admonition, " Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth. The uncertainty of life, e.g., renders it unwise in 11.ny who begin to realize their responsibilities, and to act for themselves, to postpone self-consecration to God. If not done now, when the affec- tions are fres?, w~e1:1- habits ~re beginning to form, there is risk of its not being done at all. Certamlr it 1s more difficult to make a change, and to enter upon the higher life when the hea~t 1s taken up with a love of other things, wh.en the attention and interest are absorbed in other cares. Then, too, love of our Creator and service of him are due from us in the best of our days, in the time of our strength and energy, and not merely when we are weary and worn out with following our own devices, and are anxious merely to escape utter ruin and overthrow. True it is that the repentant prodigal is welcomed when he returns to his Father's house; the worker \ieginning even at the eleventh hour receives his wages as though he had been the who.e day in the vineyard. But their sense of gratitude, wonder, and awe at the love which has overlooked their faults and shortcomings is the source of a joy far inrerior to that of those who have never wandered, who have served faithfully with all the strength and all the day, upon whom the sunshine of God's favour has ever rested. Another and final reason why it is wise to remember our Creator in the days of youth is that this is the secret of a happy life. The happiness which is disturbed by remembrance of God is not worth the name. That alone gives satisfaction-the satisfaction after which the Preacher sought so long and in so many quarters-which springs from communion with God. H alone is intense, it alone is lasting. Arising as it does from the relations of the spirit of man with him who created it, it is raised above all the accidents of time and change. The sooner, therefore, that we begin this life of holy communion and service, the longer period of happiness shall we know, the surer will be our ground of confidence for the future, when the day comes for leaving the world. "Over against the melancholy circumstances of decay and decline, as the end of life draws on, will be set the bright memories of the past, the consciousness of present help, and the hope of a joyous immortality. "Vanity of vanities; a.11 is va.nity ! " was the sentence of one whose wisdom sprang only from Lis experience of a.n earthly life, and upon whose mind the burden lay of human sorrows and cares. Bnt "a. greater than Solomon," One whose wisdom is Divine, whose power to remove every burden is daily seen, has an infinitely more hopeful message for us. "Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you . . . . I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I a.m, there ye may be also."-J. W.
EXPOSITION. of God, because the young ho.ve to bethink CHAPTER XII. themselves tho.t e.ll they e.re and a.II they Ver. 1.-The division into chapters is have come from God. Such plurals are un[ortunate here, as this verse is closely supposed by some to be divinely intended connected with ver. 10 of the preceding to adumbrate the doctrine of tho Holy chapter. Remember now thy Creator in the Trinity-a. dark saying conto.ining II mys- days of thy youth. Set God o.lways before tery which future revelation should ex- thine eyes from thy earliest days; think who plain. '' He that me.de thee" is a common me.de thee, and what thou wast made for, phrase in Ecclesiasticue (see iv. 6; vii. 30; not for self-pleasing only, not to gratify thy xxxix. 5). It is to be noted thnt Gratz passions which now are strong, but that reads ''cistern" or "fountain " in pfoce of thou mightest use thy powers and energy in " Creator," and exple.ins this term to mean e.ccordance with the le. we of thy being as e. "wife," 11s in Prov. v. 15-18. But the altera- creature of God's hands, responsible to him tion has nothing to support it, and is most for the use of the faculties and capacities unnecesB&ry, though Cheyne seems inclined with which he he.a endowed thee. The to adopt it (' Job o.nd Solomon,' in loc.). word for "Creator" is the participle of the While the evil de.ye oome not; i.e. before verb bara, which is that used in Gen. i. I, they come. " Days of evil;" a.I .;,µ,lpa., .-ijr etc., describing God's work. It is plural KO.Kiar (Septuagint) (Matt. vi. 34); tempus in form, like J!,'/.ohim, the plural being that of ajflictionis (Vulgate). The phrase refers to majesty or excellence (comp. Job x.xxv. 10; the grieve.noes and inconvoniencee of olu ha 1,jv. 5). lt is used here as an appellation e.ge, which are further and gre.phic11lly de- OH, XII. 1-14,] ECOLESIASTES; OR, THE PREACHER. 297