companionship of two persons who love one another more than they love anybody else in the world-this close communion of two human beings is not the less a supreme good because it is transitory. In this shape the union of two persons formed of body and soulit can positively never again recur, and yet it is supremely enjoyed by those who now enjoy it, supremely missed by those who have enjoyed and lost it, supremely longed for by those whom some overmastering necessity keeps asunder.

'All beauteous things for which we live

By laws of space and time decay;
But oh, the very reason why

I clasp them is because they die.'

We may therefore admit the 'transitoriness' and deny the 'vanity.' Again, it may be urged that while all those things of which the transitoriness is bewailed by the poets are indeed transitory, there are still other things left which are not. Or a thing may have two aspects, one transitory, one permanent. A good act dies as an act; its goodness lives and fertilizes. Preachers admit and emphasize the transitoriness of all 'earthly pleasures and ambitions'; they use their transitoriness as a foil by which to contrast the permanence of goodness and of wisdom. The permanence and indestructibility of these in one form or in another are conditioned and assured by the permanence and indestructibility of their source. And if there be in human life and in outward nature manifestations and qualities which betoken and require God, then these qualities and appearances cannot be empty, cannot be vain. If there be such a thing as beauty, if there be such a thing as wisdom, if there be such a thing as goodness, if there be such a thing as soul, because God is, then no thing or deed or person which displays them can possibly be vain. God and 'all is vanity' are in the last resort contradictions in terms.

§ 4. Two beliefs unharmonized and inconsistent with each other.— But this contradiction was not apparent to the author of Ecclesiastes. Or rather his belief in both was too strong to allow of either to yield unto the other. He did not so utterly believe in 'all is vanity' as to compel him to deny that God could be. His faith in God was not warm and living enough to make him realize that' vanity' is not coextensive with all.' He pushed neither his faith nor his scepticism to its legitimate and logical conclusion. He probed neither unto the bottom. Professor Cornill not unjustifiably contends that the Book of Ecclesiastes may be regarded

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as a triumph of Jewish piety. For though its author sees everywhere unsolvable riddles and vanities,' he never imagines that the right deduction may possibly be that God is a fiction. In truth the author's belief in God appears to be, as it were, merely borrowed from his environment. God is taken for granted, or assumed; he has not been felt and realized in the soul as the source of goodness and truth, the guarantee of love and of love's reality, even as love is the evidence of him. But the cry, 'all is vanity,' is the author's very own; that is personal and experienced.

Beyond this dual but unequal belief in God and vanity it is not easy to make any definite statement of the writer's opinions or counsels. So much depends on whether certain verses are his or not his. On the whole it would appear as if he recommended a moderate and perhaps even a grateful enjoyment of the external goods of life-avoiding excess and debauchery on the one hand, and a needless asceticism or self-denial on the other. Man had best be wise and good, because after all wisdom is 'better' than vanity and virtue 'better' than vice. Man also had best fear God, for God is all-powerful, and 'what's to come is still unsure.' A prudential morality and a prudential religion apparently; what seems higher and better is more probably than not an interpolation or a misunderstanding.

When all is said, it remains strange that this book, even if 'edited' and corrected, should have found a place in the Canon. Is it because in the opening of his book the author assumes the person of Solomon? He puts his words into Solomon's mouth not to give them an adventitious authority, but dramatically. If Solomon, the great king, with all his magnificence and all his wisdom, found all things vanity, no lesser man could refuse to abide by his decision. But the mask is hardly maintained beyond the first two chapters. The author, moreover, calls himself not Solomon but Koheleth, the precise meaning of which is uncertain. It is most probable that it is applied to Solomon, regarded as a public teacher of wisdom, a "preacher" or "debater" in an assembly, setting forth before his listeners the conclusions to which experience or reflexion had brought him' (Professor Driver).

$5. Opening keynotes.-Let us now listen to the reflections of Koheleth from the beginning of them to their end. The passages which may be interpolations will be indicated either by being enclosed in brackets or by being printed in italics.

The words of the Preacher, the son of David, king in Jerusalem. Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity

of vanities; all is vanity. What profit hath a man of all his labour which he taketh under the sun? One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh: but the earth abideth for ever. The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to its place where it must arise. The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again unto its circuits. All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place whither the rivers go, thither they return to go again.

All things are full of weariness; man cannot utter it: the eye is not satisfied with seeing, nor the ear filled with hearing. The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done : and there is no new thing under the sun. Is there any thing whereof it may be said, 'See, this is new'? it hath been already in the ages which were before us. There is no remembrance of former generations; neither shall there be any remembrance of generations that are to come with those that shall come after.

