DAVID: FIVE SERMONS

NOTE:--The first four of these Sermons were preached before theUniversity of Cambridge. 

SERMON I. DAVID'S WEAKNESS

Psalm lxxviii. 71, 72, 73. He chose David his servant, and took himaway from the sheep-folds. As he was following the ewes great withyoung ones, he took him; that he might feed Jacob his people, andIsrael his inheritance. So he fed them with a faithful and trueheart, and ruled them prudently with all his power. 

I am about to preach to you four sermons on the character of David. His history, I take for granted, you all know. 

I look on David as an all but ideal king, educated for his office byan all but ideal training. A shepherd first; a life--be itremembered--full of danger in those times and lands; then captain ofa band of outlaws; and lastly a king, gradually and with difficultyfighting his way to a secure throne. 

This was his course. But the most important stage of it wasprobably the first. Among the dumb animals he learnt experiencewhich he afterwards put into practice among human beings. Theshepherd of the sheep became the shepherd of men. He who had slainthe lion and the bear became the champion of his native land. Hewho followed the ewes great with young, fed God's oppressed andweary people with a faithful and true heart, till he raised theminto a great and strong nation. So both sides of the true kinglycharacter, the masculine and the feminine, are brought out in David. For the greedy and tyrannous, he has indignant defiance: for theweak and helpless, patient tenderness. 

My motives for choosing this subject I will explain in a very fewwords. 

We have heard much of late about 'Muscular Christianity. ' A cleverexpression, spoken in jest by I know not whom, has been bandiedabout the world, and supposed by many to represent some new ideal ofthe Christian character. 

For myself, I do not understand what it means. It may mean one oftwo things. If it mean the first, it is a term somewhatunnecessary, if not somewhat irreverent. If it mean the second, itmeans something untrue and immoral. 

Its first and better meaning may be simply a healthy and manfulChristianity, one which does not exalt the feminine virtues to theexclusion of the masculine. 

That certain forms of Christianity have committed this last faultcannot be doubted. The tendency of Christianity, during thepatristic and the Middle Ages, was certainly in that direction. Christians were persecuted and defenceless, and they betookthemselves to the only virtues which they had the opportunity ofpractising--gentleness, patience, resignation, self-sacrifice, andself-devotion--all that is loveliest in the ideal female character. And God forbid that that side of the Christian life should ever beundervalued. It has its own beauty, its own strength too madeperfect in weakness; in prison, in torture, at the fiery stake, onthe lonely sick-bed, in long years of self-devotion and resignation, and in a thousand womanly sacrifices unknown to man, but written forever in God's book of life. 

But as time went on, and the monastic life, which, whether practisedby man or by woman, is essentially a feminine life, became more andmore exclusively the religious ideal, grave defects began to appearin what was really too narrow a conception of the human character. 

The monks of the Middle Ages, in aiming exclusively at the virtuesof women, generally copied little but their vices. Their unnaturalattempt to be wiser than God, and to unsex themselves, had donelittle but disease their mind and heart. They resorted more andmore to those arts which are the weapons of crafty, ambitious, andunprincipled women. They were too apt to be cunning, false, intriguing. They were personally cowardly, as their own chroniclesdeclare; querulous, passionate, prone to unmanly tears; prone, astheir writings abundantly testify, to scold, to use the mostvirulent language against all who differed from them; they were, attimes, fearfully cruel, as evil women will be; cruel with that worstcruelty which springs from cowardice. If I seem to have drawn aharsh picture of them, I can only answer that their own documentsjustify abundantly all that I have said. 

Gradually, to supply their defects, another ideal arose. Thewarriors of the Middle Ages hoped that they might be able to serveGod in the world, even in the battle-field. At least, the world andthe battle-field they would not relinquish, but make the best ofthem. And among them arose a new and a very fair ideal of manhood:that of the 'gentle, very perfect knight, ' loyal to his king and tohis God, bound to defend the weak, succour the oppressed, and putdown the wrong-doer; with his lady, or bread-giver, dealing forthbounteously the goods of this life to all who needed; occupied inthe seven works of mercy, yet living in the world, and in theperfect enjoyment of wedded and family life. This was the ideal. Of course sinful human nature fell short of it, and defaced it byabsurdities; but I do not hesitate to say that it was a higher idealof Christian excellence than had appeared since the time of theApostles, putting aside the quite exceptional ideal of the blessedmartyrs. 

A higher ideal, I say, was chivalry, with all its shortcomings. Andfor this reason: that it asserted the possibility of consecratingthe whole manhood, and not merely a few faculties thereof, to God;and it thus contained the first germ of that Protestantism whichconquered at the Reformation. 

Then was asserted, once for all, on the grounds of nature andreason, as well as of Holy Scripture, the absolute sanctity offamily and national life, and the correlative idea, namely, theconsecration of the whole of human nature to the service of God, inthat station to which God had called each man. Then the OldTestament, with the honour which it puts upon family and nationallife, became precious to man, as it had never been before; and sucha history as David's became, not as it was with the mediaeval monks, a mere repertory of fanciful metaphors and allegories, but thesolemn example, for good and for evil, of a man of like passions andlike duties with the men of the modern world. 

These great truths, once asserted, could not but conquer; and theywill conquer to the end. All attempts to restore the monastic andfeminine ideal, like that of good Nicholas Ferrar at Little Gidding, failed. They withered like hot-house exotics in the free, keen, bracing English air; and in our civil wars, Cavalier and Puritan, inwhatever they differed, never differed in their sound and healthyconviction that true religion did not crush, but strengthened andconsecrated a valiant and noble manhood. 

Now if all that 'Muscular Christianity' means is that, then theexpression is altogether unnecessary; for we have had the thing forthree centuries--and defective likewise, for it is not a merelymuscular, but a human Christianity which the Bible taught ourforefathers, and which our forefathers have handed down to us. 

But there is another meaning sometimes attached to this flippantexpression, 'Muscular Christianity, ' which is utterly immoral andintolerable. There are those who say, and there have been of latethose who have written books to shew, that provided a young man issufficiently brave, frank, and gallant, he is more or less absolvedfrom the common duties of morality and self-restraint. 

That physical prowess is a substitute for virtue is certainly no newdoctrine. It is the doctrine of every red man on the Americanprairies, of every African chief who ornaments his hut with humanskulls. It was the doctrine of our heathen forefathers, when theycame hither slaying, plundering, burning, tossing babes on theirspear-points. But I am sorry that it should be the doctrine of anyone calling himself a gentleman, much more a Christian. 

It is certainly not the doctrine of the Catechism, which bids usrenounce the flesh, and live by the help of God's Spirit a new lifeof duty to God and to our neighbour. 

It is certainly not the doctrine of the New Testament. WhatsoeverSt. Paul meant by bidding his disciples crucify the flesh, with itsaffections and lusts, he did not mean thereby that they were todeify the flesh, as the heathen round them did in their profligatemysteries and in their gladiatorial exhibitions. 

Neither, though the Old Testament may seem to put more value onphysical prowess than does the New Testament, is it the doctrine ofthe Old Testament, as I purpose to show you from the life andhistory of David. 

Nothing, nothing, can be a substitute for purity and virtue. Manwill always try to find substitutes for it. He will try to find asubstitute in superstition, in forms and ceremonies, in voluntaryhumility and worship of angels, in using vain repetitions, andfancying that he will be heard for his much speaking; he will try tofind a substitute in intellect, and the worship of intellect, andart, and poetry; or he will try to find it, as in the present case, in the worship of his own animal powers, which God meant to be hisservants and not his masters. But let no man lay that flatteringunction to his soul. The first and the last business of every humanbeing, whatever his station, party, creed, capacities, tastes, duties, is morality: Virtue, Virtue, always Virtue. Nothing thatman will ever invent will absolve him from the universal necessityof being good as God is good, righteous as God is righteous, andholy as God is holy. 

Believe it, young men, believe it. Better would it be for any oneof you to be the stupidest and the ugliest of mortals, to be themost diseased and abject of cripples, the most silly, nervousincapable personage who ever was a laughingstock for the boys uponthe streets, if only you lived, according to your powers, the lifeof the Spirit of God; than to be as perfectly gifted, as exquisitelyorganised in body and mind as David himself, and not to live thelife of the Spirit of God, the life of goodness, which is the onlylife fit for a human being wearing the human flesh and soul whichChrist took upon him on earth, and wears for ever in heaven, a Manindeed in the midst of the throne of God. 

