ill. Our first parents lost Eden by listening to the words of the
tempter, and the speech of the wicked always diffuses an unwholesome moral atmosphere around it, if it does not eject a deadly poison into the soul. But the conversation and teaching of the godly are always a means of moral health to others; by their words they witness for the truth of God, and are the means of _"opening men's eyes, and turning them from darkness to light, from the power of Satan unto God"_ (Acts xxvi. 13). And, like their Divine Master, they _"know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary"_ (Isa. l. 4), and thus that which flows from their lips is as refreshing and healthful to weary and struggling men and women on the highway of life as the living, cooling water-course is to the dusty and thirsty traveller.
+III. Because the flow is natural and spontaneous.+ Water may be sent through a tract of country by artificial means; fields may be watered and reservoirs filled by calling in science to supply natural deficiencies. But there is, after all, no comparison between this kind of forced irrigation and that which is the result of natural causes. If there is water beneath the surface of the earth it must force its way and find an outlet; it needs no hand of man to come to its aid; it penetrates the soil and forms a fertilising stream in obedience to natural law. And so the speech of a good man has nothing forced or artificial about it. It is the overflow of heartfelt experience. Like the apostles of old, he _"cannot but speak the things which he has seen and heard"_ (Acts iv. 20). The _"good things"_ of his lips are the natural outcome of the _"good treasure of his heart," "for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh"_ (Matt. xii. 34, 35).
_OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS._
Talleyrand defined speech to be the art of concealing one's opinions. Speech, even without any attempt at concealment, must be endlessly deep and wide as uttering all our being. Who can translate all its outgoings? If this be so with man, who shall judge of God and censure His obscurer revelations? Solomon is satisfied with one great difference,--that while men's speech is _"deep,"_ God's speech is both _"deep"_ and _"living."_ One has a vital source, the other is dead and stagnant. Grant that both are obscure. One is the darkness of a pool, the other the breadth and gush of an overflowing water. We ought to submit to mystery in God, for the tide of His utterance is to flow on for ever.--_Miller._
One "greater than Solomon" "astonished the people" by the clearness, no less than by the _depth of the waters_ (Matt. vii. 28, 29). No blessing is more valuable than a "rich indwelling of the Word," ready to be brought out on all suitable occasions of instruction. If the wise man sometimes "spares his words," it is not for want of matter, but for greater edification. The stream is ready to flow, and sometimes can scarcely be restrained. The cold-hearted, speculative professor has his _flow_--sometimes a torrent of words, yet without a drop of profitable matter; chilling, even when doctrinally correct; without life, unction, or love. Lord! deliver us from this barren "talk of the lips" (chap. xiv. 23). May our _waters be deep,_ flowing from thine own inner sanctuary, refreshing and fertilising the Church of God!--_Bridges._
In the two clauses of the verse, on the principle of parallelism, there appears to be an inversion of the same sentiment; for, properly speaking, the words uttered are not the "deep waters," but the stream that issues from them; and, on the other hand, "the wellspring of wisdom" is not "the flowing brook," but the deep and copious fountain or reservoir from which it issues. Another passage may serve to confirm this view. "Counsel in the heart of man is like deep water; but a man of understanding will draw it out." Here, the counsel is the deep water, not the words. But the words are the stream which the deep waters send forth. The words bring out and contain the counsel.--_Wardlaw._
It must be remembered that "deep waters" are associated in the Old Testament with the thought of darkness and mystery (xx. 5; Psalms lxix. 2; Eccles. vii. 24), and we get a more profound thought if we see in the proverb a comparison between all teaching from without and that of the light within. The words of a man's mouth are dark as the "deep waters of a pool, or tank; but the well-spring of wisdom is as a flowing brook, bright and clear." So taken the verse presents a contrast like that of Jeremiah ii. 13.--_Plumptre._
When this word _vir_ is used for man in sacred Scriptures it signifieth one who is strong and mighty, and for his strength great and excellent, and then by a man here we may understand him who is mighty and great in knowledge; the words of such a man are as deep waters, to the bottom whereof the shallow capacity of every one is not able to reach. But yet where the spring of those waters is a well-spring of wisdom, though sometimes it send forth deep waters, yet it doth not always; for that were to overwhelm the hearers. But at other times it is as a flowing brook, more shallow for capacity, but more forcible also in the stream of it, and either by persuasive exhortation carrying on the hearers to a pursuit of virtue and godliness, or else by a dissuasive reproof carrying them away from the practice of wickedness, and in both washing away the stains of their sinful lives. Wherefore St. Gregory saith, so must every preacher deal with his hearers as God dealeth with him; he must not preach to the simple as much as he knoweth because himself doth not know of heavenly mysteries as much as they are.--_Jermin._
The subject of verse 5 has been treated in the Homiletics on chap. xvii., verses 15 and 26.
_MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.--Verses_ 6-8.
FOLLY AND ITS RESULTS.
+I. None but a foolish man seeks contention.+ As we saw in the previous chapter (verse 14) contention or strife is an evil of which none at its beginnings can see the end. It may seem a very insignificant deed to strike a flint and steel together so as to produce a single spark, but one spark may produce a terrible and destructive fire. When a settler in a forest rubs two dry sticks together the act seems a trifling one, but the friction in time develops the latent heat of the wood, and there is enough fire brought into activity to lay low many a mighty forest tree. None but foolish men and children ever play with fire, and when they do it they generally suffer themselves first, but they are often not the only sufferers. So it is with contention, or a dispute in words. Wise men are often obliged to contend for truth and right, but they never _seek_ an occasion of dispute. But there are moral fools who think it only an amusement to pick a quarrel, little heeding what the consequences of it may be, not caring if blows succeed to angry words, or perhaps even desiring that they should do so. But although a man may play with fire and escape unharmed, or may even apply a torch to his neighbour's house without singeing so much as a hair of his own head, no fool's lips enter into contention or call for strokes without bringing retribution upon his own head. "His mouth" is in his own "destruction," and "his lips are the snare of his soul," for it is a law as old as the universe that _"with what measure ye meet it shall be measured to you again"_ (Matt. vi. 1, 2). The man who seeks contention will always find others like-minded with himself who will be willing to do for them what he has done for others, and he who "calls for strokes" upon his fellow-creatures will receive them upon his own head with compound interest.
+II. None but a cruel man will be a tale-bearer.+ A quarrelsome, passionate man is a fool, and he is also a cruel man, but he is not so cruel as the tale-bearer. The first man wounds, but he inflicts his injury in open daylight and in the front of his victim, but the second is like the treacherous footpad whose face is never seen and whose step is never heard, but who comes up behind his prey in the dark and leaves no trace behind but the mortal sword-thrust. But it must not be forgotten that there must always be two persons implicated in the guilt and cruelty of thus killing the reputation of a fellow-creature. The tale-bearer must have a repository for his slanders--the busy tongue must have a listening ear or no mischief would be done, and tale-bearing would die out for want of an atmosphere in which it could live. A reference to the Critical Notes will show that the word translated "wounds" may be rendered "dainties," and it is because evil reports of others are so keenly relished by an unsanctified man that the words of a tale-bearer are able to inflict such suffering and work so much ill in the world.
_OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS._
Verse 6. The emperor Julian used to banter the Christians with that precept of our Lord, "When thine adversary smites thee on the one cheek, turn to him the other also:" but Christians consult their ease as well as their consciences when they obey this precept in the spirit of it; whereas proud and passionate fools, when they give vent to their rancorous spirits, because they cannot bear the shadow of an indignity, not only turn the other cheek to their adversary, but smite, and urge, and almost force him to strike and destroy them.--_Lawson._
Verse 8. The bite of a viper is not so deadly as the wound of these "tale-bearers'" stories and insinuations. The truth is they contrive to infuse _their_ poison without a bite. If they would but appear in their true character;--would they but show their fangs, and make us feel them, we should be put upon our guard. We know the viper. We shun it. And when it has unhappily succeeded in wounding us, we instantly have recourse to means for preventing the poison from getting into the mass of the blood, and pervading the system. But these _human_ vipers infuse their poison in the language of kindness and love. "Their words are smoother than oil; yet are they drawn swords;"--envenomed fangs, of which the virus gets into our system ere we are aware, works its mischievous and morally deadly effects, and becomes incapable of extraction. Every attempt at its removal still leaves some portion of it behind. There is, in the original word, an implication of softness, simplicity, undesignedness, which only gives the secret weapon with which the wound is inflicted the greater keenness.--_Wardlaw._
The tongue of the tale-bearer is a two-edged sword, at once it cutteth on both sides, and his words are his wounds, at once wounding both him of whom he speaketh and him to whom he speaketh. To the one he gives the wounds of his slandering, to the other the wounds of his flattering. The one he woundeth so, that his blow is neither heard, seen, nor felt. The other he woundeth so, that though his blow be heard, seen, and felt, yet it is not perceived: in both they go down into the heart, as revealing the heart of the one, and as removing the heart of the other from him. . . . Or the words may be translated, _the words of a tale-bearer are as smoothing words:_ for he frameth his own words to as much softness, as those which he reporteth he maketh to be hard. And indeed, as they sound, they are commonly so pleasing, that they easily slip down into the heart, where they are readily entertained.--_Jermin._
_MAIN HOMILETICS OF VERSE_ 9.
TWIN-BROTHERS.