I the Preacher was king over Israel in Jerusalem. And I gave my heart to seek and search out by wisdom concerning all things that are done under heaven: this sore travail hath God given to the sons of man to trouble themselves therewith. I saw all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all was vanity and pursuit of wind. That which is crooked cannot be made straight: and that which is wanting cannot be numbered. I communed with mine own heart, saying, Lo, I have gotten great wisdom, more also than all they that have been before me in Jerusalem: yea, my heart hath seen great store of wisdom and knowledge. And when I had given my heart to know wisdom, and to know madness and folly: I perceived that this also is pursuit of wind. For in much wisdom is much vexation: and he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.

The Hebrew word translated 'vanity' means literally 'a breath.' All human things, the Preacher means, are as empty, unsubstantial and transitory as a breath. Pursuit or striving after wind' also indicates the flimsy and unsatisfying result of every human endeavour. Both phrases are meant to convey the peculiar irony which seems to the author to lurk in all God's arrangements for God gives man wisdom, but only to increase the burden

man.

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of his pain; he gives him knowledge, but only to see more clearly that the world's wrongs and anomalies can never be rectified. (The crooked cannot be made straight.') We read Koheleth's words and recognize the relative truth of them, but they also stir us up to realize their greater falsity. The pain of knowledge is nobler than the vacuity of ignorance, and the pleasures of wisdom are as real as its sorrows. That which is crooked can often be made straight, and the activity of the mind is a bond of union between ourselves and God. Aristotle's exultation over man's capacity to think and the glory of it is truer than Koheleth's lament over the painful impotence of its issues. Truer and better also is the old Jewish prayer in the Amidah: 'Thou favourest man with knowledge and teachest mortals understanding. O favour us with knowledge, understanding and discernment from thee. Blessed art thou, O Lord, gracious Giver of knowledge.' And in another formula of benediction God is thanked for 'imparting of his wisdom to those that fear him.' The last phrase might almost be translated, for sharing his wisdom with them that fear him.'

§ 6. The doubtful profit of human labour.-I said in mine heart, 'Go to now, I will prove thee with mirth, therefore enjoy pleasure: but, behold, this also is vanity.' I said of laughter, 'It is mad:' and of mirth, 'What bringeth it?' I planned in mine heart to refresh myself with wine, while mine heart yet bore itself wisely, (?) and to lay hold on folly, till I might see what was that good for the sons of men, which they should do under the heaven all the days of their life. I made me great works; I builded me houses; I planted me vineyards: I made me gardens and parks, and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruits: I made me pools of water, to water therewith the wood that bringeth forth trees: I got me servants and maidens, and had servants born in my house; also I had great possessions of great and small cattle above all that were in Jerusalem before me: I gathered me also silver and gold, and the peculiar treasure of kings: I gat me men singers and women singers, and the delights of the sons of men.

So I was great, and increased more than all that were before me in Jerusalem: also my wisdom remained with me. And whatsoever mine eyes desired I kept not from them, I withheld not my heart from any joy; for my heart had joy from all my labour; and this was my portion of all my labour. But when I looked on all the works that my hands

had wrought, and on the labour that I had laboured to do, behold, all was vanity and pursuit of wind, and there was no profit under the sun.

And I turned myself to behold wisdom, and madness, and folly, and I saw that wisdom excelleth folly, as far as light excelleth darkness. The wise man's eyes are in his head; but the fool walketh in darkness; but I also perceived that one event happeneth to them all. Then said I in my heart, As it happeneth to the fool, so will it happen even to me; and why am I then become so very wise? Then I said in my heart, that this also is vanity. For there is no remembrance of the wise more than of the fool for ever; seeing that in the days to come all will long ago have been forgotten. And how the wise man dieth even as the fool! Therefore I hated life; because the work that is wrought under the sun was offensive unto me: for all is vanity and pursuit of wind. Yea, I hated all my labour which I had taken under the sun: because I must leave it unto the man that shall be after me. And who knoweth whether he shall be a wise man or a fool? yet shall he have rule over all my labour wherein I have laboured, and wherein I have shewed myself wise under the sun. This is also vanity. So I turned to let my heart despair of all the labour which I had taken under the sun. For if a man's labour be wrought with wisdom, and with knowledge, and with skill, yet to a man that hath not laboured therein must he leave it as his possession. This also is vanity and a great evil. For what hath man of all his labour, and of the striving of his heart, wherein he hath laboured under the sun? For all his days are sorrows, and his travail grief; even in the night his heart taketh not rest. This is also vanity.

There is nothing better for a man, than that he should eat and drink, and that he should let his soul enjoy happiness in his labour. [This also I saw, that it was from the hand of God. For who can eat, or who can enjoy without him? For God giveth to a man that is good in his sight wisdom, and knowledge, and joy: but to the sinner he giveth travail, to gather and to heap up, that he may give to him that is good before God.] This also is vanity and pursuit of wind.

Sensual pleasure is at least as unsatisfying to the Preacher as the pursuit of wisdom. He admits the relative superiority of

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