And therefore it is, as you will yourselves have perceived already, that I have chosen to speak to you of David, his character, hishistory. 

It is the character of a man perfectly gifted, exquisitelyorganised. He has personal beauty, daring, prowess, and skill inwar; he has generosity, nobleness, faithfulness, chivalry as of amediaeval and Christian knight; he is a musician, poet, seemingly anarchitect likewise; he is, moreover, a born king; he has amarvellous and most successful power of attracting, disciplining, ruling his fellow-men. So thoroughly human a personage is he, thatGod speaks of him as the man after his own heart; that our blessedLord condescends to call himself especially the Son of David. 

For there is in this man (as there is said to be in all greatgeniuses) a feminine, as well as a masculine vein; a passionatetenderness; a keen sensibility; a vast capacity of sympathy, sadness, and suffering, which makes him truly the type of Christ, the Man of sorrows; which makes his Psalms to this day the text-bookof the afflicted, of tens of thousands who have not a particle ofhis beauty, courage, genius; but yet can feel, in mean hovels andworkhouse sick-beds, that the warrior-poet speaks to their humanhearts, and for their human hearts, as none other can speak, saveChrist himself, the Son of David and the Son of man. 

A man, I say, of intense sensibilities; and therefore capable, as isbut too notorious, of great crimes, as well as of great virtues. 

And when I mention this last fact, I must ask you to pause, andconsider with me very solemnly what it means. 

We may pervert, or rather misstate the fact in more than one way, toour own hurt. We may say cynically, David had his good points andhis bad ones, as all your great saints have. Look at them closely, and in spite of all their pretensions you will find them no betterthan their neighbours. And so we may comfort ourselves, in our ownmediocrity and laziness, by denying the existence of all greatnessand goodness. 

Nathan the prophet said that David's conduct would be open to thisvery interpretation, and would give great occasion to the enemies ofthe Lord to blaspheme. But I trust that none of you wish to benumbered among the enemies of the Lord. 

Again, we may say, sentimentally, that these great weaknesses are onthe whole the necessary concomitants of great strength; that suchhighly organised and complex characters must not be judged by therule of common respectability; and that it is a more or less finething to be capable at once of great virtues and great vices. 

Books which hint, and more than hint this, will suggest themselvesto you at once. I only advise you not to listen to their teaching, as you will find it lead to very serious consequences, both in thislife and in the life to come. 

But if we do say this, or anything like this, we say it on our ownresponsibility. David's biographers say nothing of the kind. Davidhimself says nothing of the kind. He never represents himself as acompound of strength and weakness. He represents himself asweakness itself--as incapacity utter and complete. To overlook thatstartling fact is to overlook the very element which has madeDavid's Psalms the text-book for all human weaknesses, penitences, sorrows, struggles, aspirations, for nigh three thousand years. 

But this subject is too large for me to speak of to-day; and toodeep for me to attempt an explanation till I have turned yourthoughts toward another object, which will explain to you David, andyourselves, and, it seems to me at times, every problem of humanity. Look not at David, but at David's greater Son; and consider Christupon his Cross. Consider him of whom it is written, 'Thou artfairer than the children of men: full of grace are thy lips, because God hath blessed thee for ever. Gird thee with thy swordupon thy thigh, O thou most Mighty, according to thy worship andrenown. Good luck have thou with thine honour; ride on, because ofthe word of truth, of meekness, and righteousness; and thy righthand shall teach thee terrible things. Thy arrows are very sharp, and the people shall be subdued unto thee, even in the midst amongthe King's enemies. ' Consider him who alone fulfilled these words, who fulfils them even now eternally in heaven, King over all, Godblessed for ever. And then sit down at the foot of his Cross:however young, strong, proud, gallant, gifted, ambitious you may be--sit down at the foot of Christ's Cross, and look thereon, till yousee what it means, and must mean for ever. See how he nailed tothat Cross, not in empty metaphor but in literal fact, in agonisingsoul and body, all of human nature which the world admires--youth, grace, valour, power, eloquence, intellect: not because they wereevil, for he possessed them doubtless himself as did none other ofthe sons of men--not, I say, because they were evil, but becausethey were worthless and as nothing beside that divine charity whichwould endure and conquer for ever, when all the noblest accidents ofthe body and the mind had perished, or seemed to perish. In theutmost weakness and shame of human flesh he would shew forth thestrength and glory of the Divine Spirit; the strength and the gloryof duty and obedience; of patience and forgiveness; of benevolenceand self-sacrifice; the strength and glory of that burning love forhuman beings which could stoop from heaven to earth that it mightseek and save that which was lost. 

Yes. Look at Christ upon his Cross; the sight which melted thehearts of our fierce forefathers, and turned them from the worshipof Thor and Odin to the worship of 'The white Christ;' and from thehope of a Valhalla of brute prowess, to the hope of a heaven ofrighteousness and love. Look at Christ upon his Cross, and seethere, as they saw, the true prowess, the true valour, the truechivalry, the true glory, the true manhood, most human when mostdivine, which is self-sacrifice and love--as possible to theweakest, meanest, simplest, as to the strongest, most gallant, andmost wise. 

Look upon him, and learn from him, and take his yoke upon you, forhe is meek and lowly of heart, and you shall find rest unto yoursouls; and in you shall be fulfilled the prophecy of Jeremiah, whichhe spake, saying, 'Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neitherthe mighty man glory in his might, neither let the rich man glory inhis wealth: but let him that glorieth glory in this, that heunderstandeth and knoweth me, that I am the Lord, who exercisesloving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness in the earth: for inthese things I delight, saith the Lord. '

SERMON II. DAVID'S STRENGTH

Psalm xxvii. 1. The Lord is my light, and my salvation; whom thenshall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom thenshall I be afraid?

I said, last Sunday, that the key-note of David's character was notthe assertion of his own strength, but the confession of his ownweakness. And I say it again. 

But it is plain that David had strength, and of no common order;that he was an eminently powerful, able, and successful man. Fromwhence then came that strength? He says, from God. He says, throughout his life, as emphatically as did St. Paul after him, thatGod's strength was made perfect in his weakness. 

God is his deliverer, his guide, his teacher, his inspirer. TheLord is his strength, who teaches his hands to war, and his fingersto fight; his hope and his fortress, his castle and deliverer, hisdefence, in whom he trusts; who subdueth the people that is underhim. 

To God he ascribes, not only his success in life, but his physicalprowess. By God's help he slays the lion and the bear. By God'shelp he has nerve to kill the Philistine giant. By God's help he isso strong that his arms can break even a bow of steel. It is Godwho makes his feet like hart's feet, and enables him to leap overthe walls of the mountain fortresses. 

And we must pause ere we call such utterances mere Eastern metaphor. It is far more probable that they were meant as and were literaltruths. David was not likely to have been a man of brute giganticstrength. So delicate a brain was probably coupled to a delicatebody. Such a nature, at the same time, would be the very one mostcapable, under the influence--call it boldly, inspiration--of agreat and patriotic cause, of great dangers and great purposes;capable, I say, at moments, of accesses of almost superhuman energy, which he ascribed, and most rightly, to the inspiration of God. 

But it is not merely as his physical inspirer or protector that hehas faith in God. He has a deeper, a far deeper instinct than eventhat; the instinct of a communion, personal, practical, living, between God, the fount of light and goodness, and his own soul, withits capacity of darkness as well as light, of evil as well as good. 