+I. Slothfulness and prodigality have the same origin.+ As brothers are the children of a common parent, so sloth and waste have their root in the common sin of ungodliness; men are spendthrifts or they are lazy, because they have no right sense of their obligations to God and to man--because they do not look upon their life as a stewardship for which they must give an account (Rom. xiv. 12), but as a gift which they are at liberty to spend as they please. The acts of the prodigal and the slothful man differ in themselves, but they all spring from that spirit of self-pleasing which is the essence of ungodliness.
+II. The slothful man is a waster of God's most precious gifts.+ Twin-brothers are often so much alike that it is difficult for onlookers to distinguish one from the other. And there is an aspect in which we may view the slothful man in which we not only note the close resemblance he bears to his prodigal brother, but in which he is transformed into the prodigal himself. For the negative sinner--the man who does nothing--is a waster of his time and of his talents, and is therefore guilty of a positive crime. The man who "hid the Lord's talent" was visited with a stern sentence as a positive transgressor (Matt. xxv. 25). If we convict a man of prodigality for wasting gold, what shall we say of him who wastes what no gold can buy? "Time," says J. A. James, "is the most precious thing in the world. When God gives us a moment, He does not promise us another, as if to teach us highly to value and improve it, by the consideration, for aught we know, it may be the last. Time, when gone, never returns. We talk about 'fetching up' a lost hour, but the thing is impossible. A moment once lost, is lost for ever. We could as rationally set out to find a sound that had expired in air, as to find a lost moment." And when we reflect what infinite results depend upon what a man does with his time, we see the force of the proverb, because the slothful man is a waster of the most precious commodity in this world.
+III. The results of both extravagance and sloth are the same.+ It makes no difference in the end whether a man gets nothing, or spends all that he gets, he can come to poverty by either road. The one has been compared to a man who dies by a rapid and violent disease, and the other by a slow and subtle consumption. But the grave, sooner or later, receives them both.
_OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS._
The practical lesson is, that in personal and domestic interests, _diligence_ and _economy_ should _go together,_ and that the one without the other never can avail for either obtaining or securing even the comforts of life. Of what use is industry if its proceeds are not prudently managed when they come in?--if husband, or wife, or both, be destitute of discretion, improvident and thriftless? if there is the absence of all sober and considerate calculation, and, as a consequence, no due proportioning of outlay to income, but a reckless and wasteful expenditure, leaving an unlooked-for deficiency--a woful amount _minus_--at the year's end? The poor inconsiderate fools never think what they are about. They keep no daily reckoning--no accounts; and so their money is gone, they can't tell how--they had no idea they were living at such a rate!--and even when they have made the discovery there is no improvement. They say, possibly, _they must take care;_ but they only _say_ it, and immediately forget it. Things go on as before; and still (to use rather a colloquial, but sufficiently expressive phrase), what is taken in by the door is thrown out by the window; and still the wonder continues _how it goes!_ They are ever marvelling how _other folks do._ They can't understand it. For _their_ parts, all that comes in finds its way off from them as fast as it comes, and many a time faster! Thus, as might be expected, there are the same appearances of bareness, and cheerlessness, and want, in the dwelling of the _thriftless_ as in that of the _slothful._ Extremes thus meet. . . . _Diligence,_ let me remind you, is as necessary for the acquisition of spiritual as of temporal good--of the riches of Divine knowledge of the mind, as of the blessings of the Divine life to the heart. And not less is _economy of means._ How often may it be seen, that with means of a very limited and stinted amount, there is more of spiritual prosperity in one instance, than is discoverable in another, with means the most varied and abundant. Many believers, it is to be feared, are spiritual spendthrifts. They use their privileges on no principle of economy. They read, they hear, they frequent ordinances--and yet their progress in spiritual attainments bears no proportion to the extent of their advantages. Rich in privileges, they are poor in the graces and enjoyments of the life of God in the soul. Why? The answer is plain. They who thrive on slender means, make the most of what they have; whereas they who live in the midst of abundance get into habits of carelessness, and of the prodigal use of what they have.--_Wardlaw._
The word also here used may seem to refer this verse to that which goeth before it; and then it is a further description of a talebearer. For he is commonly a fellow slothful in his work, being busy in his words, and he is indeed brother to him that is a great waster, spoiling his own estate by his slothfulness, and by the mischief which his talebearing falleth upon him; and spoiling him to whom he talketh by the ill mind which he putteth into him.--_Jermin._
_MAIN HOMILETICS OF VERSES_ 10 _and_ 11.
TWO CITADELS.
+I. The citadel of him who trusts in the Lord.+ _"The name of the Lord."_ God has revealed Himself to men by many names, each one of which is intended to set forth some attribute of His perfect nature. The name "I AM," by which He revealed Himself to Israel (Exod.