248. The World Insufficient

The World Insufficient

Ecc_12:8 : ’93Vanity of vanities, saith the preacher; all is vanity.’94

When a book is placed in your hands, the first question you ask is, ’93Who wrote it?’94 Not all the political astuteness and classic grace and unparalleled satire of Junius’92s Letters can satisfy you, because you do not know who Junius was’97whether John Horne Tooke or Bishop Butler or Edmund Burke or some one else. Mightier than a book always is the man who wrote the book.

Now, who is the author of this text? King Solomon. It seemed as if the world exhausted itself on that man. It wove its brightest flowers into his garland. It set its richest gems in his coronet. It pressed the rarest wine to his lip. It robed him in the purest purple and embroidery. It cheered him with the sweetest music in that land of harps. It greeted him with the gladdest laughter that ever leaped from mirth’92s lip. It sprinkled his cheek with spray from the brightest fountains. Royalty had no dominion, wealth no luxury, gold no glitter, flowers no sweetness, song no melody, light no radiance, upholstery no gorgeousness, waters no gleam, birds no plumage, prancing coursers no mettle, architecture no grandeur, but it was all his. Across the thick grass of the lawn, fragrant with tufts of camphire from Engedi, fell the long shadows of trees brought from distant forests. Fish-pools, fed by artificial channels that brought the streams from hills far away, were perpetually ruffled with fins, and golden scales shot from water-cave to water-cave with endless dive and swirl, attracting the gaze of foreign potentates. Birds that had been brought from foreign aviary glanced and fluttered among the foliage and called to their mates far beyond the sea. From the royal stables there came up the neighing of twelve thousand horses, standing in blankets of Tyrian purple, chewing their bits over troughs of gold, waiting for the king’92s order to be brought out in front of the palace, when the official dignitaries would leap into the saddle for some grand parade, or, harnessed to some of the fourteen hundred chariots of the king, the fiery chargers, with flaunting mane and throbbing nostril, would make the earth jar with the tramp of hoofs and the thunder of wheels.

While within and without the palace you could not think of a single luxury that could be added or of a single splendor that could be kindled, down on the banks of the sea the dry-docks of Ezion-geber rang with the hammers of the shipwrights who were constructing larger vessels for a still wider commerce; for all lands and climes were to become tributary to Solomon’92s glory. No rest till his keels shall cut every sea, his axmen hew every forest, his archers strike every rare wing, his fishermen whip every stream, his merchants trade in every bazaar, his name be honored by every tribe and royalty shall have no dominion, wealth no luxury, gold no glitter, song no melody, light no radiance, waters no gleam, birds no plumage, prancing coursers no mettle, upholstery no gorgeousness, architecture no grandeur, but it was all his.

’93Well,’94 you say, ’93if there is any man happy, he ought to be.’94 But I hear him coming out through the palace, and see his robes actually encrusted with jewels, as he stands in the front and looks out upon the vast domain. What does he say? King Solomon, great is your dominion, great is your honor, great is your joy? No. While standing there amidst all that splendor, the tears start, and his heart breaks, and he exclaims, ’93Vanity of vanities; all is vanity.’94 What! Solomon not happy yet? No, not happy.

I learn from this subject, in the first place, that official position will never give solace to a man’92s soul. I know there have been very happy men in high positions, such as Wilberforce, as Theodore Frelinghuysen, as Governor Briggs, as Prince Albert. But the joy came not from their elevated position; it came from the Lord God, whom they had tried to serve. This man Solomon was king thirty-five years. All the pleasure that comes from palatial residence, from the flattery of foreign diplomats, from universal sycophancy, gathered around him. For a long while his throne stood firm and the people were loyal; and yet hear his awful sigh of disheartenment in the words of my text. How many people in all ages have made the same experiment with the same failure! How often you see people who think, ’93If I could only get in this or that position’97if I could be a mayor or a governor or a senator or a president, I should be perfectly happy!’94 And they have gone on, climbing from one position to another, never finding the solace they anticipated.