In one word, David is a man of faith and a man of prayer--as Godgrant all you may be. It is this one fixed idea, that God couldhear him, and that God would help him, which gives unity andcoherence to the wonderful variety of David's Psalms. It is thisfaith which gives calm confidence to his views of nature and of man;and enables him to say, as he looks upon his sheep feeding roundhim, 'The Lord is my Shepherd, therefore I shall not want. ' Faithit is which enables him to foresee that though the heathen rage, andthe kings of the earth stand up, and the rulers take counseltogether against the Lord and his Anointed, yet the righteous causewill surely prevail, for God is king himself. Faith it is whichenables him to bear up against the general immorality, and while hecries, 'Help me, Lord, for there is not one godly man left, for thefaithful fail from among the children of men'--to make answer tohimself in words of noble hope and consolation, 'Now for thecomfortless troubles' sake of the needy, and because of the deepsighing of the poor, I will up, saith the Lord, and will help everyone from him that swelleth against him, and will set him at rest. '

Faith it is which gives a character, which no other like utteranceshave, to those cries of agony--cries as of a lost child--which heutters at times with such noble and truthful simplicity. Theyissue, almost every one of them, in a sudden counter-cry of joy aspathetic as the sorrow which has gone before. 'O Lord, rebuke menot in thine indignation: neither chasten me in thy displeasure. Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am weak: O Lord, heal me, for mybones are vexed. My soul also is sore troubled: but, Lord, howlong wilt thou punish me? Turn thee, O Lord, and deliver my soul:O save me for thy mercy's sake. For in death no man remembereththee: and who will give thee thanks in the pit? I am weary of mygroaning; every night wash I my bed: and water my couch with mytears. My beauty is gone for very trouble: and worn away becauseof all mine enemies. Away from me, all ye that work vanity, for theLord hath heard the voice of my weeping. The Lord hath heard mypetition: the Lord will receive my prayer. '

Faith it is, in like wise, which gives its peculiar grandeur to thatwonderful 18th Psalm, David's song of triumph; his masterpiece, andit may be the masterpiece of human poetry, inspired or uninspired, only approached by the companion-Psalm, the 144th. From whencecomes that cumulative energy, by which it rushes on, even in ourtranslation, with a force and swiftness which are indeed divine;thought following thought, image image, verse verse, before thebreath of the Spirit of God, as wave leaps after wave before thegale? What is the element in that ode, which even now makes it stirthe heart like a trumpet? Surely that which it itself declares inthe very first verse:

'I will love thee, O Lord, my strength; the Lord is my stony rock, and my defence: my Saviour, my God, and my might, in whom I willtrust, my buckler, the horn also of my salvation, and my refuge. '

What is it which gives life and reality to the magnificent imageryof the seventh and following verses? 'The earth trembled andquaked: the very foundations also of the hills shook, and wereremoved, because he was wroth. There went a smoke out in hispresence: and a consuming fire out of his mouth, so that coals werekindled at it. He bowed the heavens also, and came down: and itwas dark under his feet. He rode upon the cherubims, and did fly:he came flying upon the wings of the wind. He made darkness hissecret place: his pavilion round about him with dark water, andthick clouds to cover him. At the brightness of his presence hisclouds removed: hailstones, and coals of fire. The Lord alsothundered out of heaven, and the Highest gave his thunder:hailstones, and coals of fire. He sent out his arrows, andscattered them: he cast forth lightnings, and destroyed them. Thesprings of waters were seen, and the foundations of the round worldwere discovered, at thy chiding, O Lord: at the blasting of thebreath of thy displeasure. He shall send down from on high to fetchme: and shall take me out of many waters. ' What protects suchwords from the imputation of mere Eastern exaggeration? The firmconviction that God is the deliverer, not only of David, but of allwho trust in God; that the whole majesty of God, and all the powersof nature, are arrayed on the side of the good and of the oppressed. 'The Lord shall reward me after my righteous dealing: according tothe cleanness of my hands shall he recompense me. Because I havekept the ways of the Lord: and have not forsaken my God, as thewicked doth. For I have an eye unto all his laws: and will notcast out his commandments from me. I was also uncorrupt before him:and eschewed mine own wickedness. Therefore shall the Lord rewardme after my righteous dealing: and according unto the cleanness ofmy hands in his eyesight. With the holy thou shalt be holy: andwith a perfect man thou shalt be perfect. '

Faith, again, it is, to turn from David's highest to his lowestphase--faith in God it is which has made that 51st Psalm the modelof all true penitence for evermore. Faith in God, in the spite ofhis full consciousness that God is about to punish him bitterly forthe rest of his life. Faith it is which gives to that Psalm itspeculiarly simple, deliberate, manly tone; free from all exaggeratedself-accusations, all cowardly cries of terror. He is crushed down, it is true. The tone of his words shews us that throughout. Butcrushed by what? By the discovery that he has offended God? Not inthe least. For the sake of your own souls, as well as for that ofhonest critical understanding of the Scriptures, do not foist thatmeaning into David's words. He never says that he had offended God. Had he been a mediaeval monk, had he been an average superstitiousman of any creed or time, he would have said so, and cried, I haveoffended God; he is offended and angry with me, how shall I averthis wrath?

Not so. David has discovered not an angry, but a forgiving God; aGod of love and goodness, who desires to make his creatures good. Penitential prayers in all ages have too often wanted faith in God, and therefore have been too often prayers to avert punishment. This, this--the model of all truly penitent prayers--is that of aman who is to be punished, and is content to take his punishment, knowing that he deserves it, and far more beside. And why?Because, as always, David has faith in God. God is a good and justbeing, and he trusts him accordingly; and that very discovery of thegoodness, not the sternness of God, is the bitterest pang, thedeepest shame to David's spirit. Therefore he can face withoutdespair the discovery of a more deep, radical inbred evil in himselfthan he ever expected before. 'Behold, I was shapen in wickedness:and in sin hath my mother conceived me;' because he could say also, 'Thou requirest truth in the inward parts; and shalt make me tounderstand wisdom secretly. ' He can cry to God, out of the depthsof his foulness, 'Make me a clean heart, O God: and renew a rightspirit within me. Cast me not away from thy presence: and take notthy holy Spirit from me. O give me the comfort of thy help again:and stablish me with thy free Spirit. Then shall I teach thy waysunto the wicked: and sinners shall be converted unto thee. ' He cancry thus, because he has discovered that the will of God is not tohate, not to torture, not to cast away from his presence, but torestore his creatures to goodness, that he may thereby restore themto usefulness. David has discovered that God demands no sacrifice, much less self-torturing penance. What he demands is the heart. The sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit. A broken and a contriteheart he will not despise. It is such utterances as these whichhave given, for now many hundred years, their priceless value to thelittle book of Psalms ascribed to the shepherd outlaw of the Judaeanhills. It is such utterances as these which have sent the sound ofhis name into all lands, and his words throughout all the world. Every form of human sorrow, doubt, struggle, error, sin; the nunagonising in the cloister; the settler struggling for his life inTransatlantic forests; the pauper shivering over the embers in hishovel, and waiting for kind death; the man of business striving tokeep his honour pure amid the temptations of commerce; the prodigalson starving in the far country, and recollecting the words which helearnt long ago at his mother's knee; the peasant boy trudging a-field in the chill dawn, and remembering that the Lord is hisshepherd, therefore he will not want--all shapes of humanity havefound, and will find to the end of time, a word said to their inmosthearts, and more, a word said for those hearts to the living God ofheaven, by the vast humanity of David, the man after God's ownheart; the most thoroughly human figure, as it seems to me, whichhad appeared upon the earth before the coming of that perfect Son ofman, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen. 

It may be said, David's belief is no more than the common belief offanatics. They have in all ages fancied themselves under thespecial protection of Deity, the object of special communicationsfrom above. 

Doubtless they have; and evil conclusions have they drawn therefrom, in every age. But the existence of a counterfeit is no argumentagainst the existence of the reality; rather it is an argument forthe existence of the reality. In this case it is impossible toconceive how the idea of communion with an unseen being ever enteredthe human mind at all, unless it had been put there originally byfact and experience. Man would never have even dreamed of a livingGod, had not that living God been a reality, who did not leave thecreature to find his Creator, but stooped from heaven, at the verybeginning of our race, to find his creature. 

