CRITICAL NOTES.—
Proverbs 14:28. Miller translates “In a great people.”
MAIN HOMILETICS OF Proverbs 14:28
A KING’S TRUE GLORY
I. Human rulers are dependent upon their people for honour.
1. The safety of the king’s crown depends largely upon the number of his subjects. This was certainly the case in the days of Solomon, and is so now to a large extent. Small kingdoms are very likely even in these days to be engulfed by more powerful states—by those who can bring into the field an overpowering number of warriors. Numbers hold the diadems on the heads of the rulers of the great nations of Europe. That Palestine was to some extent an exception to this rule was due to the especial providence of Jehovah—that it was ever overpowered by numbers was because its inhabitants forsook their covenant God. But the general rule holds good.
2. The prosperity of their land depends upon its being well populated. Other things being equal, a populous kingdom will do more business with other nations—will plant colonies and mix more with the inhabitants of other lands; and all these things extend a nation’s influence and so make its ruler’s position a more honourable one.
II. It is therefore a matter of self-interest that a ruler should govern his people righteously. This is a lesson which the potentates of the earth have been slow to learn although the page of history abounds with so many examples of the peril of disregarding it. It would be the destruction of the head if it were to say to the other members of the body, by which it is sustained in life and health, “I have no need of thee.” The existence of the one depends upon that of the other. And it is not less so with the body politic. The safety and honour of the king is bound up in the well-being of his subjects. Where the one is dependent upon the many, self-interest, as well as duty, point to his so ruling that his people may enjoy peace and prosperity and so multiply.
OUTLINES AND SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS
There is a natural tendency in the population of a country to increase. When, therefore, population diminishes, there must be some cause counter-working nature. The subjects of a country may be wasted in destructive and depopulating wars; they may be driven by oppression to quit their native land, and to seek a refuge in more distant regions; they may be starved and reduced by measures that are injurious and ruinous to trade—measures that keep up the price of bread and depress the wages of labour.… The existence of a thriving vigorous population is a mark of freedom, of wise and impartial legislation; of paternal care—and it is the palladium of all that is desirable in the results of human rule.—Wardlaw.
A sentiment arrayed against feeble princes who nevertheless array themselves with disproportionate splendour; and this, as also Proverbs 14:34, is designed to call attention to the principle, that it is not external and seeming advantages, but simply and solely the inward competence and moral excellence, whether of the head or of the members of a commonwealth, that are the conditions of its temporal welfare.—Lange’s Commentary.
How great, then, is the honour of our heavenly King in the countless multitudes of His people! How overwhelmingly glorious will it appear when the completed number shall stand before His throne (Revelation 7:9-10); each the medium of reflecting His glory (2 Thessalonians 1:10); each with a crown to cast at His feet (Revelation 4:10-11), and a song of everlasting joy to time to His praise (Revelation 5:9).—Bridges.
All grades depend upon their inferiors. The poor have us in their power. To be kind to them is a dictate of common selfishness. Carried into a spiritual light, the truth becomes much wider. Half of heaven will be what we did for the poor. Solomon was familiar with this as a king; but he marks the sentence as one for all humanity. If a man wishes to be comfortable on earth, let him make his inferiors great. And, if he wishes to be rich in heaven, let him cultivate with assiduous zest the graces of the perishing.—Miller.
The occurrence of this political precept in the midst of the maxims of personal morality is striking. Still more so is its protest against the false ideal of national greatness to which Eastern kings, for the most part, have bowed down.—Plumptre.
The people are the king’s best treasury; in their scarcity he cannot be rich. Worthy was the speech of that Goth, a king of Italy, who, speaking of his subjects, saith, “Our harvest is the rest of all.”—Jermin.
NOTE.—The population of England and Wales in 1700 was about 5,475,000. At the beginning of the present century it was between eight and nine millions; it now exceeds twenty millions.