accept the retribution!”Ethan Brand was not far wrong. There is a knowledge that saves men, and there is a knowledge that dooms them.

Of His auditors Jesus once said,“If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin”.And again,“If I had not done among them the Works which none other man did, they had not had sin: but now have they both seen and hated both Me and My Father.“But this cometh to pass, that the word might be fulfilled that is written in their Law, They hated Me without a cause” (John 15:22; John 15:24-25).A knowledge of the Truth of God is either a savor of “life unto life” or of “death unto death”. Consequently one can increase his knowledge and by the very process, seal his soul in perdition forever.

Before these evident truths, what better can any man do than join with the poet in saying: “Let me lean hard upon the Eternal Breast,In all earth’s devious ways I sought for rest And found it not. ‘I will be strong,’ I said,‘And lean upon myself, I will not cry,Nor importune to Heaven with my complaint’But now my strength fails, I fall, I faint.Let me lean hard.“Let me lean hard upon the Unfailing Arm,I said, ‘I will walk on, I will fear no harm,The spark Divine within my soul shall show,The upward pathway where my feet should go,’But now the heights to which I most aspire,Are lost in cloud. I stumble and I tire.Let me lean hard.“Let me lean harder still, that Swerveless Force,Which speeds the solar systems on their course,Can take unfelt the burden of my woe,Which bears me to the ground and hurts me so.I thought my strength enough for any fate,But lo, I sink beneath my sorrow’s weight.Let me lean hard.”