And a reality you will surely find it--that living and practicalcommunication between your souls, and that Father in heaven whocreated them. It will not be real, but morbid, even imaginary, justin proportion as your souls are tainted with self-conceit, ambition, self-will, malice, passion, or any wilful vice; especially with thevice of bigotry, which settles beforehand for God what he shallteach the soul, and in what manner he shall teach it, and turns adeaf ear to his plainest lessons if they cannot be made to fit intosome favourite formula or theory. But it will be real, practical, healthy, soul-saving, in the very deepest sense of that word, justin proportion as your eye is single and your heart pure; just inproportion as you hunger and thirst after righteousness, and wishand try simply and humbly to do your duty in that station to whichGod has called you, and to learn joyfully and trustingly anythingand everything which God may see fit to teach you. Then as your dayyour strength shall be. Then will the Lord teach you, and informyou with his eye, and guide you in the way wherein you should go. Then will you obey that appeal of the Psalmist, 'Be ye not like tohorse and mule, which have no understanding, whose mouths must beheld in with bit and bridle, lest they fall upon thee. Greatplagues remain for the ungodly. But whoso putteth his trust in theLord, mercy embraceth him on every side. '

For understand this well, young men, and settle it in your hearts asthe first condition of human life, yea, of the life of everyrational created being, that a man is justified only by faith; andnot only a man, but angels, archangels, and all possible createdspirits, past, present, and to come. All stand, all are in theirright state, only as long as they are consciously dependent on Godthe Father of spirits and his Son Jesus Christ the Lord, in whomthey live and move and have their being. The moment they attempt toassert themselves, whether their own power, their own genius, theirown wisdom, or even their own virtue, they ipso facto sin, and arejustified and just no longer; because they are trying to takethemselves out of their just and right state of dependence, and toput themselves into an unjust and wrong state of independence. Toassert that anything is their own, to assert that their virtue istheir own, just as much as to assert that their wisdom, or any otherpart of their being, is their own, is to deny the primary fact oftheir existence--that in God they live and move and have that being. And therefore Milton's Satan, though, over and above all his othergrandeurs, he had been adorned with every virtue, would have beenSatan still by the one sin of ingratitude, just because and just aslong as he set up himself, apart from that God from whom alone comesevery good and perfect gift. 

Settle it in your hearts, young men, settle it in your hearts--orrather pray to God to settle it therein; and if you would love lifeand see good days, recollect daily and hourly that the only sane andsafe human life is dependence on God himself, and that--

 Unless above himself he canExalt himself, how poor a thing is man. 

SERMON III. DAVID'S ANGER

Psalm cxliii. 11, 12. Quicken me, O Lord, for thy name's sake: forthy righteousness' sake bring my soul out of trouble. And of thymercy cut off mine enemies, and destroy all them that afflict mysoul: for I am thy servant. 

There are those who would say that I dealt unfairly last Sunday bythe Psalms of David; that in order to prove them inspired, I ignoredan element in them which is plainly uninspired, wrong, andoffensive; namely, the curses which he invokes upon his enemies. Iignored it, they would say, because it was fatal to my theory!because it proved David to have the vindictive passions of otherEasterns; to be speaking, not by the inspiration of God, but of hisown private likes and dislikes; to be at least a fanatic who thinksthat his cause must needs be God's cause, and who invokes thelightnings of heaven on all who dare to differ from him. Otherswould say that such words were excusable in David, living under theOld Law; for it was said by them of old time, 'Thou shalt love thyneighbour and hate thine enemy:' but that our Lord has formallyabrogated that permission; 'But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, and do good to those who despitefully useyou and persecute you. ' How unnecessary, and how wrong then, theywould say, it is of the Church of England to retain these cursingPsalms in her public worship, and put them into the mouths of hercongregations. Either they are merely painful, as well asunnecessary to Christians; or if they mean anything, they excuse andfoster the habit too common among religious controversialists ofinvoking the wrath of heaven on their opponents. 

I argue with neither of the objectors. But the question is acurious and an important one; and I am bound, I think, to examine itin a sermon which, like the present, treats of David's chivalry. 

What David meant by these curses can be best known from his ownactions. What certain persons have meant by them since is patentenough from their actions. Mediaeval monks considered but too oftenthe enemies of their creed, of their ecclesiastical organisation, even of their particular monastery, to be ipso facto enemies of God;and applied to them the seeming curses of David's Psalms, withfearful additions, of which David, to his honour, never dreamed. 'May they feel with Dathan and Abiram the damnation of Gehenna, '{285} is a fair sample of the formulae which are found in thewritings of men who, while they called themselves the servants ofJesus Christ our Lord, derived their notions of the next worldprincipally from the sixth book of Virgil's AEneid. And what theymeant by their words their acts shewed. Whenever they had thepower, they were but too apt to treat their supposed enemies in thislife, as they expected God to treat them in the next. The historyof the Inquisition on the continent, in America, and in thePortuguese Indies--of the Marian persecutions in England--of thePiedmontese massacres in the 17th century--are facts never to beforgotten. Their horrors have been described in too authenticdocuments; they remain for ever the most hideous pages in thehistory of sinful human nature. Do we find a hint of any similarconduct on the part of David? If not, it is surely probable that hedid not mean by his imprecations what the mediaeval clergy meant. 

Certainly, whatsoever likeness there may have been in language, thecontrast in conduct is most striking. It is a special mark ofDavid's character, as special as his faith in God, that he neveravenges himself with his own hand. Twice he has Saul in his power:once in the cave at Engedi, once at the camp at Hachilah, and bothtimes he refuses nobly to use his opportunity. He is his master, the Lord's Anointed; and his person is sacred in the eyes of Davidhis servant--his knight, as he would have been called in the MiddleAge. The second time David's temptation is a terrible one. He hassoftened Saul's wild heart by his courtesy and pathos when hepleaded with him, after letting him escape from the cave; and he hassworn to Saul that when he becomes king he will never cut off hischildren, or destroy his name out of his father's home. Yet we findSaul, immediately after, attacking him again out of mere caprice;and once more falling into his hands. Abishai says--and who canwonder?--'Let me smite him with the spear to the earth this once, and I will not smite a second time. ' What wonder? The man is notto be trusted--truce with him is impossible; but David still keepshis chivalry, in the true meaning of that word: 'Destroy him not, for who can stretch forth his hand against the Lord's Anointed, andbe guiltless? As the Lord liveth, the Lord shall smite him, or hisday shall come to die; or he shall go down into battle, and perish. But the Lord forbid that I should stretch forth my hand against theLord's Anointed. '

And if it be argued, that David regarded the person of a king aslegally sacred, there is a case more clear still, in which heabjures the right of revenge upon a private person. 

Nabal, in addition to his ingratitude, has insulted him with thebitterest insult which could be offered to a free man in a slave-holding country. He has hinted that David is neither more nor lessthan a runaway slave. And David's heart is stirred by a terribleand evil spirit. He dare not trust his men, even himself, with hisblack thoughts. 'Gird on your swords, ' is all that he can sayaloud. But he had said in his heart, 'God do so and more to theenemies of David, if I leave a man alive by the morning light of allthat pertain to him. '

And yet at the first words of reason and of wisdom, urged doubtlessby the eloquence of a beautiful and noble woman, but no less by theSpirit of God speaking through her, as all who call themselvesgentlemen should know already, his right spirit returns to him. Thechivalrous instinct of forgiveness and duty is roused once more; andhe cries, 'Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, which sent thee thisday to meet me; and blessed be thou, which hast kept me this dayfrom shedding blood, and from avenging myself with mine own hand. '

It is plain then, that David's notion of his duty to his enemies wasvery different from that of the monks. But still they areundeniably imprecations, the imprecations of a man smarting undercruel injustice; who cannot, and in some cases must not avengehimself, and who therefore calls on the just God to avenge him. Arewe therefore to say that these utterances of David are uninspired?Not in the least: we are boldly to say that they are inspired, andby the very Spirit of God, who is the Spirit of justice and ofjudgment. 

Doubtless there were, in after ages, far higher inspirations. TheSpirit of God was, and is gradually educating mankind, andindividuals among mankind, like David, upward from lower truths tohigher ones. That is the express assertion of our Lord and of hisApostles. But the higher and later inspiration does not make thelower and earlier false. It does not even always supersede italtogether. Each is true; and, for the most part, each must remain, and be respected, that they may complement each other. 

Let us look at this question rationally and reverently, free fromall sentimental and immoral indulgence for sin and wrong. 

The first instinct of man is the Lex Talionis. As you do to me--says the savage--so I have a right to do to you. If you try to killme or mine, I have a right to kill you in return. Is this notionuninspired? I should be sorry to say so. It is surely the firstform and the only possible first form of the sense of justice andretribution. As a man sows so shall he reap. If a man does wronghe deserves to be punished. No arguments will drive that greatdivine law out of the human mind; for God has put it there. 

After that inspiration comes a higher one. The man is taught tosay, I must not punish my enemy if I can avoid it. God must punishhim, either by the law of the land or by his providential judgments. To this height David rises. In a seemingly lawless age and country, under the most extreme temptation, he learns to say, 'Blessed be Godwho hath kept me from avenging myself with my own hand. '

But still, it may be said, David calls down God's vengeance on hisenemies. He has not learnt to hate the sin and yet love the sinner. Doubtless he has not: and it may have been right for his education, and for the education of the human race through him, that he didnot. It may have been a good thing for him, as a future king; itmay be a good thing for many a man now, to learn the sinfulness ofsin, by feeling its effects in his own person; by writhing underthose miseries of body and soul, which wicked men can, and doinflict on their fellow-creatures. 

