The Ten - Forgotten Books · PDF filein danger o f undervaluing the Ten Words, and of thinking that, because Christ has come, therefore they have lost for us all their deep ... prophets?

H . ROLLS H . WATERWORTH

J . E. D I ! ON E. A. FREN CH

F. R. WATSON T. W. JAMIESON

MY COLLEAGUES , P AST AND P RESENT

IN THE WOR! OF

THE METHODIST MISSION, EDINBURGH

P RE FATORY NOTE

ALL that it is necessary to ask the reader to note by

way o f Preface is that the fol lowing chapters were

del ivered as a course o f Sunday Evening Sermons

to my own congregation during the months o f last

winter, and that, though they have since been en

tirely t e-written,they stil l remain what they were

original ly,sermons

,not essays.

EDINBURGH, October 1897.

I N T R O D U C T O RY

‘ And God spake all these words, saying , I the Lord thy God,which brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of thebondage.’—Exon. x, z.

I N T R O D U C T O R Y

OF the unique position once held by the Ten

Commandments among the most rel igious people in

the world,o ne fact is a sufficient il lustration : within

the Holy Place was the Holy o f Hol ies,wherein

once a year the high priest entered alone to o ffer

up sacrifices both fo r himself and the people ; within

the Holy o f Hol ies was the sacred ark ; and within

the ark,shrined in the innermost sanctity o f the

Holy Place,were the two tables o f stone whereon

the divine finger had traced the etern al law. Could

anything indicate more clearly the reverence paid

to the Decalogue by the Jews, o r declare with more

solemn emphasis that the end o f all rel igious o b serv

auces is the keeping o fthe commandments o fGod ?

But Ckrz’

s t !raving come (as the writer o fthe Epistle

to the Hebrews says), the minister o fa new and better

covenant,it was no longer possible that the command

ments should be to the Christian al l that they had

once been to the pious Jew. Yet are we not to-day

in danger o f undervaluing the Ten Words,and o f

thinking that, because Christ has come, therefore they

have lost for us al l their deep significance ? One can9

10 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS

only judge from the narrow round of h is own observa

tion but to me,at least

,it does appear that there is

no t in o ur teaching and thinking tod ay a sufficient

recognition of those great first principles o f morality

which are here set forth. I t was a remark o fthe late

Mr. Matthew Arnold that among the many sermons

to which,at one time or another

,he had listened

,he

had never heard o ne on the Ten Commandments. I

have a textual index to some two o r three thousand

sermons publ ished by one of the greatest preachers

of our day,but so far as I can discover

,there is not

o ne deal ing with any of the precepts of the Decalogue.

I do not forget that the great Anglican Church

appoints the commandments to be read at every

celebration of the Holy Communion but neither

can I forget, o n the other hand, that when a distin

guished Presbyterian minister (Dr. Robertson o f

I rvine) proposed to adopt the same custom in his

church some of the straiter sect immediately raised an

outcry about dreadful innovations.’ A visitor looking

round o ne o f our great cathedrals had his attention

drawn by the verger to a wall which was somewhat

bare and in need o fdecoration.

‘Yo u know,

’ said he,

‘ the Ten Commandments might be painted up ; and

the Ten Commandments, s ir, are better than nothing

and,unless I am mistaken

,that naive utterance o f

the cathedral verger was only a blunt expression

of the indifference with which multitudes o f even

Christian people regard this ancient law.

INTRODUCTORY I I

I

But,it is sometimes said

,is n o t the Decalogue a

very crude and unfinished code o f morals for men

to-day ? I t served admirably for a semi-barbarous

people,just escaped from a long and degrading

captivity ; but just because it did so serve,how is it

possible that it should be adapted for us in these

times ? Moreover,what does it consist o f but

bare precepts,negative precepts too—the k ind of

peremptory unreasoning admonitions you might

address to a child ? But surely we have o ut

grown the need of these ? Why trouble us with

precepts now that we have principles which supersede

them and make them needless ? D id not Paul saythat love is the fulfi lment o fthe whole law ? D id not

Christ tel l us that upon these two commandments ,that we love the Lord o ur God with al l o ur heart and

o ur neighbour as ourselves,hang al l the law and the

prophets ? I f then we give heed to the eleventh

commandment,why take thought fo r the rest ?

Reasoning l ike this,which is very common , is much

more plausible than conclusive, as o ne o r two con

siderations wil l show

( I) I t is said that we no longer need the detailed

precepts o f the law,n ow that Christ has given us

the larger law o f love which includes and supersedes

them . And undoubtedly,if man were wholly ruled

1 2 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS

and led by love,there would be little need to preach

to him the simple moral ities o f the Decalogue, to

say to him,

‘ Thou shalt not kill,

’ ‘ Thou shalt no t

steal,

’ and so o n . But how much can we build o n

an ‘ if ’ l ike that ? How many amongst us are there

who are so ruled and led ?

Moreover,do we not see i l lustrations every day

how even love itself is in constant need o f definite

and detailed guidance ? Because your children love

yo u, you do not cease to command them ; you do

not argue—at least,i f you are wise

, yo u do not‘ They love, that is enough ; let them do what they

will .’ Men may love their fel lows,and earnestly

desire their country’s good ; nevertheless, society

makes laws for them which it compels them to

obey ; it does not trust the general principle of

brotherhood o r patriotism to do al l that is needful.

And though in the Christian l ife it may be true that

love is the fulfi lment o f the whole law,we stil l need

the directing finger and the guiding voice to say,

This is the way,walk ye in it.’

( 2 ) But it is al leged that the moral ity o f the

Decalogue is crude and unfinished,a merely ‘

sur

face ’ moral ity. And of course the law o f Moses

especial ly if in o ur interpretation o f i t we do not

go beyond the letter o f law—fal ls immeasurablyshort o fthe law o fChrist. But a surface moral ity ’

T/Lou s/zalt n o t kill,Tltou sko lt no t s teal

,Tlzou sitalt

not comm it adultery—why

,al l these

,

’ says some o ne,

INTRODUCTORY 1 3

‘ have I But stay,o ne moment before you

finish the quotation the same law says—and this time

I do not ask to go one step beyond the letter o fwhat

is written—Tkou shalt not covet. Who wants to go

o n with the quotation now ? Who is there o fus who

wil l stand up and say,

‘ I am clean even from this

s in’? There

,surely

,is a moral ity that goes deeper

than the surface.

But the most important fact has yet to be

mentioned. Precisely what this ancient law meant

to those who first received it I do not now stay to

discuss. But—and this is the fact to be emphasized—we have a re-reading o f it from the l ips o f Christ ;and it is with this law

,as Christ has interpreted it

,

that we have to do. Now hear H im Ye have heard

that it was said to them o f o ld time,Thou shalt not

kil l ; and whosoever shal l k i l l shal l be in danger o f

the j udgment : but I say unto you, that every one

who is angry with his brother shall be in danger o f

the judgment. Ye have heard that it was said,

Thou shalt not commit adultery : but I say unto you,that every o ne that looketh o n a woman to lust after

her,hath committed adultery with her already in his

heart.’ Let a man shut himself up in the quiet o f

his own room,and l isten while Christ reads over

again this ancient law,and we shal l hear no more

from him about its ‘ surface moral ity ’

; the very last

thing he wil l be l ikely to say of it is that it does no t

cut deep enough.

I4 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS

But however we may estimate the law given by

Moses,it is stil l binding ; 1 and however o ur relation

to it may have been modified by the coming of Christ,

this at least is clear,the keeping of the command

ments o f God is not less but more incumbent upon

us because we are Christians. The verbs o f the

opening sentence of this chapter, Go d spake al l these

words,saying

,

’ should both be read in the present

tense,

‘ God speaks and says.’ Some o f us have an

altogether inverted way o fstating o ur relation to the

O ld Testament law. A Christian man rejoices t

he is free from the hard,mechan ical system that

imposed the law o f tithes,and then proceeds to

demonstrate his freedom by a niggardl iness o fwhich

any honest Jew would have been hearti ly asham

Surely that is the very acme o fperverse m isco nstruc

tion. I fwe are freed from o ne law,it is only because we

have become subject to another and a higher. We

quit the service o f o ne master, no t that we may be

chartered l ibertines,but that we may enter th

service o f Another whose demands are even more

exacting. More than is here God now asks from

us ; but He stil l asks al l that is here. Go d stil l‘ speaks and says ’

; H is voice has lost none o f

its o ld imperative ; and they only are well

pleasing unto H im who vow as did the children

1 It will be understood that I am here speaking of the Decalogue asa whole. In what sense the Fourth Commandment is of perpetualobligation I have tried to explain further on.

INTRODUCTORY 1 5

o f I srael : ‘ Al l that the Lord hath spoken wil l

we do.’

I I

Before we pass to the consideration of the com

mandments in detail , there are two o r three further

matters o fa preliminary character that cal l for brief

notice.

I t is hardly necessary fo r me to remind you that

many difficult and del icate problems touching the

Decalogue have been raised by modern criticism o f

the O ld Testament. At every step we are treading

among the ho t embers o f many a stil l burning

controversy. But inasmuch as my purpose in these

addresses is wholly practical,and anything I have

to say is in nowise affected by the final decision o f

scholarship o n the points in dispute,whatever it may

be,I shal l pass over these matters o f controversy in

silence. In what sense we are to understand the

material symbols said to have accompanied the

giving o f the law ; what was the exact form in

which it was first proclaimed by Moses ; how far

that original draft is identical with that famil iar

to us ; and how it is related to other versions o f

the law which have come down to us (as, e.g.,that

contained in the Deuteronomic code) -al l these are

matters which we may confidently leave to Biblical

scholars to thresh o ut at their leisure in their studies ;they do not concern us just now

,and to attempt


to discuss them would be as impossible as it is

undesirable.

One thing at least I think is clear : no criticism

can diminish,though it may heighten

,o ur sense o f

the greatness and majesty o f that ancient moral law,

which,l ike another Matterhorn

,rises solitary and

incomparable from the moral wastes that surround it.

The two great ideas o f the Decalogue around which ,so to speak , al l !its precepts revolve, are these

xGod and duty. Beginning where al l true thinking

must begin,with the true idea o f God and o f man

’

s

relation to H im,i t passes o n to speak o f man’s

relation to his fel low-man . And when we think

of the marvellous enrichment wh ich has come to

the whole race through the new meaning with which

these two great ideas were henceforth to be laden,

it is not easy to restrain our impatience with those

superfine critics who,using the l ight o f the very law

which they criticize,can see in the Decalogue only the

rough incompleteness,the ragged edges

,o f an un

finished work. Can they—can any man—tel l howmuch the whole world owes to-day for al l in human life

that is strongest and truest,al l that is most gracious

and tender, to that word which Moses gave to Israel

amid the deserts o f Sinai ? To us,into whose l ives

its great and simple truths have entered,til l they

have become part o f o ur very selves, i t may speak

nothing that is new,nothing that is remarkable

,

nothing indeed that does not appear perfectly sel f

INTRODUCTORY 17

evident. But it was not always so . Take, e.g., its

great truth concern ing God,that He is holy

,just

,

and good,and that He demands a like goodness

from them that worship H im.

‘ Of course,

’ we say,

o fcourse,God is good.

’ But why that o f course ’

Go back to the ancient world,and it was no t so .

As Principal Fairbairn tel ls us—and no man l ivingspeaks with greater authority o n a subject l ike this

than he does—the gods there were not good,often

most utterly iniquitous and bad .

‘ In India,in the

o ld hymns you could get written in honour o f a god

a drinking-song that any man in these days in an

hour o fhilarity might fitly sing. In beautiful,skilful

,

radiant Greece,what was ! eus , their great god -an

adulterer ; what was Aphrodite P—perso n ified lust.I f you had said to a Greek,

“Yo u ought to be god

l ike,

” he would have said ,“Nay, I wil l be man-l ike ;

that is more noble and honourable than to l ive after

the manner o f the gods.” And if yo u had gone east

into Phoenicia,where the neighbours o f the Jews

l ived , what would you have found ? Yo u would have

found gods,impurest of the impure, served not only

by human sacrifice,but by blackest

,vilest human

lust. Religion was no moral thing there in any

degree whatever, and where it had power without

moral ity, its power worked in the most immoral

way. Imagine, then , the transcendent moment fo r

man , the moment o f supremest promise, o fgrandest

hope,when the idea o f a moral deity entered his

B

THE TEN COMMANDMENTS

heart and passed into his history,when al l the ener

gies o f rel igion came to be moral energies for the

making o fmoral men . That was a moment,I call it,

o frevelation—you may cal l it of supreme guess-worko r grandest d iscovery ; or you may, by magnifying

incidental difficulties , attempt to conceal from your

self its meaning. Yet it were only to speak with

prosaic soberness were we to say,—the moment when

gravitation,navigation

,the secret o f the sea, o f the

sun , o r the stars, o r the earth, were discovered had

neither singly nor all combined equal nor even ap

proximate significance for man . Take from the

heart o f him this rel igion steeped in moral ity,made

l iving by the moral character o f its Go d, and yo u will

leave him without the grandest energy working fo r

good and peace and progress that ever came into his

history o r into his heart.’

That long quotation leads very naturally to the

second point I wish to emphasize. By this law o f

the Ten Words—by the character o f i ts precepts , andby the supreme place given to it

,according to the

divine command , in the nation’s l ife and thought

Go d declared , in terms that could not be mistaken,that the end o fal l H is deal ings with men is righteous

ness. What doth the Lord require o fthee but to do

justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with

thy God ? ’ Ceremony,symbol

,rite—these have their

place, as a hedge round about the law to protect and

defend it,but never as its substitute. Righteousness

https://www.forgottenbooks.com/join


themselves to do wrong things. There is no more

certain fact in the range o f human experience than

that with strong and earnest rel igious feel ing there

may be a feeble and imperfect hold o n the moral law,

often a very loose sense o fjustice, truth, purity.

