The Pulpit Commentary — Jeremiah — Volume 1 — Section 52

Ver. 37.- Why the confidences of men do not prosper. The people o( Israel are set forth, even within the limits of this one chapter, as having multiplied and extended their confidences; and yet it could not be said that they were prospering. Men with the religious element in their nature strongly clamouring for satisfaction, had turned to the gods of neighbouring nations, and multiplied these objects of worship unUl it conld be said, "According ~o the numper of thy cities are thy gods, 0 Judah." God compares them to thimty people who, with a copious foµntain in t)l_eir midst, .work and toil to make cisterns, anly to £ad that the end of their labour is in. br~en.gistel,'D.s -which can hold no wat.er_. ¥,d then, when th~jr broken cisterns had pr.oved qttjte UJ;la,vailing, they fly to drink of Nile,a_~d.of EuphratelJ, '. Ev,identlr; their confidence bad not prosperi:d, and a continuance.and tD1trease p(.!¥i~~rsitr,~.,as, threatened, the cause of.it all being that their confidences w~e. 61li:)i_ P-1,,,~qd,, in bis _righteousness and majesty, must inevitably reject. Consider~ _u; - • L WHY THIS QUESTION AS TO THE SUFFICIENCY OF BUMAN CONFIPENCES IS ·so D£POBTANT. The answer is that men cannot do without confidences. The events of a single day of life might be registered in such an aspect as to show what a confiding creature man is. Faith has become so much a habit with him as to be almost a second nature. Hence, even in the great concerns of life, we find many reposing trnst with very little inquiry. Looking at others, we .find tneir lives proving the need of confidence by the very frequency of doubt and irresolution in them. They are ever asking the question, yet never quite able to answer it, "What is the best thing for me to do?" And then, as so often happens, the end of hesitation and perplexity is, that they seem to have no choice at all, and go submissively towards the confidence that happens to be most inviting at the moment. Seeing, therefore, that we are compolled to have confidences, it is of the first importance to discover in what sort of confidences prosperity will alone be found. _ II. MANY ACTUAL CONFIDENCES OF MEN PROVE.FAILURES IN THE END. They approl\ch men invitingly, they seem to stand well in the judgment of past generations, they may be the objects of very general approval, and yet, when they a.re searched into, when the truth concerning them is got from the bottom of the proverbial well, that truth ie seen to be well expressed in the words which say men have not prospered in them. There is, for instance, a very plausible appearance of prosperity in worldly wealth. Many fail to acquire it, and when they acquire it, fail to keep it; but this is ~e_ld to come in the majority of cases from some fault in the man, and not in the stab1hty of his possessions. 'l'o say that a possession is as safe as the Bank of England is to utter the strongest conviction .as to its stability and security; and yet such confidences fail because they are not enough for the whole '1'11,Q,n, It is just one of the perils of ou. 11. 1-37.) THE IlOOK OF THE PROPHET JEREMIAH. 47