There are sins which a good man will not pity, but wage internecinewar against them; sins for which he is justified, if God have calledhim thereto, to destroy the sinner in his sins. The traitor, thetyrant, the ravisher, the robber, the extortioner, are not objectsof pity, but of punishment; and it may have been very good for Davidto be taught by sharp personal experience, that those who robbed thewidow and put the fatherless to death, like the lawless lords of histime; those like Saul, who smote the city of the priests for havinggiven David food--men and women, children and sucklings, oxen andasses and sheep, with the edge of the sword; those who, like thenameless traitor who so often rouses his indignation--his ownfamiliar friend who lifted up his heel against him--sought men'slives under the guise of friendship: that such, I say, were personsnot to be tolerated upon the face of God's earth. We do nottolerate them now. We punish them by law. We even destroy themwholesale in war, without inquiring into their individual guilt orinnocence. David was taught, not by abstract meditation in hisstudy, but by bitter need and agony, not to tolerate them then. Ifhe could have destroyed them as we do now, it is not for us to saythat he would have been wrong. And what if he were indignant, andwhat if he expressed that indignation? I have yet to discover thatindignation against wrong is aught but righteous, noble, and divine. The flush of rage and scorn which rises, and ought to rise in everyhonest heart, when we see a woman or a child ill-used, a poor manwronged or crushed--What is that, but the inspiration of AlmightyGod? What is that but the likeness of Christ? Woe to the man whohas lost that feeling! Woe to the man who can stand coolly by, andsee wrong done without a shock or a murmur, or even more, to thevery limits of the just laws of this land. He may think it a finething so to do; a proof that he is an easy, prudent man of theworld, and not a meddlesome enthusiast. But all that it does proveis: That the Spirit of God, who is the Spirit of justice andjudgment, has departed from him. 

I say the Spirit of God and the likeness of Christ. Instead ofbelieving David's own statement of the wrong doings of these menabout him, we may say cynically, and as it seems to me mostunfairly, 'Of course there were two sides to David's quarrels, asthere are to all such; and of course he took his own side; andconsidered himself always in the right, and every one who differedfrom him in the wrong;' and such a speech will sound sufficientlyworldly-wise to pass for philosophy with some critics; but, unfortunately, he who says that of David, will be bound in allfairness to say it of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

For you must remember that there was a class of sinners in Judaea, to whom our Lord speaks no word of pity or forgiveness: namely, thevery men who were his own personal enemies, who were persecutinghim, and going about to kill him; and that therefore, by any hardwords toward them, he must have laid himself open, just as much asDavid laid himself open, to the imputation of personal spite. Andyet, what did he say to the scribes and Pharisees: 'Ye go about tokill me, and therefore I am bound to say nothing harsh concerningyou'? What he did say was this: 'Ye serpents, ye generation ofvipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?'

Yes; in the Son of David, as in David's self, there was, and is, andwill be for ever and ever, no weak, and really cruel indulgence; buta burning fire of indignation against all hypocrisy, tyranny, lust, cruelty, and every other sin by which men oppress, torment, deceive, degrade their fellow-men; and still more, still more, remember that, all young men, their fellow-women. That fire burns for ever--theDivine fire of God; the fire not of hatred, but of love to mankind, which will therefore punish, and if need be, exterminate all whoshall dare to make mankind the worse, whether in body or soul ormind. 

But David prays God to kill his enemies. No doubt he does. Probably they deserved to be killed. He does not ask, you willalways remember, if you be worthy of the name of critical studentsof the Bible--he does not ask, as did the mediaeval monks, that hisenemies should go to endless torments after they died. True orfalse, that is a more modern notion--and if it be applied to thePsalms, an interpolation--of which David knew nothing. He askssimply that the men may die. Probably he knew his own businessbest, and the men deserved to die; to be killed either by God or byman, as do too many in all ages. 

If we take the Bible as it stands (and we have no right to dootherwise), these men were trying to kill David. He could not, andupon a point of honour, would not kill them himself. But hebelieved, and rightly, that God can punish the offender whom mancannot touch, and that He will, and does punish them. And if hecalls on God to execute justice and judgment upon these men, he onlycalls on God to do what God is doing continually on the face of thewhole earth. In fact, God does punish here, in this life. He doesnot, as false preachers say, give over this life to impunity, andthis world to the devil, and only resume the reins of moralgovernment and the right of retribution when men die and go into thenext world. Here, in this life, he punishes sin; slowly, butsurely, God punishes. And if any of you doubt my words, you haveonly to commit sin, and then see whether your sin will find you out. 

The whole question turns on this, Are we to believe in a living God, or are we not? If we are not, then David's words are of courseworse than nothing. If we are, I do not see why David was wrong incalling on God to exercise that moral and providential government ofthe world, which is the very note and definition of a living God. 

But what right have we to use these words? My friends, if theChurch bids us use these words, she certainly does not bid us actupon them. She keeps them, I believe most rightly, as a record of ahuman experience, which happily seems to us special and extreme, ofwhich we, in a well-governed Christian land, know nothing, and shallnever know. 

Special and extreme? Alas, alas! In too many countries, in toomany ages, it has been the common, the almost universal experienceof the many weak, enslaved, tortured, butchered at the wicked willof the few strong. 

There have been those in tens of thousands, there may be those againwho will have a right to cry to God, 'Of thy goodness slay mineenemies, lest they slay, or worse than slay, both me and mine. 'There were thousands of English after the Norman Conquest; therewere thousands of Hindoos in Oude before its annexation; there arethousands of negroes at this moment in their native land of Africa, crushed and outraged by hereditary tyrants, who had and have a rightto appeal to God, as David appealed to him against the robber lordsof Palestine; a right to cry, 'Rid us, O God; if thou be a livingGod, a God of justice and mercy, rid us not only of these men, butof their children after them. This tyrant, stained with lust andwine and blood; this robber chieftain who privily in his lurkingdens murders the innocent, and ravishes the poor when he getteth himinto his net; this slave-hunting king who kills the captives whom hecannot sell; and whose children after him will inevitably imitatehis cruelties and his rapine and treacheries--deal with him and hisas they deserve. Set an ungodly man to be ruler over him; that hemay find out what we have been enduring from his ungodly rule. Lethis days be few, and another take his office. Let his children befatherless, and his wife a widow. Let his children beg their breadout of desolate places. Let there be no man to pity him or takecompassion on his fatherless children--to take his part, and breedup a fresh race of tyrants to our misery. Let the extortionerconsume all he hath, and the stranger spoil his labour--for what hehas is itself taken by extortion, and he has spoiled the labour ofthousands. Let his posterity be destroyed, and in the nextgeneration his name be clean put out. Let the wickedness of hisfather and the sin of his mother be had in remembrance in the sightof the Lord; that he may root out the memorial of them from theearth, and enable law and justice, peace and freedom to take theplace of anarchy and tyranny and blood. '

That prayer was answered--if we are to believe the records ofNorman, not English, monks in England after the Conquest, by thespeedy extinction of the most guilty families among the Normanconquerors. It is being answered, thank God, in Hindostan at thismoment. It will surely be answered in Africa in God's good time;for the Lord reigneth, be the nations never so unquiet. And we, ifwe will read such words rationally and humanly, remembering thestate of society in which they were written--a state of society, alas! which has endured, and still endures over a vast portion ofthe habitable globe; where might is right, and there is little or noprinciple, save those of lust and greed and revenge--then instead ofwishing such words out of the Bible, we shall be glad to keep themthere, as testimonies to the moral government of the world by a Godand a Christ who will surely avenge the innocent blood; and as aGospel of comfort to suffering millions, when the news reaches themat last, that they may call on God to deliver them from theirtormentors, and that he will hear their cry, and will help them. 

SERMON IV. DAVID'S DESERTS

2 Samuel i. 26. I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan:very pleasant hast thou been unto me: thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women. 

Passing the love of woman? How can that be, we of these days shallsay. What love can pass that, saving the boundless love of him whostooped from heaven to earth, that he might die on the Cross for us?No. David, when he sang those words, knew not the depth of woman'slove. And we shall have a right so to speak. The indefeasible andDivine right which is bestowed by fact. 