’ In al l

the world’s history there is no more mournful chapter

than that long and,alas ! stil l unfinished chapter

o n the divorce o f moral ity from rel igion. In every

age men have been ready,as some o ne said o f the

Jesuits,to lengthen the creed and shorten the com

mandmen ts, to tithe mint and anise and cummin and

neglect the weightier matters of the law. The Goths

o f ancient Spain , o ne historian tells us, were indeed

very devout, but they regarded their acts o f rel igion

chiefly as reparation for their vices ; they compounded

for exceptional ly bad sins by an added amount o f

repentance,and then they sinned again without com

punction.’ Twelve centuries later,George Borrow

,

travell ing through the same land , declared o f the

wretched Jews o f Lisbon , that, though they would

n o t partake o f the beast of the uncloven foot and the

fish which has no scales, yet they broke the eternal

commandments o ftheir Maker without scruple. New

man had a l ike experience in the Morea,where he

found ruffian ly bandits, the terror of the whole land,who yet

,with al l their brutal ity, observed the fasts o f

the Greek Church with the utmost strictness. Ben

venuto Cell in i tel ls the story o fh is own life,in which

the most pious sentiments and the grossest immorality

INTRODUCTORY 2 !

keep o ne another company o n the same page, without

apparently so much as a semblance of feeling of

incongruity. Nelson sends home despatches so re

l igio us in their tone that even Wilberforce thought

that they would have the effect o f leading men to

speak more o f Providence, at the very time that he

was l iving in an il l icit union with another man’s

wife. And who has not heard o fthe infamous forger

o fo ur own day, who, fleeing from the hand of justice

to Madrid , there to perish miserably by his own

hand,was found with the scapular, the symbol of

his religious faith,under h is garments ?

I t is the old,sad story : ‘ Thou bearest the name

o f a Jew,and restest upon the law

,and gloriest

in God,and knowest H is wil l, and approvest the

things that are excellen t,and art confident that

thou art thyself a gu ide o f the bl ind,a l ight of them

that are in darkness, a corrector o fthe fool ish, a

yes,yes

,but—we know how Paul pricked that puff-bal l

o f vain pretensions thou that teachest another,

teachest thou not thyself ? thou that preachest a

man should n o t steal,dost thou steal ? thou that

sayest a man should not commit adultery,dost thou

commit adultery ? thou who gloriest in the law

through thy transgression o f the law,dishonourest

thou Go d ? ’ I t is good to say, Lord, Lord,’ to hear

His word , to know and possess H is law ; but all

this is nothing, and less than nothing, if it stand

alone. ‘ The soul o f rel igion is the practick part ’

;


and it is he that doeth the wil l o f My Father which

is in heaven ’ who shall enter into the k ingdom o f

heaven.

Once more let us read the famil iar words before we

pass to the precepts which fol low :‘Aua

’God spake

all these wo rds,say ing,

I am the Lo rd thy God, wh ich

brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the ho use

of houa’age.

’ What is this ? The Lord is our Law

giver,but fi rst o fal l He is Redeemer . How we forget

that ! We remember the blackness and darkness

and tempest,the mount that burned with fi re and

the thunder-smitten crags but we forget this tender,

gracious prelude. Like words of iron dropped from

cold,stiff l ips o f stone the commandments seemed to

us ; but 10 ! by this o ne word they are softened and

transfigured. Before God gave Israel the law,Go d

set Israel free. No longer do H is words seem to us

as the arbitrary decree o f a great and terrible Deity

whose fittest symbol is the fiery thunder-cloud ; they

are the commands o f H im who, with a stretched-o ut

arm and a strong right hand , saved H is people from

the Oppressor’s yoke. Behind God’s law is H is love ;Sinai is a foregleam of Calvary the voice that cries

,

‘ Thou shalt not,

’ is the voice o f H im who can say,

‘ I am the Lord thy Go d, which brought thee o ut o f

the land o fEgypt, o ut of the house o fbondage.’

I s n o t that ever God’s way ? H is first approach to

us is not in judgment,but in mercy. He that made

INTRODUCTORY 2 3

me whole,the same said unto me that is the

D ivine order : first the blessing, afterwards the com

mand . He lays H is yoke upon us,but first of al l He

establ isheth H is love towards us. Shall we not hear

and obey H is Son,who is al ike the revelation o f the

Father’s love and the Father’s law ?

F I RST COMMANDMENT

Thou shalt have none other gods beforeMe.’—ExoDUS xx. 3 .



law ? ’ And Jesus said unto him,

‘ Thou shalt love

the Lord thy God with al l thy heart,and with al l thy

soul,and with al l thy mind. This is the great and

first commandment.’ Therefore do Moses and Christ

al ike declare that to be right practical ly we must be

right theologically, to be right manward we must be

right Godward.

But nowadays men often say,‘ Let us give heed

to the Second Commandment never mind the First.

Al l that is written upon the second table o f the law

wil l we do ; as for the rest, it matters not. God we

do not know,and cannot be sure of ; let u s love and

be kind o ne to another ; what else can be required o f

us ? ’ Some few years ago a great controversy was

waged in the pages o ftheNineteenth Century between

Mr. Gladstone and Professor Huxley o n certain

matters touching Rel igion and Science. The con

tro versy is now well-nigh forgotten , as indeed it

deserves to be,and I only refer to it in order to quote

o ne very striking passage from the pen o f the

Professor : ‘ In the eighth century he says,

‘ in

the heart o f a world of idolatrous polytheists,the

Hebrew prophets put forth a conception o f rel igion

which appears to me to be as wonderful an inspiration

o f genius as the art o f Phidias o r the science o f

Aristotle : And what doth the Lord require o f thee

but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk

humbly with thy God ? ” If any so -cal led rel igion

takes away from this great saying o f M icah,I think

THE F IRST COMMANDMENT 2 9

it wantonly mutilates,while, i f it adds thereto, I

think it obscures the perfect ideal o frel igion.

’

Now,if Professor Huxley had accepted all that is

involved in any fair interpretation of the great passage

which he quotes,o ur controversy with him might have

been at an end long ago. But,as a matter o f fact

,

was it not he himself‘

who mutilated ’ it ? Nay,did

he not tear o ut the very heart of it ? For did he not

assure us again and again that no man knows,o r can

know,whether o r not there be a God who requires

anything at o ur hand , with whom we may walk,humbly or otherwise ? Huxley in real ity cut down

M icah’s words to this,

‘ Do justly and love mercy.

’

But that, certainly, was not the prophet’s ideal ; we

may doubt if alone it would long be the ideal o f any

people. What guarantee have we that man wil l

continue to do justly and love mercy,’

o r even that

he wil l continue to make these moral distinctions at

al l when once he has ceased to bel ieve in a God o f

whose wil l they are the expression.

I cannot discuss the point further now ; but if any

young man is tempted to think that Christ’s second

commandment ’ is enough,that it matters l ittle

whether we hold any rel igious bel ief at al l o r not,and that

,whatever happens

,we may stil l remain in

ful l and undisturbed possession o f o ur great moral

inheritance,let him turn to the first chapter o f

Mr. A. J . Balfour’s Foundations of Bel ief; o r to the

second o fProfessor P fleiderer’s Gifford Lectures—no


‘ narrow-minded theologians ’ these,surely—and he

wil l at least find enough to give him pause. But it is

needless to go into the matter further, because though

an individual here and there may have thrown o ff al l

bel ief in the existence o f Go d, the overwhelming

majority of mankind stil l continue theists o fo ne kind

o r another. Man will not,cannot

,sever his corre

spo nden ce with the Unseen. His deity may be cruel

as Moloch,lustful as Baal but a deity of some sort/

he must have the soul insists o n an outlook heaven

ward,Godward . A l l history bears testimony to that.

The very idolatry which this commandment forbids

is the strongest proof of it. For a day men may

succeed in persuading us that an iron Material ism has

spoken the last word concerning the universe ; but

the reaction is certain to come— as we have seen it

come in o ur day—and then,in o ne form o r another

,

and sometimes in the wildest extravagances of

superstitious folly,man’s innate

,indestructible faith

in the supernatural reasserts itself.

Some thought o f Go d, then , and of his relation to

God—some theology,’ that is—man wil l fashion fo r

himself ; some worship he wil l offer. And as are

these things,so is a nation’s l ife ; by them is its

character moulded .

‘ No nation,

’ says Principal

Fairbairn,‘ is ever better than its conception o f God .

Where Go d is badly conceived,the laws and manners

o f the people are sure to be bad ; where He is

nobly thought of,the ideal of the people wil l also

THE F IRST COMMANDMENT 3 1

be noble,their history a struggle towards higher

excellence.’

And this is the point at which Go d first meets H is

chosen people : not with a demonstration o f H is

existence—for that there was no need—but with arevelation

,albeit a partial revelation

,o fH is character?

First of al l the J ew must be taught the true idea

o fGod .

The revelation , I say, was‘ partial

,

’ and at this

stage inevitably so . When can yo u tel l the whole

truth o n any great matter to a child You must be

content to speak by hint, parable, suggestion. And

as yet Israel was but a child , and must be treated so.

Only in certain aspects o fit could the truth concern ing

Go d be made known ; n o t til l the fulness o f time

had come could the ful l revelation be given o r

received. Do I speak to o strongly when I say that

five-sixths of the so -cal led ‘O ld Testament difficulties

o f which we have heard so much owe their existence

to forgetfulness o f that elementary truth ? But

though the whole truth could not yet be told,o ne

lesson at least Israel must learn straightway,and this

the First Commandment was given to make plain

Jehovah is supreme, sol itary, sovereign : Thou shalt

have none o ther gods befo reMe.

’

D id this command , it has often been asked , involve

what is called an absolute monotheism ‘ I am the

Lord,and there is none else beside Me there is no

Go d’

: so did Jehovah speak by the mouth o f the


great prophet o f the Exile. Was it thus that the

children o f Israel understood this first word spoken

from Sinai ? I t does not seem to me necessary to

insist o n that interpretation. Monotheism is impl icit

rather than expl icit in the commandment,which does

not in so many words declare that there is but one

God. As to the deities o fEgypt,o r Canaan , o r other

lands,nothing is said o f them they are simply

passed over in silence and at first,at any rate, I srael

would no t hear in the commandment any co ndemna

tion of them . But what this law did unmistakably

was that fo r I srael there is but o ne God,

ah whatever other nations might do,H im only

must they serve. And when Israel had learned that

lesson , the seed had begun to germinate from which

was ultimately to spring the pure monotheism of Jew

and Gentile al ike.

I I

The Lord is sovereign,supreme ; this, I say, was

the tru th which, fi rst o f all , I srael must learn. And

the truth was taught in two ways

( I ) First, by the new name under which God made

H imsel f known,the name o f ‘ Jehovah.

’ What did

this name signify ? Without attempting to cut our

way through the tangled thickets o f controversy

which have sprung up about the word,this at least

seems clear : that it i s derived from the o ld Hebrew

THE FIRST COMMANDMENT 3 3

verb ‘ to be,

’ and that it has o ne o ftwo possible mean

! ings,either ‘ He who is ’

o r‘ He who causes to be.’

What idea,then

,do we get of H im who proclaims

H imsel f by this name ? That He alone is , uncreated

and uncaused,alone He exists o f H imsel f

,the

eternal source o fal l that is . I do not mean that this,and al l that lay involved in it

,was ful ly grasped by

Israel at Sinai ; but who does not see the significance

of a name like this given to a people situated as the

people o f Israel then were ? They had just escaped

o ut of Egypt into Canaan . With the whole l ife o f

the inhabitants o f both these lands polytheism was

inextricably intertwined . In Egypt,whence they

had but just come,men worshipped the sun

,the moon

and the stars,even the river and the soil. Now by

o ne word the falsehood o f it al l is laid bare : ‘ I am

jeho'uah .

’ These that men ignorantly worship are

but created things the Lord is their creator ; He is

God alone H im only shal l ye serve.

( 2 ) But the revelation o f D ivine sovereignty was

n o t l imited by the new D ivine name,great as that

was. Long generations must pass before the whole

truth,o f which that name was the channel

,could

sink into the minds o fthe children o f I srael . Mean

while, something more definite and palpable w as

needed , something that would strike the imagination

and make its appeal,vividly and immediately, to

the whole people. And where should that needed

something be found if not in their own past history ?

C


Herein l ies the significance o f the reference in the

words which stand as a preface to the Decalogue‘ I am the Lord thy Go d

,wh ich brought thee o ut of

the land ofEgypt, o ut of the house of bondage.

’ God

did not seek to convince I srael by abstract reason

ings that He was the supreme One ; He manifested

H imself before their eyes as supreme. He over

whelmed the false deities o f Egypt with confusion ;He brought to naught the might o f Pharaoh and

all his host ; He made them to be a people who

before were not a people ; and then , when the evi

dences o f H is mighty working were manifest before

them all,He gave them His law

,saying, Thou shalt

have none other gods before Me.’ When Authority

clothes itself in love l ike this,who shal l say it nay ?

The slain Lamb in the midst o f the throne who can

withstand ? There is no Sovereignty l ike the sove

reignty o f grace. ‘ I am the Lord thy God,which

brought thee o ut o f the land of Egypt,o ut o f the

house o fbondage.’

Yet the truth was grasped but Slowly. I srael’s

histo ry is marked by the saddest and strangest lapses

into ido latry. In Spite o f the warnings o f the pro

phets , and the continual suffering which their way

wardness bro ught upon them ,the people turned

again and again,with almost unaccountable per

versity, to seek after strange gods . But He who

brought them o ut o f Egypt bore long with them,

and taught them , til l at last the truth first given



o f the heart. That which we lean o n,that to which

we give o ur best,that which enchains o ur heart—that

is o ur god. A man’s true worship is n o t the worship

which he performs in the publ ic temple,but that

which he offers down in that l ittle private chapel

where nobody goes but himself.’ And if there ‘ we

have forgotten the name o f o ur God,and spread

forth o ur hands to a strange go d, shal l no t Go d

search this o ut ? Fo r He knoweth the secrets o f

the heart.’ ‘ This people honoureth me with theirxl ips ’

: every week in God’s house that is what we

do. But if He who knoweth the secrets of the

heart search us o ut,what shall He find ? Will He

say o f us,‘ Their heart is far from Me

,

’ because

we have chosen some other god before H im ?