Ask the men who have gone through the political life of the last forty years, in their old days, what they think of the honors of this world, and they will tell you, ’93Ashes! ashes!’94 An old man told me some time ago that he called at the White House just before the expiration of the second term of President Jackson. He sent a message in; the President came not. He sent a second time, and a third time. After a while the President came out in great indignation, and said, ’93Gentlemen, people envy me in this White House, and they long to get here; but I tell you, at the end of the second term, I am glad to get out of it, for it is a perfect hell.’94 The honors and the emoluments of this world bring so many cares with them, that they bring also torture and disquietude. Pharaoh sits on one of the highest earthly eminences, yet he is miserable because there are some people in his realm that do not want any longer to make bricks. The head of Edward I aches under his crown because the people will not pay the taxes, and Llewellyn, Prince of Wales, will not do him homage, and Wallace will be a hero. Frederick William III of Prussia is miserable because France wants to take the Prussian provinces. The world is not large enough for Louis XIV and William III. The ghastliest suffering, the most shriveling fear, the most rending jealousies, the most gigantic disquietude, have walked amidst obsequious courtiers, and been clothed in royal apparel, and sat on judgment-seats of power.

Honor and truth and justice can not go so high up in authority as to be beyond the range of human assault. The pure and the good in all ages have been execrated by the mob who cry out, ’93Not this man, but Barrabas. Now, Barrabas was a robber.’94 By patriotic devotion, by honesty, by Christian principle, I would have you, my hearers, seek for the favor and the confidence of your fellow-men; but do not look upon some high position in society as though that were always sunshine. The mountains of earthly honor are like the mountains of Switzerland, covered with perpetual ice and snow. Having obtained the confidence and the love of your associates, be content with such things as you have. You brought nothing into the world, and it is very certain you can carry nothing out. ’93Cease ye from man, whose breath is in his nostrils.’94 There is an honor that is worth possessing, but it is an honor that comes from God. This day rise up and take it. ’93Behold what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God.’94 Who aspires not for that royalty? Come now and be kings and priests unto God and the Lamb forever.

Still further, I learn from my subject that worldly wealth can not satisfy the soul’92s longing. The more money a man has, the better, if he gets it honestly and uses it lawfully. The whole teaching of the Word of God has a tendency to create those habits and that kind of mental acumen which leads on to riches. A man who talks against wealth as though it were a bad thing, is either a knave or a fool, not meaning what he says, or ignorant of the glorious uses to which money can be put. But the man who builds his soul’92s happiness on earthly accumulation is not at all wise, to put it in the faintest shape. To say that Solomon was a millionaire gives but a very imperfect idea of the property he inherited from David, his father. He had at his command gold to the value of six hundred and eighty million dollars, and he had silver to the value of one billion twenty-nine million three hundred and seventy-seven dollars. Balkis, the great Queen of Sheba, made him a nice little present of seven hundred and twenty thousand dollars, and Hiram made him a present of the same amount. If he had lost the value of a whole realm out of his pocket, it would have hardly been worth his while to stoop down and pick it up; and yet, with all that affluence, he writes the words of my text, ’93Vanity of vanities; all is vanity.’94 Alas! if that man could not find in all his worldly possessions enough to satisfy his immortal soul, no amount that you and I will ever gather by the sweat of our brow or by the strength of our arm, will make us happy.

I have been amused to hear people, when they start in life, say at what point in life they will be contented with worldly possessions. One man says, ’93I want to get twenty thousand dollars, and I will be satisfied.’94 Another, ’93I want to get fifty or a hundred thousand or a million, and then I will be satisfied. Then I will say to my soul, ’91Now, just look at that block of storehouses. Just look at those government securities. Just look at those bonds and mortgages. Just look what lucrative investments you have. Now, my soul, take thine ease; eat, drink, and be merry!’92’93 Thou fool! If you are not happy now with the smaller possessions, you will never be with the larger possessions. If with decent and comely apparel you are not grateful to God, you would be ungrateful if you had a prince’92s wardrobe crowded till the hinges burst. If you sat this morning at your table, and the fare was so poor that you complained, you would not be satisfied though you sat down to partridge and pineapple. If you are not contented with an income to support comfortably your household, you would not be contented though your income rolled in on you fifty or a hundred thousand dollars a year.