As a fact, we do not find among the ancient Jews that exalting andpurifying ideal of the relations between man and woman, which is tobe found, thank God, in these days, in almost every British work offiction or fancy. 

It is enunciated, remember always, in the oldest Hebrew document. On the very threshold of the Bible, in the very first chapters ofGenesis, it is enunciated in its most ideal purity and perfection. But in practice it was never fulfilled. No man seems to haveattempted to fulfil it. Man becomes a polygamist, lower than thevery birds of the air. Abraham, the father of the faithful, has hisSarah, his princess-wife: but he has others beside, as many as hewill. And so has David in like wise, to the grief and harm of bothhim and Abraham. 

So, it would seem, had the majority of the Jews till after theCaptivity; and even then the law of divorce seems to have been asindulgent toward the man as it was unjust and cruel toward thewoman. Then our blessed Lord reasserted the ideal and primaevallaw. He testified in behalf of woman, the puppet of a tyrant whorepudiated her upon the most frivolous pretext, and declared that inthe beginning God made them male and female; the one husband for theone wife. But his words fell on unwilling ears. His disciplesanswered, that if the case of a man with his wife be such, it is notgood for a man to marry. And such, as a fact, was the generalopinion of Christendom for many centuries. 

But of that, as of other sayings of our Lord's, were his own wordsfulfilled, that the kingdom of God is as if a man should put seedinto the ground, and sleep and wake, and the seed should spring up, and bear fruit, he knew not how. 

In due course of time, when the Teutonic nations were Christianised, there sprang up among them an idea of married love, which showedthat our Lord's words had at last fallen on good ground, and weredestined to bear fruit an hundredfold. 

Gradually, with many confusions, and sometimes sinful mistakes, there arose, not in the cloister, not in the study--not even, alas!in the churches of God, as they were then; but in the flowery meadsof May; under the forest boughs, where birds sang to their mates; bythe side of the winter hearth; from the lips of wandering minstrels;in the hearts of young creatures, whom neither the profligacy ofworldlings, nor the prudery of monks, had yet defiled: from themarose a voice, most human and yet most divine, reasserting once morethe lost law of Eden, and finding in its fulfilment, strength andpurity, self-sacrifice and self-restraint. 

That voice grew clearer and more strong as time went on. It waspurged from youthful mistakes and youthful grossnesses; till, at theReformation, it could speak clearly, fully, once and for all--nolonger on the ground of mere nature and private fancy, but on theground of Scripture, and reason, and the eternal laws of God; andthe highest ideal of family life became possible to the family andto the nation, in proportion as they accepted the teaching of theReformation: and impossible, alas! in proportion as they stillallowed themselves to be ruled by a priesthood who asserted thetruly monstrous dogma, that the sexes reach each their highestexcellence only when parted from each other. 

But these things were hidden from David. One can well conceive thathe, so gifted outwardly and inwardly, must have experienced all thatwas then possible of woman's love. In one case, indeed, he wasnotably brought under that moral influence of woman, which we nowregard, and rightly, as one of the holiest influences of this life. The scene is unique in Scripture. It reads like a scene out of theMiddle Age. 

Abigail's meeting with David under the covert of the hill; herturning him from his purpose of wild revenge by gracefulcompliments, by the frank, and yet most modest expression of hersympathy and admiration; and David's chivalrous answer to herchivalrous appeal--all that scene, which painters have so oftendelighted to draw, is a fore-feeling, a prophecy, as it were, of theChristian chivalry of after ages. The scene is most human and mostdivine: and we are not shocked to hear that after Nabal's death thefair and rich lady joins her fortune to that of the wild outlaw, andbecomes his wife to wander by wood and wold. 

But amid all the simple and sacred beauty of that scene, we cannotforget, we must not forget that Abigail is but one wife of many;that there is an element of pure, single, all-absorbing love absentat least in David's heart, which was present in the hearts of ourforefathers in many a like case, and which they have handed down tous as an heirloom, as precious as that of our laws and liberties. 

And all this was sin unto David; and like all sin, brought with itits own punishment. I do not mean to judge him: to assign hisexact amount of moral responsibility. Our Lord forbids uspositively to do that to any man; and least of all, to a man whoonly acted according to his right, and the fashion of his race andhis age. But we must fix it very clearly in our minds, that sinsmay be punished in this life, even though he who commits them is notaware that they are sins. If you are ignorant that fire burns, yourignorance will not prevent your hand from suffering if you put itinto the fire. If you are of opinion that two and two make five, and therefore spend five pounds while you only possess four, yourmistake will not prevent your being in debt. And so with all mortalaffairs. 

Sin, [Greek], means first, it seems to me, a missing the mark, end, or aim of our existence; a falling short of the law, the ideal, thegood works which God has prepared beforehand for us to walk in; andevery such sin, conscious or unconscious, must avenge itself by theDivine laws of the universe, whether physical or spiritual. Nomiracle is needed; no intervention of God with his own laws. Hislaws are far too well made for him to need to break them a secondtime, because a sinner has broken them already. They avengethemselves. And so does polygamy. So it did in the case of David. It is a breach of the ideal law of human nature; and he who breaksthat law must suffer, as David suffered. 

Look at the latter history of David, and at what it might have been. One can conceive so noble a personage under such woman's influenceas, thank God, is common now, going down into an honoured old age, and living together with a helpmate worthy of him in godly love andhonesty to his life's end; seeing his children Christianly andvirtuously brought up, to the praise and honour of God. 

And what was the fact?

The indulgence of his passions--seemingly harmless to him at first--becomes most harmful ere he dies. He commits a crime, or rather acomplication of crimes, which stains his name for ever among men. 

I do not think that we shall understand that great crime of David's, if we suppose it, with some theologians, to have been merely asudden and solitary fall, from which he recovered by repentance, andbecame for the time to come as good a man as he had ever been. Sucha theory, however well it may fit certain theological systems, doesnot fit the facts of human life, or, as I hold, the teaching ofScripture. 

Such terrible crimes are not committed by men in a right state ofmind. Nemo repente fuit turpissimus. He who commits adultery, treachery, and murder, must have been long tampering, at least inheart, with all these. Had not David been playing upon the edge ofsin, into sin he would not have fallen. 

He may have been quite unconscious of bad habits of mind; but theymust have been there, growing in secret. The tyrannous self-will, which is too often developed by long success and command: theunscrupulous craft, which is too often developed by long adversity, and the necessity of sustaining oneself in a difficult position--these must have been there. But even they would not have led Davidto do the deed which he did, had there not been in him likewise thatfearful moral weakness which comes from long indulgence of thepassions--a weakness which is reckless alike of conscience, ofpublic opinion, and of danger either to earthly welfare oreverlasting salvation. 

It has been said, 'But such a sin is so unlike David's character. 'Doubtless it was, on the theory that David was a character mingledof good and evil. But on David's own theory, that he was an utterlyweak person without the help of God, the act is perfectly likeDavid. It is David's self. It is what David would naturally dowhen he had left hold of God. Had he left hold of God in thewilderness he would have become a mere robber-chieftain. He doesleave hold of God in his palace on Zion, and he becomes a mereEastern despot. 

And what of his sons?

The fearful curse of Nathan, that the sword shall never depart fromhis house, needs, as usual, no miracle to fulfil it. It fulfilsitself. The tragedies of his sons, of Amnon, of Absalom, arealtogether natural--to have been foreseen, but not to have beenavoided. 

The young men have seen their father put no restraint upon hispassions. Why should they put restraint on theirs? How can hecommand them when he has not commanded himself? And yet self-restraint is what they, above all men, need. Upstart princes--thesons of a shepherd boy--intoxicated with honours to which they werenot born; they need the severest discipline; they break out into themost frantic licence. What is there that they may not do, and darenot do? Nothing is sacred in their eyes. Luxury, ambition, revenge, vanity, recklessness of decency, open rebellion, disgracethem in the sight of all men. And all these vices, remember, areheightened by the fact that they are not brothers, but rivals; sonsof different mothers, hating each other, plotting against eachother; each, probably, urged on by his own mother, who wishes, poorfool, to set up her son as a competitor for the throne against allthe rest. And so are enacted in David's house those tragedies whichhave disgraced, in every age, the harems of Eastern despots. 

But most significant is the fact, that those tragedies completethemselves by the sin and shame of David's one virtuous and famousson. Significant truly, that in his old age Solomon the wise shouldlove strange women, and deserting for their sakes the God of hisfathers, end as an idolater and a dotard, worshipping theabominations of the heathen, his once world-famous wisdom sunk intoutter folly. 