Idolatry dead ? The First Commandment o ut o f

date ? Alas, alas ! no ; never was the worship o f

the true Go d in such peril o f being choked with

the deceitfulness o f idols as at this very moment

in Christian England . We never broke the First

Commandment ? Then what o f the Tenth ? And

covetousness is idolatry. Do we not stil l,as in the

days o f Habakkuk the prophet,‘ sacrifice unto o ur

net and burn incense unto o ur drag,because by them

our portion is fat and o ur meat plenteous ? ’ I s not

Paul’s terrible indictment sti l l true of multitudes

J of us—we mind earthly things, o ur go d is o ur bel ly ?Would the Bedford tinker need to seek far to find

his man that could look no way but downward,with

THE FIRST COMMANDMENT 37

the muck-rake in his hand ? One stil l stands over us

with a celestial crown in his hand,and proffers to

give us that crown fo r o ur muck-rake but stil l we do

neither look up n o r regard,but rake to ourselves the

straws,the small sticks, and dust o fthe floor. In al l

o ur thoughts Go d is not, but instead the greed o f the

Mammon-worshipper,the narrowing lust o fgold

,the

unholy passion o fthe sensual ist, al l the petty vanities

and sordid ambitions o f them that every hour o f the

day and every day o fthe week crowd into the temple

and grovel before the altar o fthe go d o fthis world.

Thou shalt have none other gods before Me ’

; and

as surely as men forget that to-day,so surely shal l

the warn ings o f the prophets of o ld fulfi l themselves

in our ears. Every word they speak concerning the

folly and futil ity of the idolatry o f the past has an

application,not less pointed

,to the idolatry o f the

present. One shall cry unto !h is god!, yet can he notanswer

,n or save h im out of his trouble is it not so

stil l ? What can our gods do fo r us when we are

brought low,or in the dark and sore abasement

o fdeath ? ‘ l n that day a man shall cast away his id o

of s ilver and h is ido ls ofgo ld, wh ich they madefo r h im

to wo rsh ip, to the moles and to the bats’ have we not

seen that also,when men in weariness and disappoint

ment have turned from their idols,i t may be to seek

after other gods to their hurt,it may be to seek after

a true and l iving Go d to their salvation ? They that

mahe them shal l be l ihe unto them yea, every one that

V


trusteth in them’ is it not always so ? Our gods

cannot l ift us beyond ourselves ; men fol low their

gaze ; they grow l ike that they l ive for. Ahaz sac

r ificed un to the gods of Damascus , say ing,1 w ill

sacr ifice to them that they may help me,but they were

the ru in of h im and al l Israel’

: God open o ur eyes

in time,lest we also perish in l ike manner !

But mayhap we are attempting a compromise.

Like the Jews,who never wholly cast o ff Jehovah ,

but thought they might give H im a divided alle

gian ce ; l ike the Roman Emperor, who had a statue

o f Jesus and a statue o f Plato side by S ide in his

pantheon,so we set up o ur l ittle row o f deities. To

each we y ield homage in its turn . To-day,the

Sabbath, is saved fo r Jehovah to-morrow,Mammon

-o r worse—is our choice. I tel l you—no, not I , He

tel ls you—nay ! The Lord is a jealous God ; He

will brook no rival ; He wil l share H is throne with

none ; He wil l be al l in al l , o r He wil l be nothing.

Ye cannot serve Go d and Mammon. H im only

shalt thou serve. Oh ! let us take H im this day

to be the Lord o ur God,let us yield ourselves to

H im ; and when again He speaks and says ,‘ Thou

shalt have none other gods before Me,

’ let us make

answer to H im,

‘ Lord,have mercy upon us, and

incl ine o ur hearts to keep this law.

’

SE COND COMMANDMENT

Thou shalt not make unto thee a graven image, nor the likeness ofany form that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, orthat is in the water under the earth : thou shalt not bow down thyselfunto them, nor serve them : for I the Lord thy God am ajealous God,visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third andupon the fourth generation of them that hate Me and shewing mercyunto thousands of them that love Me and keep My commandments.

’

Exo nus xx . 4, 5, 6.

THE SECOND COMMANDMENT

LET us begin by endeavouring to understand what

the commandment means. Why was it given,and

what exactly is it that by it is forbidden ?

I

( I ) And , in the first place, how is this Second

Commandment related to,and how does it differ

from,the First ? To many the distinction is by no

means obvious. More than once it has been said

Are not the two commandments really o ne ? Thou

shalt have none other gods before Me —that forbids

idolatry.

‘ Thou shalt n o t make unto thee a graven

image,nor the l ikeness o fany form that is in heaven

above,o r that is in the earth beneath

,o r that is in the

water under the earth : thou shalt n o t b ow down thy

self unto them,no r serve them —what is this but the

prohibition o f idolatry over again ?

But this word ‘ idolatry’has two quite distinct mean

ings. Sometimes it signifies the worship o ffalse gods ;and when men bow down to the sun , the moon , o r the

stars,we call them idolaters.’ That is the sin which

41


is forbidden by the First Commandment. But that

is n o t the only mean ing o f the term . We speak o f

the ‘ idolatry ’

o fthe children o f I srael,when in the

wilderness they worshipped the golden calf which

Aaron made fo r them. Yet they had n o t broken the

First Commandment ; the calf was no t to them in

the place o fGo d ; it was meant merely as the symbol/

o fthe unseen Jehovah. We are d istinctly told that

when the image was made,Aaron made a proclama

tion and said,To -morrow shal l be a feast to the

Lo rd.

’ Why then was Go d angry with the children

o f I srael,and why did He visit them with such sore

punishment ? Because they had worshipped the true

God under a false and forb idden form : they had kept

the First,but they had broken the Second Com

mandment. So l ikewise did Jeroboam s in when ,after the revolt o fthe tribes and the division o f the

kingdom,he set up the two calves o f gold—one at

Bethel and o ne at Dan—as representatives o f the

Go d who was worshipped at Jerusalem. Ahab,

the other hand,

‘ as if it had been a l ight thing

fo r him to walk in the sins o f Jeroboam went

and served Baal and worshipped him . And he

reared up an altar fo r Baal,in the house of Baal ,

which he had built in Samaria,

’ so setting at naught

the First Commandment.

I t is obvious that the two offences are closely\

allied,a breach of the Second Commandment readily

preparing the way fo r disobedience to the First.



destroyed .

’ Who,e.g.,would exchange the beauties

o fa prophecy l ike that Of I saiah x 1. for al l the beauty

Of al l the idols of Babylon which it consigned to de

struction ? 1 And stil l further, let it be remembered

that if the Hebrews contributed l ittle to art,i t was in

the main because their whole strength was devoted

to stil l higher and greater interests. In the D ivine

economy o f nations,i f Greece stands fo r art

,and J

Rome fo r law,it is to Judaea that we look as the

birthplace and home Of rel igion.

At the same time,a fair interpretation Of al l the

facts lends l ittle support to the idea that this com

mandment was understood by the Jews as an absolute

prohibition Of the plastic arts. Such a law,it has

been truly said,could no t possibly have emanated

from a legislator who ordered a holy tent,furnished

with al l adornments o f art and beauty,and who even

ordered two cherubim to be placed within the Holy

Of Hol ies. The fi rst part o fthe commandment, Thou

shalt not make unto thee a graven image,

’ must

be read in the l ight o f the latter,

‘ Thou shalt not

bow down thysel f unto them ,n o r serve them .

’ I t

was n o t the making Of an image,but the making o f it

fo r purposes Of worship,not the use o f it

,but the

Il

un lawful use, that the commandment forbade.

(3) One further question remains to be briefly

answered . Why was such a commandment given

1 See George Adam Smith’s Isaiah , vol . n . , from wh ich these twosentences are taken.

THE SECOND COMMANDMENT 45

at al l ? The reason o fthe First Commandment needs

no demonstration ; the evils Of polytheism are patent

to all . But why were the Jews forbidden to make

to themselves symbols o ftheir Deity ? Why should

no t a man be allowed some visible, material emblem ,

n o t that he may worship it, but that he may the

better worship the unseen Jehovah, whose emblem it

is ? Go d H imself is great, distant, impalpable ; why

should I be denied the use Ofthat which might bring

H im near to me,and help me to draw near to H im ?

The reasoning sounds plausible yet it was this very

thing that Jehovah sternly forbade. Nor is it diffi

cult to understand why.

A l l symbols tend to usurp the place o f Go d H im

self. Theoretical ly,it is true

,men do n o t worship

the material emblem . But al l experience shows that

as men put their trust in symbols,God is robbed Of

H is due. The symbol is always o n the way to being

a fetish. Beginning by being only a medium through

which the Eternal may be more easily apprehended,

it ends by intercepting and securing fo r itself that

which belongs to Go d alone. I t was exactly this

that had happened,as Principal Fairbairn tells us

,

in the land fro m which the children Of I srael had just

come. ‘ I n Egypt,

’ he says,

‘ the symbolism had

swallowed up al l the spiritual ity Of the religion .

The Deity was hidden by the symbols the symbols

were adored as Deity.

’ I t was exactly this, to o ,

which came to pass among the Israelites themselves,


when,in the days o fHezekiah , they burned incense

to the brazen serpent,the symbol Of a great D ivine

deliverance in the wilderness. Dr. Dale tells us that

he learned to understand the growth o f this kind

o f idolatry by Observing the gradual clustering o f

superstitious sentiments around an engraving o f o ur

Lord which he had over h is mantelpiece in his

college days . I t is the universal testimony : the

visible symbol,which is at firs t nothing

,is at last

identified with Go d H imself.

And again , symbolism tends to degrade o ur co n

ceptio n o fGo d. The cal f-worship Of which we read

so much in the O ld Testament was fatal,inevitably

fatal,to the purity Of the worship Of Jehovah. In

the mind Of every worshipper a twofold tendency is

at work—to l ift the symbol to the place Of Go d,to

bring God down to the level Of the symbol . What

Paul saw at Athens happens always when men are

given over to idolatry : they think that the Godhead

is l ike unto gold,o r si lver

,or stone

,graven by art and

device Of man.

’ NO idol,be it Of priceless material

worth,o r only some rudely carved block Of wood o r

stone,can be a true representation Of Go d. TO b ow

down before it is to cut the wings Of the spirit ; i t is

to fetter and cramp o ur thoughts Of God,and to

leave us earth-bound and material .

But though the children o f I srael were thus fo r

bidden to make unto them any graven image, the

instinct that sought after a Go d nigh at hand and


not afar o ff, a Go d who could be seen and heard and

handled,remained in unweakened force. And at last

the instinct was met and satisfied in the Incarnation.

In the beginning was the Word,and the Word was

with God,and the Word was Go d. And the

Word became flesh,and dwelt among us and a

mortal man could write,

‘ That which was from the

beginning,that which we have heard , that which we

have seen with o ur eyes , that which we beheld, and

o ur hands handled,concerning the Wo rd o f l ife

declare we unto yo u .

’ He who dwelleth in the light

unapproachable,whom no man hath seen no r can see

,

He who said,

‘Thou shalt n o t make unto thee a graven

image,

’ sent forth H is Son,

‘ the effulgence o f H is

glory,and the impress o fHis substance

,

’ that in H im

al l men may behold the image Of the invisible Go d.

’

I I

The Second Commandment s tands,I repeat

,for

x the spiritual ity Of worship. I t is the denial Of

material ism in religion,o f the need Of man-made

intermediaries in o ur approach to God . I t bids us

put o ur trust not in symbols, but in H im ,and seek

the quickening o fo ur rel igious emotions,n o t through

the cunning appeals o f a sensuous ritual ism,but by

listening to the revelation o f H imself which He has

given us. I s there anything in o ur l ife tod ay which

makes necessary the repetition and emphasis Of this


truth ? There is . We are face to face at the present

moment with a portentous revival o f rel igious

material ism which,under the name Of ‘ Ritual ism

,

’

threatens to wither to its root this great doctrine o f

the Spiritual ity Of worship. In Scotland happily as

yet we know l ittle Of this movement. But south o f

the Tweed a del iberate and determined attempt is

being made,in the name o f culture

,art

,and rel igion

,

to reintroduce that elaborate and cumbrous ceremonial

system , which , three centuries ago , had well-nigh

smothered the l ife Of rel igion o ut Of it,and from

which we used fondly to hope the Reformation had

freed us for ever. And meanwhile,in the great

Anglican Church,the movement is carrying every

thing before it. I t was no prejudiced No nco nfo rm ist,but Dean Farrar himself

,who two o r three years ago

declared,in the pages of one Of o ur leading reviews,

that ‘ in twenty years,i f things are suffered to go o n

at their present rate,the Church of England wil l have

become Romish in everything but name.’ Without

making any attempt to state the whole case against

Ritual ism,let me briefly mention one o r two general

principles upon which we base o ur protest.

We are not Ritual ists ; neither are we ! uakers ;and though we may bel ieve, as I do myself, that the

ideal of the ! uaker is immeasurably nearer the true

ideal Of worship than that Of the H igh Churchman ,yet we cannot go to the extreme o f the former in

his rejection of all rites and ordinances . SO long


as human nature is what it is,with its dependence

upon the material and the symbolic,and its need o f

visible forms to aid the dulness Of its spiritual percep

tions,so long will ritual continue to fi l l its place and

discharge its function in rel igious worship. But -and

here we join hands with the ! uaker—that place is

an entirely subordinate o ne. Ritual is a means to an

end,n o t an end in itself ; it is a ladder up the steps

Of which the soul may cl imb to Go d it is as the bit

o fcoloured glass which the astronomer uses to enable

him to gaze upon the sun . But if the rite do n o t

take us past itself,i f the soul l inger upon the s teps Of

the ladder,if the eye do not get beyond the coloured

glass,if the seen and temporal emblem do not l ift o ur

thoughts to the unseen and eternal real ity,it has

missed the whole purpose o f its existence ; it is n o t

only not helping us,it is hindering and hurting us. And

that, as al l experience Shows, is what always happens

whenever ritual is exalted beyond its rightful place

religion is vulgarized and material ized . Enlisting

the senses as the all ies Of the spirit,

’ says Dr. Mac

laren,‘ is risky work. They are very apt to fight fo r

their own hand when they once begin,and the history

o f al l symbol ical and ceremonial worship shows that

the experiment is much more l ikely to end in sen

sual izing rel igion than in spiritual izing sense.’

