Ver. 17.-The advantages of society. I. OBSERVE m WHAT THE ADVANTAGES OP SOCIETY CONSIST, We have ancient authority for the idea that it i11 not good for man to be alone _(Gen. ii. 18). Man is naturally a gregarious being, Though some people are more sociable than others, no one can be healthy in perpetual solitude, The isolation of the hermit engendered the wildest hallucinations of fanaticism together with the narrowest conception of the world. Prisoners of the Bastille, in solitary confinement, were reduced to a condition of semi-idiocy. Robinson Crusoe made the best of his situation, yet he could not live without the companionship of animal pets, and he was glad of the humble friendship of a poor savage. 1. Society quickens a man's intelligence. Even Words- worth was thought by some to have deteriorated mentally in his comparative seclusion at Rydal Mount, and yet there were other men of high mental power in his neighbour- hood. Men's thoughts are stimulated and sharpened by conversation. 2. Society rouses a man's energy. Empty society of mere pleasure-seekers only dissipates a man's powP.rs in frivolity. But the society of earnest men stimulates by sympathy, emulation, and encouragement. 3. Society broadens a man's views. He is able to see how other men think and feel. They may not all have greater advantages than he possesses; but at least they are differently constituted and situated from himself. Thus he is lifted out of the narrowness of hie own single vision. Such breadth gives strength when it is accompanied by an earnest love of truth and right. II. CoNBIDER HOW THE ADVANTAGES OF SOCIETY MAY BE REALIZED. 1. They arc dependent on a man's residence. Horace's old dispute between the town and the country mouse has never been settled. Cowper wrote, "God made the country, mau made tho town;" and no doubt there is to be seen a certain restfulness, a purity, and a quiet powL·r ia natnre that those men miss who reside in the hea.rt of a wilderness of houses. Never- theless, there are compensations for the disagreeable pressure of population in great cities. The mind is quickened. Still, as evils also result from this manner of living, it is certainly important that those who are able to select their own residences should consider wholesome society to be as important as a pure water supi:,ly. 2. They can be found in sympathetic friendship. One good, true friend is more helpful than a score of mere acquaiatances. It is in the close intercourse of genuine friendship that the best results of the mutual play of thought and feeling can be obtained. Hence the supreme importance of cultivating friendship with the wise and good. 3. They should be obtained in the Christian Church. Christ not only called disciples to himself, one by one; he founded the Church, and bis apostles established local Churches wherever they could gather together a few converts. Christian companionship should be a help to Christian life and thought. There was a time when they who feared the Lord spake often one to another (Mai. iii. 16). .Above this earthlr friendship the Christian finds a mental and spiritual quickening in the friendship of Christ (Luke xxiv. 32), OJI, :U.VU, 1-27,] THE PROVERBS. 525
HOMILIES BY VARIOUS AUTHORS. Vere. 1-6.-Boasifulness, fealousy, and hypocrisy. I. OVER-CONFIDENCE REBUKED, (Ver. 1.) 1. On the ground of our limited knowledge, The homely proverb says, "Do not count your chickens before they are hatched." The future exists for us only in imagination. "Who knows," asks Horace, "whether the gods above will add to-morrow's time to the sum of to-day?" (' Od.,' iv. 7. 17); and Seneca, "None hath gods so favourable as that he may promise himself to-morrow's good." 2. On the ground of the Divine reserve of the secrets of destiny. To boast is to lift ourselves in effect out of that finite sphere of thought and feeling in which we have been placed by the Divine ordination. So says Horace again (and a distinctly Christian tum may be given to his exhortation), "Shun to inquire into the future and the morrow; and whatever day fortune shall afford thee, count it as i.ain" (' Od.,' i. 9. 13), Common sense and religious humility unite to teach us to" live for the day," II. SELF-PRAISE CENSURED. (Ver. 2.) "Let another praise thee, and not thine own mouth." "Self-praise stinks," and "Not as thy mother says, but as the neighbours say," are Arabic proverbs. Every individual has a certain value; the sense of this is the foundation of all self-respect and virtue. But to show an over-consciousness of this worth by self-praise is a social offence, because it is an e:caction of that which ought to be a free tribute, and betrays a desire of self-exaltation above others not easily forgiven. Ill. THE PASSION OF THE FOOL INTOLERABLE. (Ver. 3.) Whether it be envy, furious resentment of rebuke, or jealousy, it is a burden intolerable to the person himself and to those with whom he has to do. The pious may readily sin in their anger, how much more the ungodly I "Ira furor brevie est ; animum rege; qui, nisi paret, Imperat; buno framie, huno tu compeece catena." (Horaoe, • Ep.,' i. 2. 62.) It is like a. weight of stone or sand, being without ea.use, measure, or end (Poole). IV. THE TERRIBLE FORCE OF JEALOUSY AND ENVY, (Ver. 4.) It exceeds all ordinary outbursts of wrath _in violence and destructiveness. Envy is the daughter of pride, the author of revenge and murder, the beginner of sedition, o.nd the perpetual tormentor of nature (Socrates). It never loves to honour another but when it may be an honour to itself. "From envy , , . good Lord, deliver us I " V. FALSE LOVE AND FAITHFUL FRIENDSHIP CONTRASTED. (Vers. 5, 6.) False love refuses to tell a friend of his faults, from some egotistic and unworthy motive. "If you know that I have done anything foolishly or wickedly, and do not blo.me me for it, you yourself ought to be reproved" (Plaut., 'T1inum.,' i. 2. 57). "It is no good office," says Jeremy Taylor," to make my friend more vicious or more o. fool; I will restrain his folly, but not nurse it." "I think that man is my friend through whose o.dvice I am enabled to wipe off the blemisheR of my soul before the appearance of the awful Judge" (Gregory I.), Christians should "speak the truth in Jove" (Eph. iv, 16). If the erring one does not learn it from the lips of love, he will have to learn it from a harsher source and in ruder tones (comp. Job v. 17, 18; Ps. cxli. 5; Rev. iii. 19; eh. xxviii. 23). There cannot be a more worthy improvement of friendship than in a fervent opposition to the sins of those we love (Bishop Hall).-J,