But, it may be said, the punishment of David's sin fell on his sons, and not upon himself. 

How so? Can there be a more heavy punishment, a more bitter pain, than to be punished in and by his children; to see his own evilexample working out their shame and ruin? But do not fancy thatDavid's own character did not suffer for his sin. The theory thathe became, instantly on his repentance, as good and great a man ashe was before his fall, was convenient enough to certain theologiansof past days; but it is neither warranted by the facts of Scripture, nor by the noble agonies, however noble, of the 51st Psalm. 

It is a prayer for restoration, and that of the only right and truekind: 'Take not thy Holy Spirit from me;' and, as such, it wasdoubtless heard: but it need not have been fulfilled instantly andat once. It need not have been fulfilled, it may be, till that lifeto come, of which David knew so little. It is a fact, it was notfulfilled in this life. We read henceforth of no noble and heroicalacts of David. From that time forth--I speak with all diffidence, and merely as it seems to me--he is a broken man. His attitude inAbsalom's rebellion is all but imbecile. No act is recorded of himto the day of his death but what is questionable, if not mean andcrafty. The one sudden flash of the old nobleness which he hasshewn in pardoning Shimei, he himself stultifies with his dying lipsby a mean command to Solomon to entrap and slay the man whom he hastoo rashly forgiven. The whole matter of the sacrifice of Saul'ssons is so very strange, so puzzling, even shocking to our ideas ofright and wrong, that I cannot wonder at, though I dare not endorse, Coleridge's bold assertion, that they were sacrificed to a plot ofState policy, and the suspicion of some critics, that the wholescene was arranged between David and a too complaisant priesthood, and God's name blasphemously taken in vain to find a pretext for apolitical murder. And so David shivers pitiably to his grave, aftera fashion which has furnished a jest for cynics and infidels, butwhich contains, to the eyes of a wise man, the elements of thedeepest tragedy; one more awful lesson that human beauty, valour, wit, genius, success, glory, are vanity of vanities: that man isnothing, and God is all in all. 

But some may ask, What has all this to do with us? To do with us?Do you think that the Scripture says in vain, 'All these things arewritten for our example'? As long as human nature is what it isnow, and was three thousand years ago, so long shall we be temptedto commit the same sins as David: different in outward form, according to the conditions of society; but the same in spirit, thesame in sinfulness, and the same in the sure punishment which theybring. And above all, will men to the end be tempted to the sin ofself-indulgence, want of self-control. In many ways, but surely insome way or other, will every man's temptation be, to lose self-control. 

Therefore settle it in your minds, young men, that the first and thelast of all virtues and graces of which God can give is self-control; as necessary for the saint and the sage, lest they becomefanatics or pedants, as for the young man in the hey-day of youthand health; but as necessary for the young man as for the saint andthe sage, lest, while they become only fanatics and pedants, hebecome a profligate, and a cumberer of the ground. 

Remember this--remember it now in the glorious days of youth whichnever will return, but in which you are sowing seed of which youwill reap the fruit until your dying day. Know that as you sow, sowill you reap. If you sow to the flesh, you will of the flesh reapcorruption; corruption--deterioration, whether of health, ofintellect, of character in some shape or other. You know not, andno man knows, what the curse will be like; but the curse will surelycome. The thing which is done cannot be undone; and you will findthat out before, and not merely after your dying day. Thereforerejoice in your youth, for God has given it to you; but remember, that for it, as for each and all of his gifts, God will bring youinto judgment. And when the hour of temptation comes, go back--goback, if you would escape--to what you all were taught at yourmother's knee concerning the grace of God; for that alone will keepyou safe, or angel, or archangel, or any created being safe, in thislife and in all lives to come. 

SERMON V. FRIENDSHIP; OR, DAVID AND JONATHAN

2 Samuel i. 26. I am distressed for thee, my brother Jonathan:very pleasant hast thou been unto me: thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women. 

Passing the love of woman! That is a hard saying. What love canpass that? Yet David doubtless spoke truth. He was a man who musthave had reason enough to know what woman's love was like; and whenhe said that the love of Jonathan for him passed even that, hebestowed on his friend praise which will be immortal. 

The name of Jonathan will remain for ever as the perfect pattern offriendship. 

Let us think a little to-day over his noble character and histragical history. It will surely do us good. If it does nothingbut make us somewhat ashamed of ourselves, that is almost the bestthing which can happen to us or to any man. 

We first hear of Jonathan as doing a very gallant deed. We mightexpect as much. It is only great-hearted men who can be truefriends; mean and cowardly men can never know what friendship means. 

The Israelites were hidden in thickets, and caves, and pits, forfear of the Philistines, when Jonathan was suddenly inspired toattack a Philistine garrison, under circumstances seeminglydesperate. 'And that first slaughter, which Jonathan and hisarmour-bearer made, was about twenty men, within, as it were, anhalf-acre of land, which a yoke of oxen might plough. '

That is one of those little hints which shews that the story istrue, written by a man who knew the place--who had probably been inthe great battle of Beth-aven, which followed, and had perhapsascended the rock where Jonathan had done his valiant deed, and hadseen the dead bodies lying as they had fallen before him and hisarmour-bearer. 

Then follows the story of David's killing Goliath, and coming backto Saul with the giant's head in his hand, and answering modestly tohim, 'I am the son of thy servant Jesse the Bethlehemite. '

'And it came to pass, when he had made an end of speaking unto Saul, that the soul of Jonathan was knit with the soul of David, andJonathan loved him as his own soul. 

'Then Jonathan and David made a covenant, because he loved him ashis own soul. 

'And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him, andgave it to David, and his garments, even to his sword, and to hisbow, and to his girdle. '

He loved him as his own soul. And why? Because his soul was likethe soul of David; because he was modest, he loved David's modesty;because he was brave, he loved David's courage; because he wasvirtuous, he loved David's virtue. He saw that David was all thathe was himself, and more; and therefore he loved him as his ownsoul. And therefore I said, that it is only noble and great heartswho can have great friendships; who admire and delight in othermen's goodness; who, when they see a great and godlike man, conceive, like Jonathan, such an affection for him that they forgetthemselves, and think only of him, till they will do anything forhim, sacrifice anything for him, as Jonathan did for David. 

For remember, that Jonathan had cause to hate and envy David ratherthan love him; and that he would have hated him if there had beenany touch of meanness or selfishness in his heart. Gradually helearnt, as all Israel learnt, that Samuel had anointed David to beking, and that he, Jonathan, was in danger of not succeeding afterSaul's death. David stood between him and the kingdom. And yet hedid not envy David--did not join his father for a moment in plottinghis ruin. He would oppose his father, secretly indeed, andrespectfully; but still, he would be true to David, though he had tobear insults and threats of death. 

And mark here one element in Jonathan's great friendship. Jonathanis a pious man, as well as a righteous one. He believes the Lord'smessages that he has chosen David to be king, and he submits; seeingthat it is just and right, and that David is worthy of the honour, though it be to the hurt of himself and of his children after him. It is the Lord's will; and he, instead of repining against it, mustcarry it out as far as he is concerned. Yes; those who are mosttrue to their fellow-men are always those who are true to God; forthe same spirit of God which makes them fear God makes them alsolove their neighbour. 

When David escapes from Saul to Samuel, it is Jonathan who does allhe can to save him. The two friends meet secretly in the field. 

'And Jonathan said unto David, O Lord God of Israel, when I havesounded my father about to-morrow any time, or the third day, and, behold, if there be good toward David, and I then send not untothee, and shew it thee; the Lord do so and much more to Jonathan. '

Then David and Jonathan agree upon a sign between them, by whichDavid may know Saul's humour without his bow-bearer finding outDavid. He will shoot three arrows toward the place where David isin hiding; and if he says to his bow-bearer, The arrows are on thisside of thee, David is to come; for he is safe. But if he says, Thearrows are beyond thee, David must flee for his life, for the Lordhas sent him away. 

Then Jonathan goes in to meat with his father Saul, and excusesDavid for being absent. 