Open

your eyes and see if this is no t precisely what is

going o n in o ur midst to -day. I have quoted before 1

1 See the author’s Fi r st Th ings Fi rst, p. 199 .

D


some very remarkable statistics from a H igh Church

hand-book publ ished two o r three years ago,in

which the writer rejoices in the spread ofH igh Church

principles as evidenced by the fact that there are now

in this country so many churches in which incense is

used , so many in which the much-controverted east

ward position is assumed,so many in which altar

l ights are burned during the sacrament o f the

Eucharist,and so o n ,

and so o n . I nstead o fthe pure,

spiritual rel igion o f Jesus we get a rel igion o f the

senses,a baptized paganism after this fashion.

‘ Ye

observe days,and months

,and seasons

,and years

,

’

Paul wrote to the Galatians ;‘ I am afraid of you .

’

And no wonder ; for when ritual is the supreme care

of the Church,the things most worth caring fo r are

soon lost sight Of. I am not a Covenanter nor the

son o fa Covenanter ; but when your brave Covenant

ing forefathers , in the days of Scotland’s bloody sweat

and agony,spread the white cloth on the bleak

mountain-side,and with only a deal table as their

‘ altar,

’ and a coarse earthenware vessel as their

chal ice,did ‘ eat this bread and drink this cup

,

’ they

knew more o f the ‘ Real Presence ’

o f H im who

said,

‘ This do in remembrance Of Me,

’ than is

possible when , as so often to-day, the spiritual

real ity is hidden amid the blazing splendours,the

visible pomp and circumstance,

Of a priestly

ministration.

And further,this movement is a distinctly retro



movement is a gigantic anachronism ? I t is putting

back the hands o f the clock some three thousand

years. The very fact that Go d once used ritual ism

o n the large scale and then delib eratelyp ut it by, is

the strongest o f al l reasons why we Should not now

go back to it. ‘ Ye that have come to know God,

’

Paul wrote to the Galatians—and verily it is a thing

to be marvelled at that thinking men with that great

Epistle in their hands should be led astray by the

shallow plausib i l ities Of a pretty ceremonial ism‘ how turn ye back again to the weak and beggarly

rudiments,whereunto ye desire to be in bondage

over again ? ’ And a ‘ turning back ’ the movement

certainly is. I t is the man that was healed going

back to the crutches with which he used to hobble

along in the days Of his lameness ; it is the grown

up man,who has learned to read , going back to the

A B C picture-book Of his childhood it is for us who

have with Open face beheld Him to choose rather to

dwel l among the types and emblems that do but

dimly shadow H im forth.

I s it said that multitudes find in these things helps

to a higher l ife ? Be it so yet even then the word

o f warn ing is not unneeded . But when men say, as

they do say,that these things are necessary

,and that

without them it is impossible to please Go d,we dare

not be silent. DO you remember how,we are told

,

the Greeks came to Jesus ? They came first to Philip

o f Bethsaida and asked him, saying,‘ Sir

,we would


see Jesus.’ Phil ip cometh and tel leth Andrew ; then

Andrew cometh and Phil ip,and they tel l Jesus.

And there are some who would fain persuade us that

it is only in that same circumambient fashion that a

man can find his way to Christ. Yo u must come by

the ‘ Church,

’

o r the priest, or the sacrament. A

thousand times No I I am no violent anti-Romanist,

Go d knows,but I am a Protestant, and I fo r o ne do

protest against the idea that any rite,o r priest

,o r

church has right o r authority to stand between my

soul and my Saviour. That hateful heresy,the

fruitful mother o fa thousand mischiefs,is rearing its

head amongst us again to-day, and if we do not take

heed to ourselves,i f not we

,then o ur children

,wil l

have to fight the battle o fthe Reformation over again.

Thank God it is as easy to come to Christ as it was

in the days when N icodemus came by night and

when the woman OfSamaria talked with H im by the

well-side. The way Of approach is as direct, as

immediate as ever it was : ‘ H im that cometh unto

Me I wil l in no wise cast out ’

;‘ him to Me ’

and the middleman,let him cal l himsel f by whatever

name he will , is an intruder. And what can he do

for us ? We have o ur great H igh Priest,and al l that

draw near to God through H im,He is able to save

to the u ttermost. Now,though you have ten thousand

earthly intermediaries, how much can they add to

God’s great uttermost Therefore let us ourselves

come, and bid al l men come, and come boldly, unto the


throne o fgrace,that we may receive mercy

,and may

find grace to help us in time of need.

I I I

And now,in conclusion

,let us glance fo r a moment

at the stern words with which obedience to this

commandment is enforced : For I the Lord thy Go d

am a jealous Go d,visiting the iniquity o f the fathers

upon the children,upon the third and upon the fourth

generation o f them that hate Me ; and showing

mercy unto thousands o fthem that love Me and keep

My commandments.’ The words have been Often

misunderstood,and sometimes by certain sceptics Of

the baser sort grossly caricatured . Men have read in

them the bl ind vengeance o f a vindictive Deity,the

unreasoning fury o f o ne who,when he has been

wronged,strikes o ut wildly, not knowing o r caring

o n whom his blows may fal l . Why,they have asked

,

should the children be made to suffer for the iniquity

o ftheir fathers ?

Do not let us lose sight of the fact that if there is

here what looks l ike a terrible threat,there is l ikewise

a promise. And the promise is greater than the

threat,fo r if the iniquity of the fathers is to be visited

upon the children un to the th ird andfo ur thgeneration ,

mercy is to be Shown un to a thousand generations .

1

1 Thi s is, without doubt, the true rendering . See R .V. marg. , andcp. Deut. vii. 9 : ‘ The faithful God , which keepeth covenant an

mercy wi th them that love Him , and keep His commandments, tothousand generations.


And when we come to examine this twofold state

ment Of God’s deal ings with man,what is it but a

s imple and unscientific statement Of the truths which

nowadays we sum up under the convenient term o f

heredity ? The race is o ne. Fo r good o r for il l, the l ife

o f the o ne is bound up in the l ife of the many. And

instead o fmurmuring, should we no t rather be thank

ful that these things are 50 ? What other guarantee

have we fo r the progress o f mankind ? I f the gains

accumulated in o ne generation could not be passed

o n to the next, if the fathers could transmit nothing

to the children,every generation would need to begin

anew,the race would be at a standsti l l . And because

this is not the law Of our life, therefore are we where

we are tod ay ; others have laboured , and we have

entered into their labours .

But,of necessity

,the truth is two-sided. The law

works with stern impartial ity. We cannot choose

the good,and leave the bad

,perpetuating the o ne and

annihilating the other. Every man must enter upon

the whole of his inheritance,the bad as well as the

good . I t may seem hard that the in iquity Of the

fathers should b e visited upon the children , yet when

we remember that this is SO by v irtue o f a principle

which alone secures the growing welfare Of the race,

al l idea o f injustice vanishes. The law which underl ies

this great sanction o f the Second Commandment,right ly understood, is the merciful provision o fa good

and wise God,who, through al l man

’s sin and fol ly,is


ever seeking to lead him to higher and higher levels

o fgoodness and truth.

And why should we stumble at that word,

‘ I the

Lord thy Go d am a jealous God’

? The word has

suffered serious degradation at the hands Ofus in whom

jealousy is s o Often a mean and unworthy temper.

Nevertheless there is a holy jealousy,a jealousy

which is the pain Of wounded,thwarted love

,the

hunger Of love fo r that which is its due,its o wn . And

such is the jealousy Of God. Why did He command

H is people, saying, Thou shal t not make unto thee

any graven image ’

? Because He would have al l

their love for H imself. And when they thrust creed,

o r rite,o r symbol between H imself and them, He

sent H is prophets to lay rude hands o n the unholy

thing,and to cry, Nehushtan ! a piece Of brass ! In

the Lord God Of hosts be your trust,and not in these

things !’

Once when I was a lad a jeering unbel iever said

to me,Your Bible is not true to itself : it says that

Go d is love, and it says that He is a jealous God

how can He be both ? ’ and I , being only a child , did

n o t know how to answer him . But now I know that

Go d could not be a jealous God if He were not a

loving God ; H is jealousy is a measure o f H is

Never could He speak thus to me if He were

indifferent to me, if it were a matter of no concern

to H im whether I served H im o r not. And when I

read these old,Old words, instead of the face o f an


angry Deity,breathing forth threatenings and wrath

,

which is al l that some men see, there meets me a

Face all aglow with love,and eyes that hunger fo r

my love. And when I put down my ear to l isten,

instead o f the gnashing fury o f jealous hate,which

is al l that some men hear,a Voice o f love

,tender,

beseeching,pitiful , cal ls to me :

‘ Child o f man , I

have redeemed thee,thou art M ine ; yield thyself

to Me.’


Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain ; for theLord wil l not hold guiltless taketh inExo nus xx. 7.

THE TH IRD COMMANDMENT

FOLLOWING the plan o fthe two previous addresses,let us begin by learning in what sense this command

ment was understood by those to whom it was first

given,passing then to the consideration of its meaning

fo r us tod ay.

I

There is some sl ight ambiguity in the wording o f

the commandment. What is it to take the name

Ofthe Lord ‘ in vain The phrase so translated—Ifol low the exposition o fPrincipal Dykes—may meaneither Of two things : ( I ) Falsely, that is, to cover a J

l ie ; or ( 2 ) Wi thout real ity, that is, as an empty, Vhollow pretence SO that the commandment may

be regarded as a prohibition Of false swearing ; o r,giving to it a more general meaning

,as directed

against al l idle and irreverent use Of the D ivine name

whatever. In a word, the commandment condemns

either perjury o r profanity. I f now we turn to the

book Of Leviticus,we shal l find there (xix. 1 2 ) a kind

of ampl ified version o f this law,in which both sins

61


are condemned : ‘ Ye shal l not swear by My name

falsely ; neither shalt thou profane the name o fthy

Go d : I am Jehovah.

’ We shall therefore probably

b e r ight if, interpreting the earl ier word in the l ight

o f th e later,we regard this commandment as the

prohibition Of perjury and profanity al ike.

I t is worthy of note that,so emphatic is the

testimony which this ancient code bears to the

cardinal virtue of truthfulness,the s in of false swearing

is condemned both by the N inth and Third Command

ments. There it is forbidden as a crime against man,

here as a s in against the Most H igh God,whose

majesty it violates,whose judgment it defies.

Considerable d iscussion has arisen concern ing the

relation Of this commandment to the taking o f

judicial oaths . I t wil l hardly be contended that the

custom Ofoath-taking in courts of j ustice is a breach

o f the commandment as it stands in the Decalogue.

To say nothing o f the solemn example o f Jehovah

H imself swearing by H is own awful Name, the sense

Of this law was undoubtedly given by Jesus when He

said,Ye have heard that it was said to them o f o ld

time,Thou shalt not forswear thyself

,but shal l

perform unto the Lord thine oaths.’ I t is,Of course

,

the words o f Christ which follow which have given

rise to the doubt that has arisen in the minds Of

some : ‘ I say unto yo u ,Swear not at al l ; neither by

the heaven,for it is the throne of God ; nor by the

earth,for it is the footstool of H is feet ; nor by

THE TH IRD COMMANDMENT 63

Jerusalem, fo r it is the city o fthe great ! ing. Neither

shalt thou swear by thy head , for thou canst not make

o ne hair white o r black. But let your speech be, Yea,yea ; Nay, nay : and whatsoever is more than these

is Of the evi l o ne.

’ The Friends, as is wel l known ,regard these words as an absolute prohibition Of al l

oaths under any circumstances whatever. Let me

say at once that, whether their interpretation be right

o r wrong, it is nothing less than monstrous that any

o ne holding it, and therefore conscientiously question

ing the lawfulness o f oaths,should be subjected to

legal o r civi l d isab i l ities for refusing to take them.

Ideally,to o

,in this as in other matters

,I bel ieve the

! uaker is right. H is i s the goal towards which

Christ is pointing us ; and when human society i s

reconstructed o n the basis o f the Sermon o n the

Mount,and a man’s word is his bond

,the oath wil l

be a meaningless form,because it wil l be impossible

to add to the sacredness Of the Obl igations o f truth.

But that time is not yet ; and meanwhile, because o f

the hardness of men’s hearts,many things are suffered

to remain which will one day pass away. Further,

Christ’s words must be interpreted in the l ight o f the

circumstances under which they were spoken and o f

the rest o fScripture. When Christ spoke truthfulness

was being undermined by the false distinctions per

m itted and encouraged by the casuistry o fthe Rabbis.There were, they said, oaths that were binding and

oaths that were not binding. I f a man sware by


Jehovah, o r used the D ivine Name at al l , his oath bound

him but if the Sacred Name did not pass his l ips,i f

he only sware by Jerusalem,o r by the Temple

,o r by

his head,he might go free. Christ broke through

this mesh o frabbinical sophistry with o ne plain word,

and,regardless for the moment Of al l possible ex

ceptio n s , declared ,‘ I say unto you , Swear not at al l.

’

That there are exceptions,the New Testament itself

seems plainly to Show. Witness the solemn assevera

tions OfSt. Paul : Before God I lie not,’ I cal l God

fo r a witness upon my soul ,’ ‘ God is my witness

,

whom I serve in my spirit in the gospel o fHis Son.

’

‘ And our Lord also,

’ as o ne writer points o ut,

‘ when

put o n oath before the high priest,took the adjura

tion as made under the law,and thus both recog

n ized and establ ished the lawfulness and propriety

o f the judicial custom .

’

Of the sins which this commandment forbids,

perjury and profanity,it is not necessary for me to

speak ; the o ne i s a crime against the common law

punishable by severe penalties the other is now an

Offence so vulgar that to be guilty o f i t is to be guilty

Of a b reach o f the laws of al l good society. I t is

indeed a fact o f sad significance that,as Dr. Dale

says,profanity should have held its own as long

as it was regarded only as a s in against God,and

vanished as soon as it became an Offence against

the conventional ities o f the drawing-room . But the

commandment is more than a prohibition,it is a call

THE TH IRD COMMANDMENT 65

to reverence,and it is as such that I want us here

carefully to consider it. ‘ Thou shalt not take the

name o f the Lord thy God in vain ’

; that is to say,

not the name simply,but al l that the name connotes

and reveals ; the character and being o f H im who

took it,that thereby He might make H imself known

,

are to be h eld in reverence. The Jews,with that

/strange l iteral ism which has always been their curse

,

gave their reverence to the word itself. The mere

vocable was invested with mysterious awe. I t was

/never used in their intercourse with heathen nations

gradual ly they ceased even to use it themselves.

