The Pulpit Commentary — Proverbs — Section 358

Tho contmry disposition betokens folly (eh. the moist west winds that come ea...h night xiv.17). It ishlaglorytopa1aoveratra.na- from the sea. The bright skies cause the greseion. It is a. real triumph a.ad glol'y for heo.t of the day to radiate very quickly into o. man to forgive and to tnke no notice of epnce, so that the nights are as cold ns the rln.y injuries offered him. Thus in his poor wo.y is the reverse. . . . To this coldness of the he imitates Almighty God (Micah vii. 18, night air the indispensable watering of all " Who is a God like unto thee, that plant-life is due. The winds, loaded with parcloneth iniquity, o.nd po.sseth by the moisture, are robbed of it as they pa~e over tro.nsgrosaion of the remno.nt of his heri- the land, the cold air condensing it into tage? he retnineth not his anger for drops of water, which fall in a gmcious ever, because he delighteth in mercy"). rain of mist on every thirsty blade. In the Hero it is discretion or pruclence that makes morning the fog thus created r,sts like a o. man patient and forgiving; elsewhere the sea over the plains, and far up the sides of same effect is attributed to love (eh. x. 12; the hills, which raise their heads abov" it xvii. 9). The Septuagint Version is hard to like so many islands. . . . The amount of uuderstand : Tb ll~ 1ea.6x11µ.a. aUTov '1dpx.-ra., moisture thus poured on the thirsty ve~eta- ..-a.pa.voµ.o,., "And hie glorying cometh on tion during the night is very great. Dew the transgressors;" but, taken in connection seemed to the Israelites a mysterious gift with the former hemistich, it seems to mean of Heaven, as indeerl it is. That the elctcs that the patient mo.n's endurance of the should be stayed from yielding it was n. contrndictione of sinners is no reproach or special sign of Di vine wrath, and there disgrace to him, hut redounds to his credit could be no more gracious conception ot' a. o.nd virtue. "Vincit qui patitur," "He con- loving farewell address to his pe,,ple than quers who endures." where Moses tells them that his speech Ver. 12.-The king's wrath is as the roar- should distil as the dew. 'l'he favour of an ing of a lion, which inspires terror, o.s pre- Orient.al monarch could not be more bene- luding danger and death. The same idea ficially conceived than by saying tiiat, while occurs in eh. :a:. 2 (comp. Amos iii. 4, 8). hi,i wrath is like the roaring of a lion, his The Assyrian monuments have made us favour is as the dew upon tLe grass." Ji:i:;i familiar with the lion RB a type of royalty ; (ratson), "favour,'' is translated by the Sep- and the famous throne of Solomon was tuagint, -rb i.>..apov, and by the Vulga1e, ornamented with figures (of lions ou each of hilaritas, "cheerfulness" (as in eh. :s:viii. its six steps (1 Kings x. 19, etc.). Thus 22), which gives the notion of a. smiling, St. Paul; alluding to the Roman emperor, serene, benevolent countenance, as con- says (2 Tim. iv. 17), "I was delivered out trwited with the angry, lowering look of a of the mouth of the lion." "The lion is displeased monarch. dead," announced Me.rsyas to Agrippa, on Ver. 13.-With the first clause we may the decease of Tiberius (Josephus, 'Ant.,' compare eh. x. I ; xv. 20: xvii. 21, 25. x.viii. 6. 10). The moralist here gives a Calamity in the Hebrew is in the plural monition to kings to repress their wrath number (contritiones, Paga.), as if to ma.rk and not to let it rage uncontrolled, and a the many and continued sorrows which e. warning to subjects not to offend their ruler, bad son brings upon bis father, bow he lest he tear them to pieces like· a savage causes evil after evil to harass and distress beast, which an Eastern despot had full him. The oontentions of a. wife are a oon- power to do. But his favour is as dew upon tinual dropping (comp. eh. =vii. 15). The the grass. In eh. x.vi. 15 the king's favour flo.t roofa of Eastern houses, formed of planks was compared to a. cloud of the latter rain ; loosely joined and co,ered with a coating of here it is likened to the dew (comp. Pd. l:nii. clay or plo.ster, were always subject to leak- 6). We hardly understand in England the age in heo.vy rains. The irritating alterca- real bearing of this comparison. "The secret tions and bickering of a cross-grained wife of the luxurfont fertility of many parts of are compared to the continuous chip ot· water Palestine," says Dr. Geikie ·('Holy Land through a.n imperfectly constrncted roof. and Bible,' i. 72, etc.)," lies iu the rich supply Tecta jugiter perstillantia, as the Vulgate of moisture afforded by the sea-winds which has it. 'l'he Scotch say, •• A leaky house blow inland eaoh night, and water the face and a scoldino- wife a.re two bad com- of the whole land. There is no dew, panions." Th~ two clauses of the verse properly so called in Palestine, for there are co-ordinate, expressing t,vo facts that is no moisture in the hot summer uir to be render home life miserable a.ud llllemlur- chilled iuto dewdrops by the coolness of able, viz. the misbehaviour of e. sou and the the night, as in a. climate like ours. From ill temper of a. wife. The Septuagint, follow- May till October rain is unknown, the sun ing a ditt'erent reading, has, "Nor aro offer- shiuin,::- with unclouded brightness day after ings from a harlot's hire pure," which is an day. 'l'he hent becomes intense, the ground allusion to l>eut. :a:iii. 18. bLml; and vegetation would perish but fo, Ver. H.-Houau and riohes are an inheri- 1'68 THE PROVERBS. [on. ,mi:. 1-29.