A profound gloom rests on the second act or section of this drama. It teaches us that we are helpless in the iron grip of laws which we had no voice in making; that we often lie at the mercy of men whose mercy is but a caprice; that in our origin and end, in body and spirit, in faculty and prospect, in our lives and pleasures, we are no better than the beasts that perish; that the avocations into which we plunge, amid which we seek to forget our sad estate, spring from our jealousy the one of the other, and tend to a lonely miserliness, without a use or a charm.
I. The Preacher's handling of this subject is very thorough and complete. According to him, men's excessive devotion to affairs springs from "a jealous rivalry the one with the other;" it tends to form in them a grasping, covetous temper which can never be satisfied, to produce a materialistic scepticism of all that is noble and spiritual in thought and action, to render their worship formal and insincere, and in general to incapacitate them for any quiet, happy enjoyment of their life. This is his diagnosis of their disease.
II. But what checks, what correctives, what remedies, would the Preacher have us apply to the diseased tendencies of the time? How shall men of business save themselves from that excessive devotion to its affairs which breeds so many portentous evils? (1) The very sense of the danger to which they are exposed a danger so insidious, so profound, so fatal should surely induce caution and a wary self-control. (2) The Preacher gives us at least three serviceable maxims. To all men of business conscious of their special dangers and anxious to avoid them he says, (a) Replace the competition which springs from your jealous rivalry with the co-operation which is born of sympathy and breeds goodwill. (b) Replace the formality of your worship with a reverent and steadfast sincerity. (c) Replace your grasping self-sufficiency with a constant holy trust in the fatherly providence of God.
S. Cox, The Quest of the Chief Good,p. 140.
References: Ecclesiastes 3:2. G. Dawson, Sermons on Daily Life and Duty,p. 277; J. M. Neale, Sermons in Sackville College,vol. i., p. 57. Ecclesiastes 3:4. J. H. Newman, Parochial and Plain Sermons,vol. iv., p. 334; W. Braden, Christian World Pulpit,vol. ix., p. 81; G. Rogers, Ibid.,vol. xxviii., p. 91.Ecclesiastes 3:6. S. Baring-Gould, One Hundred Sermon Sketches,p. 107. Ecclesiastes 3:7. A. A. Bonar, Contemporary Pulpit,vol. i., p. 123.Ecclesiastes 3:9-22. R. Buchanan, Ecclesiastes: its Meaning and Lessons,p. 107.
I. In the fourth chapter Koheleth comes to the conclusion that life is essentially and irretrievably wretched wretched not because (as he had formerly thought) it would so soon be over, but wretched because it lasted too long. All that pleasure did for him was thus to increase his gloom. There was one thing he had forgotten in making out his programme: he had forgotten the miseries of other people. The prosperity he secured for himself did not remove their adversity, but only brought it out into more startling relief. He was infected by their wretchedness, for in the midst of all his dissipation he had preserved a kindly heart. "I considered," he says, "the tears of those who are oppressed, and who have no comforter." The oppression of the poor by the rich was one of the most characteristic phases of Oriental society. To be poor was to be weak, and to be weak was to be reduced more or less into the condition of a slave.
II. In Ecclesiastes 5:4 Koheleth makes a new departure. He remarks that greed is at the bottom of a good deal of human misery. All work, he says, and all dexterity in work, is due to envy, to a jealous determination to outstrip our neighbours, to what Mallock calls the "desire for inequality." In contrast to the career of selfish isolation, Koheleth describes the advantages of sympathetic co-operation with one's fellow-men. We should not, he says, strive againstone another, each for his own good; we should strive withone another, each for the good of the whole. Co-operation is preferable to competition.
III. It now occurs to Koheleth that we may perhaps find some help in religious observances. He has already pointed out to us how we are hemmed in on all sides by limitations and restrictions. It must evidently be important what attitude we assume towards the Power which thus checks and thwarts us. Take care, he says, how you go into the house of God, how you perform your sacrifices, and prayers, and vows. He teaches us, as wise men have always taught, that obedience is better than sacrifice. Again, the value of prayer depends not on its length, but on its sincerity. Speak only out of the fulness of your heart. God is not to be trifled with. He cannot be deluded into mistaking for worship what is mere idle talk.
A. W. Momerie, Agnosticism,p. 204.
References: Ecclesiastes 4:1-3. J. Bennet, The Wisdom of the King,p. 174; T. C. Finlayson, A Practical Exposition of Ecclesiastes,p. 101.Ecclesiastes 4:1-8. R. Buchanan, Ecclesiastes: its Meaning and Lessons,p. 136. Ecclesiastes 4:4-6. J. Bennet, The Wisdom of the King,p. 196. Ecclesiastes 4:5; Ecclesiastes 4:6. J. H. Cooke, The Preacher's Pilgrimage,p. 54.Ecclesiastes 4:9; Ecclesiastes 4:10. R. D. B. Rawnsley, Sermons for the Christian Year,p. 512; C. J. Vaughan, Memorials of Harrow Sundays,p. 16. Ecclesiastes 4:9-16. R. Buchanan, Ecclesiastes: its Meaning and Lessons;p. 150. Ecclesiastes 4:12. J. Vaughan, Children's Sermons,1875, p. 9; J. Keble, Sermons from Ascension Day to Trinity Sunday,p. 395.Ecclesiastes 4:13. J. Bennet, The Wisdom of the King,p. 234; New Manual of Sunday-school Addresses,p. 1. 4 C. Bridges, An Exposition of Ecclesiastes,p. 79. 4, 5 G. G. Bradley, Lectures on Ecclesiastes,p. 79.