There is a tradition that it was heard but once a year,

when it was uttered by the high priest o n the great

day o f Atonement. ‘ In reading the Scriptures it

became customary never to pronounce it,but to

replace it,wherever it occurred

,with another D ivine

name,which was regarded as less awful and august.’

And , as every one who has had a fi rst lesson in the

reading o fhis Hebrew Bible knows,the signs o f that

strange custom are to be found there to this day.

1

This is the beginning Of that Pharisaism which by

and by wil l devour widows’ houses and for a pretence

make long prayers. No t with such Observances can

Go d be wel l-pleased . None the less H is word abides,

n o t o ne jot o r tittle o f this law has passed away,and

H is call to reverence is as loud and clear as ever.

Let us give earnest heed unto it to-day.

1 See Dr. Dale’s Lecture on the Third Commandment.E


I I

There has been Of late years a marked decay Of the

spirit Of reverence. Religious authority,rank

,grey

hairs, the parental relation—none o f these commandthe reverence once yielded ungrudgingly to them.

No r is the tendency by any means confined to o ur

o wn country. In modern France,M r. Hamerton

tells us, the sentiment Of reverence is less and less

cultivated .

‘ The difficulty is,

’ he says,

‘ to find

Objects fo r reverence that can effectual ly withstand

the desecrating l ight o f modern criticism .

’ The

average Frenchman finds them neither in rel igion nor

in pol itics ; and though in family l ife there is much

affection and some respect,there is no veneration .

I t is to be hoped that we have not suffered to the

same extent in this country ; but that we have

suffered seriously,no one

,I think

,wil l deny. But it

may be urged that much o f the SO-cal led reverence

Of the past was false and degrading. The Obsequious

deference Of the poor to rank and wealth has given

place to the manl ier independence o f an age that

bel ieves

The rank is but th e guinea s tamp,The man ’

s th e gowd for a’ that.’

The superstitious veneration that clung about some Of

the great names and hoary institutions o fthe past has

vanished at the first touch o f the l ight Of truth. It



head and dragging her after us in a kind Of boisterous

triumph, but devoutly, tentatively, and with the air

o fo ne touching the hem of a sacred garment no t as

a prisoner Of war, but as a goddess. A l l our wisest

and best teachers emphasize this for us. We live

by admiration , hope, and love,’ says Wordsworth.

‘ The first condition o fhuman goodness,

’ says George

E l iot,

‘ is something to love ; the second something

to reverence.’ Al l real joy and power Of progress in

humanity,’ says Ruskin ,

‘ depend o n finding some

thing to reverence, and al l the baseness and misery

Of humanity begin in disdain.’ And therefore does

Tennyson pray

Let knowledge grow from m ore to more,

But more of reve rence in us dwell.’

I I I

Especial ly do we need to cherish the spirit o f

reverence in religion . And certainly no man can be

a bel ieving student o f the Bible and yet count this

o ne o f the ‘ second-rate sentiments Of the soul .’

Summarize the first three commandments,and is not

this what they say to us :‘ Think o f God worthily

,

worship H im worthily, let H is name be counted

holy ’

? When Jehovah appeared to Moses in the

midst o fthe burning bush in the wilderness,H is first

word to him was a cal l to reverence Draw not nigh

hither : put Off thy shoes from Off thy feet,for the

THE THIRD COMMANDMENT 69

place whereon thou standest is holy ground.

’ When

Isaiah beheld the vision o f the Lord, i t was as o ne

sitting upon a throne,high and l ifted up

,whose train

fi l led the Temple Above H im stood the seraphim

each o ne had s ix wings ; with twain he covered his

face,and with twain he covered his feet

,and with

twain he did fly. And o ne cried unto another,and

said,Holy

,holy

,holy is the Lord o f hosts the

whole earth is ful l o f H is glory.

’

God is in heaven

and thou upon earth,’ says the writer Of Ecclesiastes

in o ne pregnant sentence, therefo re let thy words be

few .

’ And though in the New Testament God comes

down o ut Of heaven , the law Of reverence loses none

o f its stringency. When ye pray,

’ said o ur Lord to

H is disciples,say

,Our Father, which art in heaven

but the first petition checks al l irreverent presumption,

Hallowed be Thy Name.’ Do we not read of Christ

H imself that He was ‘ heard fo r H is godly fear ’

?

SO does al l Scripture, al ike by precept and example,exhort us to have grace whereby we may offer

service well-pleasing to God , with reverence and awe ;

x for o ur Go d is a consuming fire.’

Yet will any o ne deny that there are multitudes of

Christian men and women who never think seriously

about this matter at al l ? Take,eg ,our treatment o f

the words Of Holy Writ. When we remember what

the Bible is how that, enshrined within it, l ike a

precious jewel in its casket,is the very word Of God

H imself ; when we cal l to mind al l that it has been


to countless generations o f the sainted dead,and al l

that it is stil l to multitudes Ofearth’s hol iest and best,

i s it worthy o fus,to take no higher ground

,to turn

its sacred words to ridicule,or to use them to point

o ur sorry jests ? I remember once hearing a distin

gu ished preacher and Doctor o f D ivinity, speaking

from this very desk,perpetrate a miserable joke

,which

I try in vain to forget,about the parable o f the

Prodigal Son. I t was sacrilege ; a man who could

jest over the fifteenth o fSt. Luke might have chalked

a caricature o n the wall Of the Holy o f Hol ies,or

scrawled a witticism o n the sepulchre in Joseph’s

garden.

’ When the Church trifles with her holy

things after that fashion,is it any wonder that the

world is quick to fol low her unhal lowed example ?

Again,have not we Nonconformists stil l much to

learn in the matter Of the conduct Of publ ic worship

I am no t usually disposed to apologize for Archbishop

Laud—and indeed,in these days

,when he has so many

apologists,it is hardly necessary—but when Laud

found the Communion Table,which then stood in the

middle o f the nave Of the church,used for al l kinds

o f purposes, as a desk for irreverent churchwardens,and sometimes even as a hat-stand , he did wel l to be

angry. And,n o t to put to o fine a point upon it, are

we not Often guilty o fa certain irreverent slovenliness

in the worship of God’s house ? I have no patience

with the peddling exegesis o fthe ritualist who thinks

that the meaning o fPaul ’s mistranslated wo rds about

THE TH IRD COMMANDMENT 7 1

bowing at the name o fJesus is fulfi l led by the wo r

shipper bobbing h is head Or making a curtsy at the

mention Of the Sacred Name ; no r do I bel ieve that

the apostol ic injunction to do everything decently

and in order is the o ne great commandment upon

which hang all the law and the prophets . Neverthe

less,we have forgotten the honour due to God’s great

name. We have be l ittled the idea Of worship ; o ur

churches and chapels are to us Often no more than‘ preaching-places ’

o ur people ask,

‘Who is going

to preach ? ’ and what is perhaps worst of al l,the Offer

ing o f the congregation’s prayer and praise and the

reading Of the Word o fGod—the whole service,that

is,except the sermon—are spoken of and treated as

mere ‘ prel iminaries.’ These things,let us frankly

admit it,are a reproach to us. We must strive fo r

the exaltation Of the idea of worship ; and if the

ritual ist o r anybody else has shown us a neglected

duty,let us be unfeignedly thankful

,and make haste

to mend o ur ways.

I s there not some danger,too

,to the Church just

now from a false sensational ism ? I am no apologist

for dulness and some o f the churches amongst us

which, as Sydney Smith used to say, are‘ dying Of

dignity,’ would be none the worse

,but very much the

better, fo r a touch o f the extravagances they are so

quick to condemn in others. Fo r there is a true as

well as a false sensationalism ; and perhaps the most

sensational preaching the world has ever l istened to


was heard in Galilee more than eighteen hundred

years ago. Nevertheless,there is danger. I t is n o t

fo r us to s it in judgment o n men who have bravely

set themselves to break up the stony indifference Of

o ur big cities,whose methods may not be o ur methods,

yet because they are owned by God are above o ur

criticism but when o ne reads the catch-titles Of some

modern sermons,and the advertisements Of some

present-day services—advertisements which savourmore o fthe music-hal l than Of the House Of God—he

cannot but feel that St. Paul’s al l things to al l men

is already strained to the breaking-point,and that it

is possible to sacrifice too much,even witn the laud

able motive o fwinning the careless and the indifferent.

And,again

,is there not also danger—to tak e but

o ne more example—in a certain type Of evangel icalChristianity which

,glory ing as is its right in the

nearness and grace o fChrist,sometimes forgets what

is due to H is greatness and majesty ? God forbid

that I should rob o ne heart o f the joy and strength

that come to it through the knowledge o f that free

access which in Christ al l men have to God. Yet do

we not often miss in the hymns and prayers o ftod ay

that strain o f awe and wondering adoration that

ought ever to mingle with o ur words when we speak

Of Christ ? Let us beware Of overmuch familiarity ;do not let us fondle Christ. My Lord and my Go dfaith cries in the rapture of .her new-found joy ; but

let her n o t forget that He is my Lo rd and my God.

’

THE THIRD COMMANDMENT 7 3

‘ God is in heaven,and thou upon earth ; therefore

let thy words be few.

’

Let no o ne say these things are ‘trifles.

’ Rather

let us remember, as some o ne has said, that reverence

is the comely sheath within which al l the vital New

Testament virtues are nurtured.

’ Habits o f irrever

ence end inevitably in the coarsening o f the soul’s

fibre,and religion itself cannot long l ive where

reverence has died o ut.

IV

How then shal l we cherish and foster the reverential

spirit ? The answer must be in o ne word. Whatso

ever things are honest—o r, as the word l iterally

means,‘ reverend ,

’ to be venerated think o n these

things.’ Every day the soul is creating its own

atmosphere, its own environment,which in turn

reacts upon itself ; therefore if we would have the

reverent spirit we must fix o ur mind upon things

worthy to be had in reverence.

But now,let us take heed how we apply that. Let

us foster,say some among us, the spirit Of rel igious

awe by subdued cadence and mystic colour and

Gothic arch ; let us appeal to men through al l the

subtlety and charm o fan ornate and beautiful ritual .

But whatever value there may be in these things for

some,there is peril in the use Of them ; and if we

Nonconformists have with some persistency refused


their doubtful aid, it has not been without good

reason . Our emotions may be kindled o r subdued

by the sweet harmonies of colour and sound we may

be rapt into solemn ecstasy by the beauty of wail ing

l itany o r roll ing symphony,and yet in al l this there

may be no true reverence. Reverence is the soul’s

awes truck sense of the presence Of Go d. When

Moses beheld the burning bush in the wilderness,the

sight only awakened within him the spirit Of curiosity‘ I wil l turn aside now

,and see this great s ight

,why

the bush is not burned ’

; but when Go d cal led unto

him o ut Of the midst Of the bush and said,

‘ I am the

God o f thy fathers,the God Of Abraham

,the Go d Of

Isaac,and the God o f Jacob,

’ then Moses hid his

face ; for he was afraid to look upon Go d.

’ And it

was when I saiah knew that his eyes had seen the ! ing,the Lord Of hosts

,that h is soul was bowed down within

him,and he cried

,Wo e is me ! for I am undone.’

Brethren,let us beware o f a counterfeit reverence.

I would rather,if I may adopt the words o f another,1

be a fol lower Of George Fo x,and sit with my hat on

in a meeting-house l ittle better than a village club

room,than educate my soul into an awe that is not

born o fthe thought

LO, God is h ere ! le t us adore ,And own how dreadful is th is place !Le t all within us fee l His power,And s i len t bow before His face.’

1 See a very striking sermon by Rev. T. G. Selby in his Lesson ofa D i lemma, p. 143.


FOU RTH COMMANDMENT

Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. S ix days shalt thoulabour, and do al l thy work : but the seventh day is a sabbath untothe Lord thy Go d : in it thou shalt not do any work , thou, nor thyso n , nor thy daughter, thy manservant , nor thy maidservant, nor thycattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates : for in six days theLord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is , and

rested the seventh day : wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbathand hallowed it.’ -E! ODUS xx. 8-H .

THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT 1

THERE is,perhaps

,none Of the commandments co n

cern ing which it is so difficult to speak plainly and

to some practical purpose as the Fourth . I hold en

tirely with those who say that the pulpit is n o t fo r

the airing Of man’s doubts,but for the proclamation

Of God’s certainties . Yet this is just o ne o f those

cases in which,though a man is almost compelled to

speak,it is so difficult for him to Speak with certainty.

The relation in which Christians stand to -day to

the Sabbath instituted by the Mosaic law has been

construed in terms d irectly opposite by men o f equal

scholarship and godliness. Thus the great Conti

nen tal Reformers , Lutheran and Calvinist al ike, held

that Scripture hath abol ished the Sabbath by teach

ing that al l Mosaic ceremonies may be omitted since

the Gospel has been revealed.

’ The Scotch Reformers,

o n the other hand , declared that God ‘ in H is Word,

by a positive moral and perpetual commandment,

binding al l men in al l ages,hath particularly

appointed o ne day in seven for a Sabbath,to be kept

1 I have to express my indebtedness throughout this chapter toDr. Dale’s lecture on the same subject.


holy unto H im ’

and they even go so far as to affirm

that this day from the beginning o fthe world to the

resurrection Of Christ was the last day of the week,

and from the resurrection of Christ was changed into

the first day Ofthe week.