It is not what we get, it is what we are, that makes us happy or miserable. If that is not so, how do you account for the fact that many of those who fare sumptuously every day are waspish and dissatisfied and overbearing and foreboding and cranky and uncompromising; with a countenance in which wrath always lowers, and a lip which scorn curls; while many a time in the summer even-tide you see a laboring man going home in his shirtsleeves with a pail on his arm and a pickax over his shoulder, his face bright with smiles and his heart with hope and the night of his toil bright with flaming auroras? It is an illustration and proof of the fact that it is not outward condition that makes a man happy.

Would I could, by the power of the Lord Almighty, break the infatuation of those men who are neglecting the present sources of satisfaction, hoping that there is to be something in the future for them of a worldly nature that will satisfy their souls. The heart right, all is right. The heart wrong, all is wrong. But I ask you to higher riches; to crowns that never fade; to investments that always declare dividends. Come up this day and get it’97the riches of God’92s pardon, the riches of God’92s mercy, the riches of God’92s peace; Blessed are all they who put their trust in him.

I go still further, and learn from this subject that learning and science cannot satisfy the soul. You know that Solomon was one of the largest contributors to the literature of his day. He wrote one thousand and five songs. He wrote three thousand proverbs. His topics had world-wide range. The Bible says distinctly he wrote about plants, from the cedar of Lebanon to the hyssop that groweth out of the wall, and about birds and beasts and fishes. No doubt he put off his royal robes and put on hunter’92s trapping and went out with his arrows to bring down the rarest specimens of birds; and then with his fishing tackle he went down to the stream to bring up the denizens of the deep, and plunged into the forest and found the rarest specimens of flowers. Then he came back to his study and wrote books about zoology, the science of animals; about ichthyology, the science of fishes; about ornithology, the science of birds; about botany, the science of plants. Yet, notwithstanding all his achievements, he cries out in my text, ’93Vanity of vanities; all is vanity.’94

Have you ever seen a man try to make learning and science his God? Did you ever know such a fearful autobiography as that of John Stuart Mill, a man who prided himself on his philosophy, and had a wonderful strength of intellect; yet after his death, his autobiography goes forth to the world, showing that his whole life was a gigantic wretchedness. We have seen men go out with mineralogist’92s hammer and geologist’92s pry and botanist’92s knife and ornithologist’92s gun and storm the kingdom of nature in her barred castles of cave and grove and forest; and if there is any heaven on earth, it is that. With your eyes prepared for all beautiful sights and your ears for all sweet sounds and your soul for all great thoughts, if you go forth in the place where God breathes in the aroma of flowers and talks in the wind’92s rustling and sings in the roar of the forest and mountain cataract, then you know why Linn’e6us spent his life amidst plants and Cuvier found intelligent converse among beasts and Werner grew exhilarant among minerals and Audubon reveled among birds and Agassiz found untraveled worlds of thought in a fish. But every man who has testified, after trying the learning and science of the world for a solace, testified that it is an insufficient portion. The philosopher has often wept in astronomer’92s observatory and chemist’92s laboratory and botanist’92s herbarium. There are times when the soul dives deeper than the fish and soars higher than the bird, and, though it may be enraptured with the beauties of the natural world, it will long after trees of life that never wither and fountains that never dry up and stars that shall shine after the glories of our earthly nights have gone out forever.

Oh, what discontents, what jealousies, what uncontrollable hate have sprung up among those who depended upon their literary success! How often have writers, with their pens, plunged into the hearts of their rivals’97pens sharper than cimeters, striking deeper than bayonets! Voltaire hated Rousseau. Charles Lamb could not endure Coleridge. Waller warred against Cowley. The hatred of Plato and Xenophon is as immortal as their works. Corneille had an utter contempt for Racine. Have you ever been in Westminster Abbey? In the ’93Poets’92 Corner,’94 in Westminster Abbey, sleeps Drayton the poet; and a little way off, Goldie, who said the former was not a poet. There sleeps Dryden; and a little way off, poor Shadwell, who pursued him with fiend’92s fury. There is Pope; and a little way off is John Dennis, his implacable enemy. They never before came so near together without quarreling! Byron had all that genius could give a man and that sympathy with nature could give a man and that literary applause could give a man, and yet died in wretchedness.