'Then Saul's anger was kindled against Jonathan, and he said untohim, Thou son of the perverse, rebellious woman, do not I know thatthou hast chosen the son of Jesse to thine own confusion, and untothe confusion of thy mother? For as long as the son of Jesse livethupon the ground, thou shalt not be established, nor thy kingdom. Wherefore now send and fetch him unto me, for he shall surely die. And Jonathan answered Saul his father, and said unto him, Whereforeshall he be slain? what hath he done? And Saul cast a javelin athim to smite him; whereby Jonathan knew that it was determined ofhis father to slay David. '

He goes to the field and shoots the arrows, and gives the signagreed on. He sends his bow-bearer back to the city, and Davidcomes out of his hiding-place in the rock Ezel. 

'And as soon as the lad was gone, David arose out of a place towardthe south, and fell on his face to the ground, and bowed himselfthree times; and they kissed one another, and wept one with another, until David exceeded. And Jonathan said to David, Go in peace, forasmuch as we have sworn both of us in the name of the Lord, saying, The Lord be between me and thee, and between my seed and thyseed for ever. And he arose and departed: and Jonathan went intothe city. '

And so the two friends parted, and saw one another, it seems, butonce again, when Jonathan went to David in the forest of Ziph, and'strengthened his hand in God, ' with noble words. 

After that, Jonathan vanishes from the story of David. We hear onlyof him that he died fighting by his father's side, upon the downs ofGilboa. The green plot at their top, where the Israelites' laststruggle was probably made, can be seen to this day; and there mostlikely Jonathan fell, and over him David raised his famouslamentation:

'O Jonathan, thou wast slain in thine high places. I am distressedfor thee, my brother Jonathan: very pleasant hast thou been untome: thy love to me was wonderful, passing the love of women. Howare the mighty fallen, and the weapons of war perished!'

So ends the beautiful and tragical story of a truly gallant man. Seldom, indeed, will there be seen in the world such perfectfriendship between man and man, as that between Jonathan and David. Seldom, indeed, shall we see anyone loving and adoring the very manwhom his selfish interest would teach him to hate and to supplant. But still every man may have, and ought to have a friend. Wretchedindeed, and probably deservedly wretched, is the man who has none. And every man may learn from this story of Jonathan how to choosehis friends. 

I say, to choose. No one is bound to be at the mercy of anybody andeverybody with whom he may come in contact. No one is bound to say, That man lives next door to me, therefore he must be my friend. Weare bound not to avoid our neighbours. They are put near us by Godin his providence. God intends every one of them, good or bad, tohelp in educating us, in giving us experience of life and manners. We are to learn from them, live with them in peace and charity, andonly avoid them when we find that their company is really doing usharm, and leading us into sin and folly. But a friend--which is amuch deeper and more sacred word than neighbour--a friend we havethe right and the power to choose; and our wisest plan will be tocopy Jonathan, and choose our friends, not for their usefulness, butfor their goodness; not for their worth to us, but for their worthin themselves; and to choose, if possible, people superior toourselves. If we meet a man better than ourselves, more wise thanourselves, more learned, more experienced, more delicate-minded, more high-minded, let us take pains to win his esteem, to gain hisconfidence, and to win him as a friend, for the sake of his worth. 

Then in our friendship, as in everything else in the world, we shallfind the great law come true, that he that loseth his life shallsave it. He who does not think of himself and his own interest willbe the very man who will really help himself, and further his owninterest the most. For the friend whom we have chosen for his ownworth, will be the one who will be worth most to us. The friendwhom we have loved and admired for his own sake, will be the one whowill do most to raise our character, to teach us, to refine us, tohelp us in time of doubt and trouble. The higher-minded man ourfriend is, the higher-minded will he make us. For it is written, 'As iron sharpeneth iron, so a man sharpeneth the face of hisfriend. '

Nothing can be more foolish, or more lowering to our own character, than to choose our friends among those who can only flatter us, andrun after us, who look up to us as oracles, and fetch and carry atour bidding, while they do our souls and characters no good, butmerely feed our self-conceit, and lower us down to their own level. But it is wise, and ennobling to our own character, to choose ourfriends among those who are nearer to God than we are, moreexperienced in life, and more strong and settled in character. Wiseit is to have a friend of whom we are at first somewhat afraid;before whom we dare not say or do a foolish thing, whose just angeror contempt would be to us a thing terrible. Better it is thatfriendship should begin with a little wholesome fear, till time andmutual experience of each other's characters shall have broughtabout the perfect love which casts out fear. Better to say withDavid, 'He that telleth lies shall not stay in my sight; I will notknow a wicked person. Yea, let the righteous rather smite mefriendly and reprove me. All my delight is in the saints that arein the earth, and in such as excel in virtue. '

And let no man fancy that by so doing he lowers himself, and putshimself in a mean place. There is no man so strong-minded but whathe may find a stronger-minded man than himself to give him counsel;no man is so noble-hearted but what he may find a nobler-hearted manthan himself to keep him up to what is true and just and honourable, when he is tempted to play the coward, and be false to God's Spiritwithin him. No man is so pure-minded but what he may find a purer-minded person than himself to help him in the battle against theworld, the flesh, and the devil. 

My friends, do not think it a mean thing to look up to those who aresuperior to yourselves. On the contrary, you will find in practicethat it is only the meanest hearts, the shallowest and the basest, who feel no admiration, but only envy for those who are better thanthemselves; who delight in finding fault with them, and blackeningtheir character, and showing that they are not, after all, so muchsuperior to other people; while it is the noblest-hearted, the verymen who are most worthy to be admired themselves, who, likeJonathan, feel most the pleasure, the joy, and the strength ofreverence; of having some one whom they can look up to and admire;some one in whose company they can forget themselves, their owninterest, their own pleasure, their own honour and glory, and cry, Him I must hear; him I must follow; to him I must cling, whatevermay betide. Blessed and ennobling is the feeling which gathersround a wise teacher or a great statesman all the most earnest, high-minded, and pious youths of his generation; the feeling whichmakes soldiers follow the general whom they trust, they know not whyor whither, through danger, and hunger, and fatigue, and deathitself; the feeling which, in its highest perfection, made theApostles forsake all and follow Christ, saying, 'Lord, to whom shallwe go? Thou hast the words of eternal life'--which made them readyto work and to die for him whom the world called the son of thecarpenter, but whom they, through the Spirit of God bearing witnesswith their own pure and noble spirits, knew to be the Son of theLiving God. 

Ay, a blessed thing it is for any man or woman to have a friend; onehuman soul whom we can trust utterly; who knows the best and theworst of us, and who loves us, in spite of all our faults; who willspeak the honest truth to us, while the world flatters us to ourface, and laughs at us behind our back; who will give us counsel andreproof in the day of prosperity and self-conceit; but who, again, will comfort and encourage us in the day of difficulty and sorrow, when the world leaves us alone to fight our own battle as we can. 

If we have had the good fortune to win such a friend, let us doanything rather than lose him. We must give and forgive; live andlet live. If our friend have faults, we must bear with them. Wemust hope all things, believe all things, endure all things, ratherthan lose that most precious of all earthly possessions--a trustyfriend. 

And a friend, once won, need never be lost, if we will only betrusty and true ourselves. Friends may part--not merely in body, but in spirit, for a while. In the bustle of business and theaccidents of life they may lose sight of each other for years; andmore--they may begin to differ in their success in life, in theiropinions, in their habits, and there may be, for a time, coldnessand estrangement between them; but not for ever, if each will be buttrusty and true. 

For then, according to the beautiful figure of the poet, they willbe like two ships who set sail at morning from the same port, andere nightfall lose sight of each other, and go each on its owncourse, and at its own pace, for many days, through many storms andseas; and yet meet again, and find themselves lying side by side inthe same haven, when their long voyage is past. 

And if not, my friends; if they never meet; if one shall founder andsink upon the seas, or even change his course, and fly shamefullyhome again: still, is there not a Friend of friends who cannotchange, but is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever?

What says the noble hymn:--

'When gathering clouds around I view, And days are dark and friends are few, On him I lean, who, not in vain, Experienced every human pain:He sees my griefs, allays my fears, And counts and treasures up my tears. '

Passing the love of woman was his love, indeed; and of him Jonathanwas but such a type, as the light in the dewdrop is the type of thesun in heaven. 

He himself said--and what he said, that he fulfilled--'Greater lovehath no man than this--that a man lay down his life for hisfriends. '

In treachery and desertion; in widowhood and childlessness; in thehour of death, and in the day of judgment, when each soul must standalone before its God, one Friend remains, and that the best of all. 

{285} From a charter quoted by Ingulf--and very probably a spuriousone.