’ 1

I f from doctrine we turn to practice the diver

genc ies are even more bewildering. Of o ur custom

in Scotland it is needless fo r me to speak ; but if

you go o n to the Continent you find a very different

practice prevail ing. And when I speak of the Co n

tinent, I am not thinking merely Of the gay, butterfly

life o f the average Parisian . In Germany, e.g.,it is

said that the Sabbath is kept by the very strictest

and most spiritual of the people as a day fo r public

worship and general relaxation ; and when the

worship is over the pastor wil l join with his people

in playing their national games. NO one,I suppose

,

wil l question the devoutness and sincerity o fthe late

Prince Consort ; yet it was a wel l-known fact that

the Prince used frequently to spend Sunday evening

in playing a game o f chess with his friends ; and

when some o ne whom this fact greatly shocked wrote

to Bishop Wilberforce o n the matter, the Bishop re

pl ied by reminding his correspondent Of the facts

which I have just mentioned,and o f the difference

between the Prince’s training as a German Lutheran

and ours in this country.

2

1 See Chadwick’s Exodus (Expositor

’s Bi ble), p. 30 5.

2 See Bishop Wilberforce’s Life, vol. i. p. 377.

THE FOURTH COMMANDMENT 8 I

And for some o fus the case is sti l l further compl i

cated by the fact that while in practice we hold with

those o f the straiter sect, we are yet Often compel led

to part company with them as soon as they begin to

give reasons fo r the faith that is in them. Good

causes are Often weaken ed by the hopelessly bad

logic o fsome Of their advocates and that is the fate

which has befallen the Sabbath question . The con

c lus io ns o f the Sabbatarian are Often irreproachable,but his premises are usual ly impossible he gives his

case away the moment he Opens his mouth in argu

ment. Most people know the advice once given

by Lord Mansfield to a man o f practical good sense

who,being appo inted governor to a colony

,had

to preside in its court o f justice without previous

judicial practice o r legal education.

‘ Give your

decision boldly,’ said Lord Mansfield

,

‘ for it wil l

probably be right ; but never venture o n assigning

reasons,for they will almost infall ibly be wrong.

’

When I l isten to the arguments o f some Of my

Sabbatarian friends, I am Often tempted to wish that

it was possible fo r them to fol low the same advice.

The moral o f al l this is Surely very plain : in a

matter in which good men think so differently,we

must avoid al l censorious and uncharitable judg

ments . Of all unlovely sins,the s in o funcharitable

nes s is the unlovel iest,and withal

,th e most gratui

tous. Can any be more displeasing to God than they

who mingle their own strict Observance of the

F


Sabbath with the most l iberal denunciations o f al l

who interpret the D ivine law in a different fashion ?

Ah,brethren it wi ll avail us l ittle at the last that we

have kept the Fourth Commandment with never so

much dil igence if all o ur l ife has been a transgression

o fthe Eleventh Commandment, which is the fulfi l l ing

o f the whole law.

‘ One man esteemeth o ne day

above another : another esteemeth every day al ike.

Let each man be fully assured in his own mind.

Who art thou that judgest the servant o f another ?

to his own lord he standeth o r falleth .

’ That is the

true spirit in which to approach the subject, and it is

only so that it can be profitably,o r even safely

,

discussed.

I

When we turn to the New Testament fo r o ur in

struction , we are perhaps somewhat taken aback to

find that its first word o n the subject appears to be

a simple negative , and to this effect, that thejewish

S abbath is no longer binding on Chr istians. Yet it

seems impossible to read the writings o fSt. Paul and

avoid that conclusion .

In the O ld Testament we find special reverence

given to the Sabbath along the whole l ine o f Israel’s

history. But when we pass to the New Testament

we are conscious at once Of a startl ing change. Even

among Jewish Christians we see the observance o f



ignoring the Sabbath. E lsewhere,as I have said

,it

is d istinctly annulled. Take,eg.

,the words from

Paul’s Epistle to the Romans,which I have already

quoted : One man esteemeth o ne day above another :

another esteemeth every day al ike. Let each man be

ful ly assured in his own mind.

’ ‘ I am afraid Of yo u,’

the Apostle wrote to the Galatians. Why ? Ye ob

serve days’

!Sabbaths, that is!,‘ and months

,and

seasons,and years.’ Or, if this be not sufficient,

read this from the Epistle to the Colossians : Let no

man judge you in meat, o r in drink , o r in respect o f

a feast day,or a new moon

,o r a sabbath day : which

are a shadow of the things to come.’ Conjuring

with texts has sometimes produced very astonishing

doctrinal results ; but it is difli cult to see how the

cleverest jugglery can explain away the significance

of statements l ike these ; and if we accept St. Paul

as an authoritative interpreter Of the Gospel OfChrist,these words ought to be to us the end o f al l contro

versy.

Moreover,the idea Of one day in seven set apart

as holy unto the Lord is essential ly a Jewish rather

than a Christian idea. The same idea,in other forms

,

meets us frequently in Judaism . Thus we have the

holy nation,the holy tribe, the holy man, the holy

place,and so forth. And the meaning was that Go d

claims al l o ur l ife. ‘ Consecrated men,consecrated

property,consecrated space

,consecrated time

,de

clared that Go d sti l l claimed the world as His own ,


and that in al l the provinces Of human l ife He insisted

o n being recognized as Lord of al l .’ Just as a land

owner,over whose property the publ ic are al lowed to

make a way,wil l sometimes close it during o ne day in

the year that thereby he may show that the land is

his every day, so Go d decreed that o ne day should

be set apart fo r H im ,that men might learn that to

H im not o ne but al l o ur days belong.

1 When

came the larger truth was plainly taught ; therefore that

which was designed to lead the way towards it,which

was in its very nature only provisional and temporary,

itself passed away. The Sabbath was,as Paul said

,

‘ a shadow Of the things to come,

’ and when that

which was perfect had come,that which was in part

was done away.

I t is sometimes sought to parry the force Of these

conclusions by urging that the Sabbath was instituted,

not at Sinai,but at the Creation

,and that therefore

its Obligation is unaffected by the passing away o f

the Mosaic law. In reply to this, there are two things

to be said. In the first place,traces o f the existence

o f a weekly Sabbath before the Exodus are so ex

tremely uncertain that they can scarcely be said to

exist at al l . Of none o f the patriarchs do we read

that they remembered the Sabbath day to keep it

holy. And though Of course we hear o f ‘ weeks ’

long before the giving o f the law at S inai, the

1 The illustration is borrowed , I think , from one of Robertson’s

Sermons.


division Of time into periods o f seven days is one

thing, the Observance Of o ne Of them as a sacred day

o r day of rest is another and altogether different

thing, and Of this there is no certain trace til l after

the Exodus. And even though there were—and thisis the second fact to be named—it is d ifficult to seehow it could affect the question under discussion .

Fo r i f Christianity superseded Judaism,much more

did it Supersede al l that went before Judaism.

And besides al l this,setting aside for the moment

al l consideration o f what he ought to do,as a plain

matter of fact no Christian does Observe the Fourth

Commandment. The commandment bade the Jews

keep holy the seventh day o f the week ; we keep'

holy the first. The commandment said,

‘ In it thou

shalt not do any work,

’ and when it said that it

meant it ; we read in one place o f a man who was

stoned for gathering sticks on the Sabbath day.

But not so do any o f us Observe the Lord’s Day,neither do we fear that such non-Observance wil l be

visited with penalties so dread . And stil l further,the day to which we pay special regard is to us com

memorative o f events wholly different from those o f

which the weekly Sabbath reminded the pious Jew.

How then,in face Of al l this

,is it possible for us to

declare that the Sabbath o f the Jews is sti l l binding

upon us to -day ?


I I

Then has the Fourth Commandment no longer

any meaning for us ? What is the relation o f the

Sabbath that has passed to the weekly Day o f Rest

that sti l l remains,and how is the Observance Of this

latter day to be maintained and defended ? I am

sorry to have spent so long in what wil l appear to

be merely negative and destructive criticism but it

was necessary to clear the ground in order to answer

these questions,and to build up the truth as it is

in the New Testament. Certainly, the command

ment has a meaning fo r us to-day ; and there is a

very manifest relation between the Jewish Sabbath

and the Christian Sunday,though the latter is not

fenced about by the restrictions which protected the

former.

Very interesting is it to note how the Observance Of

the Lord’s Day sprang into existence. I t was no t

a creation , but a growth, and in the New Testament

we can watch it growing. I t was not the outcome o f

a definite command,as the Sabbath before it had

been,but a response to the conscious needs Of the

early Christian Church. At first,and for a l ittle

while,the believers would observe the Sabbath

,as

had been their wont ; when exactly the practice

ceased we cannot tel l probably i t d ied o ut gradual ly

as did , e.g., their attendance at the serv ices o f the

Temple. In the case o f the Gentile Christians,as


we have already seen,the law Of the Sabbath was

never imposed at all. Meanwhile,another influence

was at work among Jews and Gentiles al ike. There

might be no imperative without bidding them to keep

holy the seventh day,but there was an imperative

within that cal led them to worship, to prayer, and to

fellowship. They had,moreover

,from Judaism ready

to their hand the conception Of a weekly day Of rest

what then more natural than that,fixing o n the day

which was to them the day o f days,the first day Of

the week,the day o n which o ur Lord rose from the

dead,they should pay to it something o f the special

regard that,under Judaism

,had been paid to the

seventh,and separating themselves from their ordi

nary duties,should give themselves wholly to prayer

and the Word

Now,obviously

,there is nothing in al l this to con

stitute a command definite with the defin iteness Of

the Fourth Commandment. Yet we need have no

shadow o f misgiving that in following in the foot

steps o f the fi rst disciples we are acting in perfect

harmony with the wil l Of God. People who are

never satisfied unless they can quote chapter and

verse for al l they bel ieve and do wil l doubtless sigh

for the sharp decisiveness o f the language o f the

Decalogue. But such a spirit is the sign Of a l ittle

faith. I s not God the Holy Spirit stil l in H is Church

to guide it into al l truth ? Is there one who knows

what the Observance o f the Lord’s Day has been to


us,and who wil l ask himself where we should have

been without it,who can yet doubt for o ne moment

that it is Of God ? Has it come to this, that we can

only hear God’s voice in the stern Thou shalt not ’

o f Mount S inai,and not when He speaks to us

through the long years of the Church’s history ?

When any institution o f the Church can claim the

manifest blessing of the Most H igh,anxiety about

title-deeds is want Offaith in Go d.

Moreover,has God not given us

,once for all

,a

clear revelation of H is wil l in this matter in the

Fourth Commandment itself ? To say,as I have

said,that the Jewish Sabbath has passed away is no t

to place the command to keep it holy on the same

level as,say,

the command to abstain from shel l-fish,

or to practise the rite o f circumcision. E lse how

comes it that this commandment has a place among

the permanent moral laws o f the Decalogue ? The

Sabbath was ‘ a shadow Of the thin s to com

True, but beneath its passing form there lay an

eternal truth,and that permanent element of good

passing over into the Christian Sunday has been by

it secured to all mankind.

I I I

Now will become manifest the grounds o n which

we plead for the Observance Of the weekly Day o f

Rest. I t is a great social institution which provides


for man his needed physical rest ; and it is a great

spiritual privilege which secures to him,what he

needs n o t less , the opportunity for rel igious worship

and spiritual culture. I t is o f perpetual Obl igation,

because it ministers to deep necessities which are

themselves perpetual .

Of the value Of the Christian Sunday as a social

institution it is hardly necessary,at this time o fday

,

to speak. On that point the verdict Of history has

been given , and men o f al l sects and parties are

agreed. In a letter written a few years ago,

‘ at

the end o f a laborious publ ic career,

’ Mr. Gladstone

stated that to his constant Observance Of the Christian

Day o fRest he attributed in great part the prolonga

tion o f his l ife and the preservation o f the faculties

he sti l l possessed. John Bright once said in the

House Of Commons that the stab i l ity and character

o f o ur country, and the advancement o f o ur race,

depend very largely o n the mode in which the Day

o fRest,which seems to have been spec ially

'

adapted to

the needs Of mankind,shal l be used and Observed.

’

And Lord Macaulay—to make one more quotationspeaking in the same place

,said We are not poorer

,

but richer,because we have

,through many ages,

rested from o ur labour o ne day in seven. That day

is not lost. While industry is suspended , while the

plough lies in the furrow, while the Exchange is

silent,while no smoke ascends from the factory, a

process is going o n quite as important to the wealth



mood . Some persons are never weary o f sneering

at what they cal l ‘ the insufferable dulness o f the

Scotch Sabbath ’ and when you are as ignorant as

many Of these self-appointed censors o fo ur Northern

ways are,nothing is so easy as to sneer. But if

the choice has to be made between Puritan over

precision,o n the o ne hand

,and that laxity ‘ which,

in many parts Of the Continent, has marked the day

from other days only by a more riotous worldl iness,

and a more entire abandonment of the whole com

munity to amusement,

’ 1o n the other

,then I fo r o ne

shal l hold up both hands for the Scotch Sabbath.

As I have said before,

‘ a wide and rapid extension o f

the provision for publ ic amusement wil l inevitably

mean in the long-run more work for those who have

already to o much work to do,

’z and let working men

and women remember—fo r the question touches no

one so nearly as it touches them—that not only inthe book o fMoses

,but in the book o fhuman nature

,

is it written,Six days shalt thou labour and do al l

thy work.

’

And if man needs o ne day in seven fo r physical

rest,not less does he need it fo r spiritual restoration

and soul-culture. Mankind’s great want just now, as

Hawthorne says somewhere,is sleep.

‘ The world

should recl ine its vast head o n the first convenient

1 F. W. Robertson.2 See a brief discussion of the Sabbath question in the Author

’s

Table Talh offesus.


pil low,and take an age-long nap. I t has gone

distracted through a morbid activity.

’0 the sick

hurry o f o ur modern l ife,that leaves us no leisure to

grow wise ! That bitter French epitaph, Born a man

and died a grocer,

’ says al l there is to say about the

l ives o fmultitudes.

The world is too much with us late and soon ,Get ting and spending

,we lay waste our powers .

’

Therefore,just because the world is so much with us

,

just because we are by thronging duties pressed,

’ the

more resolute must we be to push the world back

from us,and to shut and bolt the door against it.

Ah,brethren

,I tel l yo u , these crowded, bustl ing days

would soon trample o ut o fo ur l ives al l that makes us

kin to Go d if we had no t the s ilent spaces o f o ur

Sabbaths wherein the soul may think and pray and

grow !