I come to learn one more lesson from my subject, and that is that there is no comfort in the life of a voluptuary. I dare not draw aside the curtain that hides the excesses into which Solomon’92s dissoluteness plunged him. Though he waved a sceptre over others, there arose in his own soul a tyrant that mastered him. With a mandate that none dared disobey, he laid the whole land under tribute to his iniquity. Delilah sheared the locks of that Samson. From that princely seraglio there went forth a ruinous blight on the whole nation’92s chastity; but after a while remorse, with feet of fire, leaped upon his soul, and with body exhausted and loathsome and dropping apart with putrefaction, he staggers out from the hell of his own iniquity to give warning to others.

Oh, how many have ventured out on that wild sea of sensuality, driven by fierce winds of passion, hurled against rocks, swallowed in the whirl of hell’92s maelstrom! That was the last of them. No! that was not the last of them. Oh, how many young men have gone on that path of sin because it seemed blooming with tropical splendor and the sky was bright and the air was balm and from the castles that stood on the shore of glittering seas there came ringing up laughter as merry as the waves that dashed on the crags beneath! By some infernal spell their eye was blinded and their ear was stopped, or they would have heard the clank of chains and the howl of woe, and across their vision would have passed spectres of the dead, with shrouds gathered up about faces blistered with pain and eyes starting from their sockets in agony. But, alas! they saw it not, they heard it not, until from the slippery places the long, lean, skeleton hands of despair reached up and snatched them down, destroyed without remedy!

Has this sorcerer cast his eye on you? O young man! have you been once and again to the places where the pure never go? Have you turned your back upon a mother’92s prayer and a sister’92s love? And, while I speak, does your conscience begin to toll dismally the burial of your purity and honor? Put back now or never. Put back! That shadow that falls upon thy soul is from no passing cloud, but from a night deep, starless, eternal. God’92s eye watcheth thy footsteps. A little farther on, and no tears can wash out thy sin and no prayer will bring a pardon. Put back now or never! I tear off the garlands which hide this death’92s head, and hold before you today the reeking skull of sinful pleasure. Nations have gone down under this sin. Exhumed cities on broken pillars and on temple walls have preserved in infamous sculpture the memory of scenes before which the antiquarian turns his head and asks if there be a God where so long has slept his vengeance. The world still trembles under the weight of this behemoth of iniquity, and, from the myriad graves in which it holds the scarred carcasses of the slain, lifts up its hands, crying, ’93How long, O Lord, how long?’94 From Christian circles, from the very altars of God, the ranks of ruin are made up. They march on with scorched feet over a pathway of fire, the ground trembling with earthquake and the air hot with the breath of woe and sulphurous with the fleet lightnings of God’92s wrath. Scorpions strike out at every step and the ’93worm that never dies’94 lifts its awful crest, with horrid folds to crush the debauched. Oh, there is no peace in the life of a voluptuary! Solomon answers, ’93None! none!’94

But if there is no complete satisfaction in worldly office, in worldly wealth, in worldly learning, in sinful indulgence’97where is there any? Has God turned us out on a desert to die? Ah, no; look at this one that comes this morning’97this fair one. Immortal garlands on her brow. The song of heaven bursting from her lips! ’93Her ways are ways of pleasantness, and all her paths are peace.’94 In Christ is peace. In Christ is pardon. In Christ is everlasting joy, and nowhere else.

Substantial comfort will not grow

In nature’92s barren soil;

All we can boast, till Christ we know,

Is vanity and toil.

But where the Lord has planted grace,

And made his glories known,

There fruits of heavenly joy and peace

Are found, and there alone.

Autor: T. De Witt Talmage