CRITICAL NOTES.—
Ecclesiastes 4:1. So I returned.] Passing from the reflections of the last chapter to a new subject of contemplation. They had no comforter. The repetition of this phrase is intended to make the thought emphatic.
Ecclesiastes 4:4. Every right work.] Every work marked by excellence and skill. But the writer has chiefly in view that successful work which excites the envy of others.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.— Ecclesiastes 4:1-3
THE TYRANNY OF FORCE AGAINST RIGHT
I. Such tyranny is an immense evil.
1. It is an old evil. From the days of Cain, who did the first murder, there have been tyrants who have used their power to oppress the innocent. Brute force, without the government of the reason and conscience, employed to crush the defenceless, is one of the earliest forms of human iniquity.
2. It is an inveterate evil. Since Abel’s murder, the oppressors and the oppressed have been the chief actors in history. In every age, might has prevailed over right. No nation can show a clear page, purged from this blot. Humanity has become so indoctrinated with the claims of mere power that armies are still called “forces.” Even now, society is not advanced enough to render supreme homage to reason and moral right. Still the ultimate appeal of nations is to force.
II. Such tyranny gives rise to extreme suffering. The innocent may be strong in the sense of right, and in the defence of conscience; still human nature must feel.
1. These sufferings open the fountains of sorrow. When courage, goodness, and skill are of no avail against a vicious power; when the innocent are trampled under by the iron heel of tyranny, no wonder that the eye fills, and the heart is overwhelmed with emotion.
2. These sufferings are sometimes aggravated by the circumstance that they have no earthly comforter. The good have often been alone in the sorrows inflicted by the oppressor, and have looked around in vain for a sympathetic heart. With no eye to pity, and no heart to cheer, the load of misery comes with crushing weight.
III. Such tyranny causes existence to seem but a questionable benefit. The long record of human agony produced by the tyranny of the powerful; the cruel persecutions of some of the brightest ornaments of human nature—these things are a sore trial to our faith in the goodness of the Supreme Power. It seems as if God were indifferent to the most grievous wrongs of men. The existence of such evils in the world tempts a man to indulge in the most extravagant and desperate language.
1. He affirms that the dead are better off than the living. (Ecclesiastes 4:2.) The thought of the wrongs which man inflicts on man so sickens the heart that we are plunged into that gloomy mood in which we are ready to hail the condition of the dead, and welcome the long sleep and the safe shelter of the grave. There are deeds so horrible that the contemplation of them is enough to make us loathe life.
2. That the gift of existence is itself an evil. (Ecclesiastes 4:3.) There are seasons when the contemplation of the darker side of history so occupies the mind that we are tempted to regard the gift of life itself as a doubtful blessing. We almost wish as if our eye had never opened to the light of day, and that we had never been called from that dark negation which we once were. A state of non-existence appears to us preferable to a state of ill-existence.
3. There are times when this melancholy thought presses itself with peculiar force upon the mind. Times in the individual life—times in the life of nations. The state of mind, however, here described, does not and cannot last. Though the soul may have to pass through this shadow, she emerges into the light of a better hope. Elsewhere the Royal Preacher praises life as a Divine gift. Our feeling regarding the wrongs of time is thus modified by the higher truths, and the belief in eternal justice.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
Ecclesiastes 4:1. Grace, while fortifying the soul against the violence of trouble, does not seal up the fountains of nature.
A tear is often the only tribute that the oppressed can give to misery.
The tears of the oppressed are—
1. A dumb protest against the cruel might of wrong.
2. An appeal to the justice of Heaven.
3. A revelation of an eternal future.
The pious, in the fiercest trial, though all men may forsake them, have yet a Comforter at their side.
Society has not yet reached that stage of progress wherein the convictions of reason and conscience bear supreme rule. Notwithstanding the advance of knowledge, and the presence of the Christian Religion for so many ages, humanity is still far from this ideal perfection.
A mechanical force is of no service to man unless he can guide and direct it to certain ends. There are some forces of nature of great potentiality, but they are like wild beasts that cannot be tamed. Power needs the direction of goodness to make it venerable, and worthy of praise.
The world has not yet got beyond the illusion of military glory—a proof that the worship of force has not yet disappeared from amongst us.
The Lord has a bottle, and into that bottle he puts His people’s tears, and the tears of all who are oppressed. When Joseph wept at Dothan, and the Jews at Babylon, it was not the sand of the desert, nor the stream of Euphrates, which intercepted the tear, but God’s bottle.… And whether it be the scalding tear of the Southern Slave, or that which freezes in the Siberian exile’s eye, God’s bottle has received them all; and when the measure is full, the tears of the oppressed burst in vials of vengeance on the head of the oppressor [Dr. J. Hamilton].
The power of the oppressor is, after all, a mere shadow—a vanishing thing. The power most to be dreaded is that which is on the side of the oppressed. He who has taken refuge in the citadel of God is the most terrible foe.
Ecclesiastes 4:2. When one attentively regards the innumerable sorrows of the heart, miseries, great evils, and troubles on earth, and the awful wickedness there is in the world, which is the devil’s kingdom, one must surely be of the mind that it were better to be dead than to see so much wretchedness [Luther].
There are such sights of misery on earth, that in the confusion of his feeling, the spectator finds a momentary relief in thinking upon the dread repose and secure refuge of the dark house.
The dead are clean escaped from the hands of the tyrant. The door of the sepulchre for ever bars the entrance of revenge.
Ecclesiastes 4:3. In certain frames of the feeling, it is natural to wish for the condition of non-existence. Extreme sorrow has plunged some of the best men into this trial—Job—Jeremiah.
When life seems so poor a heritage, the true and Absolute Being becomes all to us.
The tribulation through which we must enter into the Kingdom of Heaven may consist of temptations to indulge the most extravagant and vain wishes.
There are times when we seem to snatch a consolation from the dreariest of all philosophies.