And when once we have l ifted this Sabbath

question to that level,we shal l cease to vex either

o ur own souls o r the souls o f o ur ministers with the

l ittle nibbl ing interrogations o f a petty casuistry : is

it wrong to ride in a tram-car, o r to read a novel, o r

to visit friends, o r to do o n the Sabbath day any o f

the many things concern ing which some people love

to be for ever asking questions ? For my Own part,I

decl ine to discuss these matters o r to make rules for

anybody but myself. I have read of a good Bishop

of the time Of James I . who,when he was asked

whether ladies might o n Sundays employ their hands


in knotting (something l ike what we cal l

he repl ied with purposeful ambiguity,‘ They may

The wise Old man was right. Let us rise to

the true conception o f the Lord’s Day,and questions

l ike these wil l never be asked,o r wil l answer them

selves. We are not under law,but under grace.

The Sabbath is not so much an Obligation as a

privilege ; it is not a tax which God levies, it is a free

gift which He bestows. So let us think o f it , so let us

receive it, and o ur Sabbaths wil l become to us also

a del ight,the holy o fthe Lord

,honourable.

’

F I FTH COMMANDMENT

Honour thy father and thy mother : that thy days may be long uponthe land which the Lord thyGod giveth thee. —E! ODUS xx . 1 2 .

THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT

THE position o fthis commandment in the Decalogue

arrests o ur attention at once. I t has Often b een

pointed o ut that the Ten Commandments are a kind

Of summary Of o ur duty to Go d and to man. But

now it would appear that they were original ly

divided,not as we are accustomed to see them ,

but into two tables o f five commandments each ;so that the Fifth Commandment was regarded as

belonging,n o t to the second table, which sets forth

o ur duty to man , but rather to the first,which sets

forth o ur duty to God . The fact is not without

significance, and may serve to emphasize for us the

sacredness and importance o f this commandment.

In the years o f childhood parents are to their

children in the place Of Go d ; they are H is vice

gerents , clothed with H is authority ; the family is

H is institution . D isobedience to parents,therefore

,

is no t s imply a s in against man ; it i s even more

a sin against God,by whose wil l their authority

is exercised. Even the ancients seem to have had

some glimpse o f that truth when they cal led fi l ial

N/ love by the beautiful name Of piety.

’

G


A further fact which invests this commandment

with special dignity is referred to by St. Paul‘ Honour thy father and mother,

’ he says,

‘wh ich

is the first commandmen t w i th prom ise.

’

The pro

mise is this : ‘ That thy days may be long upon

the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee.’

‘J But what does the promise mean ? I s it simply

a promise Of long l ife to the individual ? SO it

is Often understood ; and , instances to the contrary

notwithstanding, I see no insuperable difficulty in

the way o f adopting such an interpretation . I t will

hardly be questioned that, speaking general ly, a

l ife discipl ined by habits o f order and Obedience

wil l not so soon wear itself o ut as a l ife which

knows no restraint,and in which outbursts Of reck

less lawlessness are wholly unchecked . And yet

I am n o t at al l sure that this is what the promise

means. Remember that in that early time anything

l ike an organized national l ife can scarcely be said

to have existed. Everything centred in the family ;it was the keystone o f the arch ; whatever struck

at its authority imperi lled the very existence of the

whole slender so cial fabric. When , therefore, God

said,

‘ Honour thy father and thy mother,that thy

days may be long upon the land which the Lord

thy God giveth thee,

’ what He meant to declare

was that submission to parental authority was not

merely the guarantee Of individual long l ife,but

the surest safeguard Of national stabil ity and well



their fathers’ grey hairs with sorrow to the grave.

In al l l iterature,sacred or profane

,are there any

words that so go to our hearts as the piercing cry Of

David over his twice-dead son O my son Absalom,

my so n,my so n Absalom ! would God I had died

for thee,O Absalom , my so n

,my so n !

’ And to

this day,it is said

,each Jewish child

,as he passes by

the traditional tomb o f Absalom in the Valley Of

Jehoshaphat,

‘ is taught to spit at it and hurl a co n

tumelio us stone at the resting—place o f the rebel l ious

so n .

’ And let every young ‘ Rechabite ’ to-day re

member that the first Rechabites won their blessing

from God because they hearkened to the command

ments of their father Jonadab.

Not less impressive is the witness Of the New

Testament . To children Paul writes—and this is

the only word which he addresses directly to them

Children,Obey your parents in the Lord : for this

is right ’

; and one count in that terrible indictment

which h e brings in the first chapter o f his letter

to the Romans against the Gentiles is that they were‘ disobedient to parents

,without natural affection .

’

Again,when the rich young ruler came to Jesus

saying,

‘ Good Master,what shall I do that I may

inherit eternal l ife ? ’ Christ answered by quoting

some of the commandments,and among them this :

Honour thy father and mother.’ Never d id the fires

Of His indignation burn with a fiercer heat than

when He denounced the heartless quibbling Of the

THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT IOI

Rabbis,who suffered a man under cover of a rel igious

imposture to escape his Obligations as a son. Such

an o ne had only to say o f al l or any o f his worldly

possessions,

‘ I t is Corban ’

(i .e. given to Go d), andfithough the vow remained unfulfi l led until the day o f

his death,a destitute parent had no claim upon him.

‘Ye hypocrites,

’ said Jesus, well did Isaiah prophesy

o f you, saying, This people honoureth Me with their

l ips,but their heart is far from Me.’ And

,as if this

were not enough,behind the words o f Mary’s Son

,

l ike a great sounding-board to fl ing them forth to the

world,are the thirty years He spent in Nazareth

subject unto H is parents. Have we young men and

women who cal l ourselves Christians pondered as we

ought the fact that,apart from the incident in the

Temple,the only thing we know of Jesus during

thirty out o f the thirty-three years Of H is earthly

life is that He kept the Fifth Commandment ?

I I

There is,I think

,a special cal l to emphasize this

commandment tod ay, in view o f a combination

o f circumstances tending to elbow the Old-fashioned

virtue o fhonour to parents into the background.

In certain quarters a deliberate attempt is be ing

made to break up the institution of the family as

it exists amongst us at present. Some Social ist

writers—among them,I regret to say,

the late Mr.


William Morris—do not hesitate to tel l us that

while ‘ it is reasonable to feel tenderness for the

persons who have taken the pains Of cherishing

us in o ur helplessness, and to wish to pay them

back with some l ittle kindness when we no longer

need that care,

’ i t is unjust and absurd that we

should continue to bear the Obligations that hitherto

rel igion and custom have united to lay upon us.

That is a question which just now I must decl ine to

discuss. A l l I wil l say is this,that if Social ism ally

itself with doctrines of that sort,good-bye once and

for ever,in o ur land at least

,to al l its dreams o f

a reconstructed society ! There are postulates in the

world Of morals as there are in the world Of mathe

matics,things that we do not discuss

,but take for

granted , and the sacredness o f Home is o ne o f

them .

But,apart from del iberate attacks such as this,

not a few o f the social conditions o f l ife tod ay are

ful l o f peril to the home, and especial ly to that

spirit of reverence to parents which this command

ment enjoins. Mr. Barrie puts his finger o n one

o f these in his beautiful book, Margaret Ogi lvy ,

when,speaking o f the changes that have come to

pass in his own native Thrums, he says,‘With so

many o f the family, young mothers among them ,

working in the factories,home-l ife is no t so beauti

ful as i t was . So much Of what is great in Scotland

has sprung from the closeness o f the family ties ;



ye fathers,provoke not your children to wrath.

’

But it is not to these that I wish special ly

to speak just now,nor yet to very young chil

dren,but rather to young men and women sti l l

in their ’teens,o r only just out of them ; and they,

I trust,wil l grant me the apostol ic l iberty of using

great plainness o fspeech.

I I I

What is meant by ‘ honouring ’ father and mother ?

No exact definition need be attempted ; but in all

worthy ‘ honouring ’

of o ur parents,these three

elements must be included : Obedience,reverence

,

J love. In that painful account which John Stuart

M i l l gives us,in his Autobiography

,o f his early

education by his father,he frankly confesses that

,

though he was loyally devoted to his father,he did

not love him . This is probably o ne Of the cases in

which the fault has to be laid at the father’s door

rather than the son’s but however that may be,such

a relation between parent and child is but a very

imperfect real ization o f the relation set forth in this

commandment. Obedience, reverence, love—thesethree

,and each Of them is necessary.

( I ) First, obedience—and if this were a children ’s

address this is the word o n which I should lay the

emphasis. But as these words are not meant fo r

them,let me say, parenthetically, to their fathers

THE F IFTH COMMANDMENT 10 5

and mothers,that for a l ittle child rel igion is summed

Up in the word obedience ; to -him the Fifth Com

mandment is the First Commandment and the sum

o f al l the Ten Commandments. Yo u are to your

children in God’s s tead,and your word to them must

be as God’s law. Many o f us are anxious that o ur

l ittle ones should learn to say their morn ing and

evening prayer,to love God’s Book, and to del ight

in the services of God’s house. And al l this is right

and fitting ; but again let me remind you, that when

Paul writes to children he says nothing o f these

things,but only

,

‘ Obey your parents in the Lord

for it is right ’ and that al l that we know Of the boy

Jesus is that He went down to Nazareth with H is

parents and was subject unto them. For a l ittle

\/child, to obey is better than to pray, and we do o urchildren a grievous hurt when we allow any display

Of religious precocity or priggishness to even seem to

atone for a lack o f.prompt and willing Obedience.

I f they give not reverence unto the fathers Of their

flesh, how shal l they learn subjection unto the Father

o fspirits and l ive ?

But when children have grown to manhood and

womanhood , obviously the duty Of obedience is

modified. I f children are to be commanded,young

men and women are rather to be consulted ; fo r,after all , as some o ne has said, fathers are not

captains in a regiment,neither are their sons privates

in a company. I t is probably just here,in actual


l ife, that practical difficulties most frequently arise

in the case o f grown-up sons and daughters stil l

l iving under the parental roof. I fear I can contri

bute nothing to their solution . Where children are

grown up, let their parents remember that they are

no longer children ; and let the grown-up children

not forget that their parents are their parents stil l.

And though that may sound a bit Of oracular wisdom,

as cheap and as useless as such wisdom usual ly is,

it is al l I can say ; after al l, where the ties o f

reverence and love are strong,there wil l be few

difficulties that wil l not easily be solved.

( 2 ) But whatever difficulties may beset the duty

o f obedience, respect and reverence are always due.

Yet it is in this that many,even Of those who love

,

are found wanting. I t is said of the children o f

Jonathan Edwards,that when their parents came into

the room they al l instinctively rose to their feet and

remained standing til l their parents were seated.

That is a method o f showing respect to parents

which is now, I suppose, altogether antiquated .

But,for one

,I confess I l ike that Old-world courtesy

better than some o f o ur modern ways . When a

youth who has had a University training,fo r which

his parents have had to scrape and pinch and deny

themselves,al l which they have will ingly done, that

they might give their so n a better start in l ife than

they had themselves—when such a youth speaks halfcontemptuously about ‘ the Mater ’

o r‘ the Guv

’

nor,’



written for the world,the essence o f i t, so far as it is

worthy and good, wil l sti l l be yours. May God

reward you,my dearest mother, for all you have done

fo r me ! I never can.

’ I t is said that when James

Garfield was instal led as President o f the United

States,he insisted that his aged mother should be

present at the ceremony ; when it was complete, in

the presence o f them all , he turned and kissed her

withered cheek. I f any man is tempted to set l ightly

by his father o r his mother because his name has

been set o n high, let him remember James Garfield

and Thomas Carlyle.

(3) Obedience, reverence—love. Of many things

that might be said concern ing love to parents I have

only time for o ne, and I select it because experience

has taught me so often its need : Cultivate a free and

spontaneous expression o fyour love. In that beauti

ful book o f Mr. Barrie’s,from which I have already

quoted,he tells us that, reticent as the Scot may be

outside his own home—in fact, a house with al l theshutters closed and the door locked —Once at homehe is self-reveal ing in the superlative degree

,and the

feel ings so long dammed up overflow ; he has not

more to give than his neighbours,but it is bestowed

upon a few instead of being distributed among many ;he is reputed niggardly

,but fo r family affection at

least he pays in gold . Perhaps that is true o f more

homes than we think. Nevertheless,i t is an um

doubted fact that in England and Scotland al ike

THE F IFTH COMMANDMENT 10 9

J we are to o much ashamed o f the sign s Of emotion,

til l often,for lack o f demonstrativeness, the feelings

themselves are starved. I have never once—if I mayspeak for myself—reproached myself that I havespoken too freely ; but a hundred times I have done

so because the gratitude, the love, the regret that

were at the heart did no t find the right word in

which to utter themselves and the Opportunity passed

and the word was never spoken .

There is a pretty story told concern ing the late

D r. Dale. He was travel l ing, I think , in the Colonies.

Speaking o n o ne Occasion o f the relation o f a pastor

to his congregation , and pleading fo r a freer rec ipro

city Offeel ing between them ,he said that he Often felt

incl ined to say to his o wn people,

‘ I f you love me,

tel l me so .

’ The l ittle speech reached England

sooner than did the speaker,and when some months

later the doctor entered the hal l in Birmingham in

which a ‘ welcome home ’ had been arranged for

him,almost the first Object that met his eyes was

a large scrol l across o ne end of the build ing,

‘We

xlove you , and we tel l yo u so .

’ ‘ I f yo u love me, tel l

me so —it is what multitudes are asking. Do no t

say it is a mean o r vulgar desire ; it i s the cry o f

parch ed souls that are thirsting for love and sym

pathy. And perhaps there are none who utter that

cry so Often in the si lence as our fathers and

mothers. Let us love them,and let us learn to tel l

them so .


IV

But what,it may be asked

,i f o ur parents are

unworthy ? How can a child ‘ honour ’ a drunken

and dissolute father o r mother ? A very painful

s tory Of child l ife is told in the recently publ ished

Autobiography of Phil ip Gilbert Hamerton,the dis

tinguished art critic and man Of letters. Hamerto n’

s

mother died shortly after his birth ; his father gave

way to the wildest excesses,and treated his l ittle

so n with great cruelty ; he died in a fit o f apoplexy,brought o n by an outburst Of ungovernable passion

because his b oy failed to read an article in the Times

to his satisfaction. Under circumstances l ike these,

how can the Fifth Commandment be obeyed ? Here,

again,I can only answer in the most general terms.

Never let us forget that golden saying Of Savonarola

to Romola : Man cann o t cho ose h is duties . Our

parents may be unworthy,but they are o ur parents

sti l l ; our Obl igation to them may be modified by

circumstances,but it remains—it is an obl igation

stil l . And,at least

,should so great a calamity

have overtaken us,and should parents o f ours

,

l ike Noah,have fal len into some gross and terrible

sin,let us choose

,not with Ham who revealed

,but

rather with Shem and Japheth who reverently hid

their father’s shame. Now,if ever

,surely ours

should be the love that not only ‘ beareth ’ but

covereth ’ al l things . (See I Cor. xii i. 7 , margin , R .V.)


1 1 2 THE TEN COMMANDMENTS

and I want to commend it to yo u al l as the most

beautiful comment o n the Fifth Commandment that I

know. I t is a son’s tribute to his mother, o f rever

ence and tender beauty al l compact. You may think

me guilty o f exaggeration , but if there is anything

quite l ike it in English l iterature I do not know where

to find it. Ever since he could remember,Mr. Barrie

tel l s us,his o ne ambition had been to please his

mother. When he was a bairn—so his mother used

to tel l him in after years—he Saw nothing bonny,he

never heard of her setting her heart o n anything,

but he flung up his head , and cried, Wait til l I’

m a

man.

’ And when the boy grew to be a man,it was

to her that the first hard-earned cheques went. After

her death he found the envelopes that had con

tained them in a box, with a bit of ribbon round

them . When he began to write books, i t was love

Of her that made him write,it is she who wanders up

and down through al l his pages. ‘ In her eyes,

’ he

says,

‘ I have read al l I know and would ever care to

write. For when yo u looked into my mother’s eyes

you knew,as if He had told yo u , why God sent

her into the world—it was to open the eyes Of al l

who looked to beautiful thoughts ; and that is the

beginning and end Of l iterature .’ And when,very

early,fame came to the so n

,it made no difference ;

there was no o ne in al l the world he cared for as the

l ittle Old woman with her thin wasted hands and

dainty white mutch at a single word he would

THE FIFTH COMMANDMENT 1 1 3

hurry Off o n a long journ ey to see her, and when he

was away he was never so busy that he had not time

to write her daily.

‘ My thousand letters,’ he says

,

‘ that she so carefully preserved,always sleeping

with the last beneath the sheet,where o ne was

found when she died—they are the only writingo f mine Of which I shal l ever boast. I would no t

there had been o ne less, though I could have written

an immortal book for it.’ And when the end came,

he could look back and say : ‘ Everything I could

do for her in this l ife I have done since I was a boy ;I look back through the years

,and I cannot see the

smallest thing left undone. Those eyes that I

could not see until I was six years Old have guided

me through l ife,and I pray God they may remain

my only earthly judge to the last.’

Happy heW i th such a mother fai th in womank indBeats with h is b lood, and t rust in all th ings highComes easy to h im , and though he trip and fal l,H e shall not bl ind h is soul wi th clay.

’

God give us many mothers l ike Margaret Ogilvy,vand many sons l ike James Matthew Barrie !


Thou shalt do no murder.’

THE S I! TH COMMANDMENT

WE begin tod ay the consideration Of the second

half o f the Ten Commandments. I t has already

been pointed o ut, in the address o n the First Com

mandment,that the starting-point of the Decalogue

is GOD : to be right practically we must be right

theologically,morality is based on religion. Now

,

with the Sixth Commandment, the opposite and

complementary truth comes into sight. Right

thoughts Of Go d are meant to issue in a right relation

to o ur fel low-men : he that loveth God must also

love his neighbour as himself. ‘ I f a man say, I

love Go d,and hateth his brother

,he is a l iar.’ No n

Christian moral ists have sometimes had severe things

to say concerning the immorality o f so -called reli

gions men ; but if yo u want to read the sharpest

condemnation Of them that think they are well-pleas

ing to God while their hearts are fi l led with all mal ice

and bitterness towards their fel low-men,read the Bible.

Immediately fol lowing,therefore

,upon the Com

mandments designed to establ ish man’s true relation

Godward,come four great laws for the safeguarding

o fman’s l ife,his home

,his possessions

,his character.

i n


And final ly,in the Tenth Commandment, passing

b evo nd overt acts Of crime, the law lays its hand

upon that evil in man’s heart which is the root Of so

much evil in h is l ife Thou shalt not covet.’

Is i t stil l urged that the Decalogue is a rough and

imperfect code o fhuman duty,that even as a l ist o f

negative precepts it is far from complete that there

is a whole catalogue o f vices Of which it takes no

account whatever ? Then again I reply,let a man

set to work to carry out its precepts,not only in the

letter,but also in the spirit

,not only as they were

first given by Moses,but as they were interpreted

anew by Jesus Christ,and above al l

,let him lay to

heart the last Of the Commandments,and he wil l no t

again speak with any hasty disrespect o fthe , moral ity

Of Sinai. At the same time,it may be readily granted

that there is no attempt in the Decalogue to set

forth the whole duty o f man . I t is no t a complete

code,but rather—as Principal Dykes has said the

first draft o fa code,

’ and the Ten Words are to be

taken ‘ as so many titles o r headings,under each o f

which yo u must range a whole section o f civil o r

criminal law .

’ Yet in so far as this is so,is it at al l

to b e wondered at ? I f,as the pol itician is never

‘ weary of tel l ing us , it is impossible to legislate in

advance Of publ ic opinion,stil l more is it necessary

,

in al l moral legislation,to have regard to the char

acter and attainments Of those for whom it is

provided. The Sermon o n the Mount o n the lips Of



for me to speak. But there were two remarkable pro

visions Ofthe Jewish law Ofmurder which will i l lustrate

what I have just said,and to which I wish briefly to

refer.1 ‘ I t was the custom among some Eastern races,’

we are told,

‘ to permit the avenger o f

murder to accept compensation in money instead

Of infl icting death o n the criminal .’ The result was

Obvious : the poor man,unable to buy himsel f Off,

paid with his l ife the penalty o fa law which the rich

man was left free to break almost with impunity.

But this the law of Moses forbade : Ye shal l take no

ransom —so runs the ancient statute (Num . xxxv. 3 I)for the l ife Ofa manslayer

,which is guilty o fdeath

but he shall surely be put to death.

’ I s there not a

principle here the recognition Of which we sometimes

seek for in vain in o ur modern courts Of justice ?

When,eg., some wealthy scoundrel , by the payment

o fa heavy fine,which is to him no punishment at al l

,

manages to escape the term o f imprisonment which,

for the same Offence,is meted o ut to a man whose

purse is empty, one wonders what has become Of o ur

boasted equality of al l men in the eyes of the law.

Perfect equal ity may never be possible—we have no

scales Of justice firm enough for that,—but a fuller

recognition o fthis principle Of the Mosaic legislation

might at least bring us o ne step nearer towards it.

Again,in Exodus xxi. 2 8, 2 9 , we read :

‘ I f an o x

1 For the substance of this and the following paragraph I am ih

debted to Dr. Dale’s admirable lecture on the S ixth Commandment.

THE SI! TH COMMANDMENT 1 2 1

gore a man o r a woman , that they die, the o x shal l

be surely stoned,and his flesh shal l not be eaten ; but

the owner o f the o x shall be quit. But if the Ox

were wont to gore in time past, and it hath been

testified to his owner,and he hath not kept him in,

but that he hath killed a man or a woman ; the ox

shal l be stoned,and h is owner also shall beput to death.

’!Ignoring the details

,which in no way concern us, is

there not,underlying this law

,a theory Of responsibil ity

which would admit Of some very useful appli cations

to day ? When , eg., a man in a fit of intoxication

commits some terrible crime,the person who sold to

him the drink which caused the intoxication would,

if the principle Of this Mosaic statute were adopted,

be made to share in the consequences of his act. As

a matter o f fact,this principle is so far embodied in

the l iquor laws o f Canada and some other o f our

colonies that it is therein provided,

‘ that wherever

any person comes to his death by suicide o r other

wise during intoxication , the sel ler Of the l iquor that

caused the intoxication is l iable to an action for

damages .’1 And eminent judges in o ur own country

have more than once expressed from the bench their

regret that the law did not allow them to summon

the publican , whose drink had been the direct cause

o f a crime, to stand in the dock with the prisoner

and share with him in his punishment. Take another

illustration . Some two o r three years ago,through

1See Chambers

’

s E ncyclopedia, art. Liquor Laws. ’


the blundering Of a railway S ignalman,a terrible

accident happened on the main l ine between Edin

burgh and London . As a consequence, the S ignalman

was committed to take his trial for manslaughter.

But when the trial came o n such evidence was

forthcoming as to the shameful ly long hours durihgwhich

,without a break

,the man had been kept at his

post,that the jury at once acquitted him . I f Moses

had had the making of o ur laws it would not have

been the railway servant,but the railway directors,!

who would have been put upon their trial fo r so

flagrant a neglect Of their duty to their employees

and to the public.

I t is perhaps worthy Of note that,in the exposition

o fthis commandment contained in later enactments

Of the Jewish law,there is nowhere any reference to

its appl ication to self-destruction . I t is a remarkable

fact that, whereas suicide in all c ivi l ized countries

is said o n good authority to be becoming more

common year by year,with the Jews length Of days

was always counted among the greatest blessings

which a man might desire,and

,as Dean Farrar ha

pointed out,in al l the four thousand years’ history

covered by the O ld Testament there are only three

recorded cases o f self-destruction . This is not the

time nor the place to discuss the change, significant

o f many things as it is ; but do not let us forget

that, as Shakespeare tel lsus , the Everlasting,

’

hath‘ fix

’

d H is canon ’gainst self-slaughter.’



And even yet,‘ when a Mammonite mother

kil ls her babe for a burial fee,

’ and organized

societies are necessary to save l ittle children from

the fiendish cruelty o f their inhuman parents,the day

has not come when we no longer need to proclaim

this ancient law of God.

Nevertheless, an immense change has come even

within the memory o f l iving men . Only this very

week I read in the pages of a London newspaper a

searching ed itorial note on the alleged cruel treatment

o fa nameless marine o n board o ne Of o ur guardships.

We shall no t lose s ight of this case,’ said the writer as

he put down his pen. And it is that eager vigilance

in the cause o f the weak and the poor,that reverence

fo r the rights o f the meanest among the dumb

mill ions in o ur land , which marks o ne Of the great

l ines Of cleavage between the Old world and the

new. The change,I say,

is an immense o ne ; what

has wrought it ? Many causes,doubtless

,have con

tributed but the beginn ing o fthe new order Of things

is here in the new conception o fthe sacredness o fl ife

which was given to Israel by the l ips OfMoses. Our

magnificent hospitals and infirmaries,with their

countless appl iances for the mitigation o f human

suffering, which are among the chiefest glories o f

o ur time, and the great medical profession , with its

eager search after knowledge that may enable it

to prolong l ife and soften pain,and make death less

terrible—this mighty tree Of human sympathy and

THE SI! TH COMMANDMENT 1 2 5

skil l,whose branches fi l l the whole earth , and whose

leaves are for the healing Of the nations, is it n o t

rooted in that reverence for human l ife to which this

Sixth Commandment gave such early expression,

and which it has done so much to sustain and

strengthen

I I I

When from exposition we turn to appl ication,we

are met at once by two questions without a discussion

Of which no Young Men’s Debating Society syllabus

used to be considered complete—I mean,Capital

Punishment and War. The relation o f the Sixth

Commandment to these venerable topics—which isal l that concerns us just now—may be stated in asentence o r two. As to the former, it is clear that the

commandment did not forbid it. ‘Whoso sheddeth

h man’s blood , by man shal l his blood be shed —so ran

the stern Old statute ; and not fo r the crime o fmurder

alone,but for many other offences was the extreme

penalty of the law infl icted among the Jews. I t is

useless, therefore, to appeal to the authority o f the

Decalogue in our discussion o fthe question o fCapital

Punishment to-day ; the matter must be settled o n

quite other grounds. Similarly in regard to War.

War may be sometimes a stern necessity and duty

and only they who are ‘ drunk with the thin,sour

wine Of a remorseless logic ’ wil l be able to discover

anything in this commandment to forbid it. On the


other hand , let us not forget—especial ly In Vi ew Of

the monstrous statements recently made in our city

by a distinguished mil itary gentleman 1—that unjustwars

,wars that are prompted by the lust Of empire

o r commercial greed,wars with weak and half-civil ized

peoples on pretexts that we should never dare ! to

breathe if we were treating with a great European

power,wars

,alas ! such as stain the latest pages Of o ur

own history—such wars are condemned,not only by

the Sixth Commandment,but by every word that

proceedeth o ut Of the mouth of God . And therein

is justified Hosea Biglow’

s creed,which, thank God , is

coming to be the creed Ofmultitudes who might shrink

from putting their faith into his queer,quaint words

Ez fe r war, I cal l i t murder,There you hev i t plain an ’ flat ;

I don’t want to go no furderThan my Testymen t fe r thatGod hez sai d so plump an’ fai rly,It ’

s ez long ez i t is broad,An’ you ’ve gut to git up ai rlyEfyou want to take i n God.

’Taint your eppyletts an’ feath ers

Make the thing a grai n m ore righ t ;’Tain t a fo llerin’ your bell-wethersW i ll excuse ye in His s igh t

Efyou take a sword an ’ dror itAn go s ti ck a fe lle r thru ,

Guv’

men t ain t to answer for it,Go d ’ll s end the bi l l to you.’

1 The reference was to an address delivered before the members ofthe P hilosophical Institution by Lord Wolseley.



are growing rich o ut of the wretchedness and degrada

tion o f their fel lows—veri ly, if there be a God thatjudgeth in the earth, He shal l search out this also.

Ay, but if we begin to speak o f ‘ bloodguiltiness ’

we shal l need to go o n ; we cannot stop there. D id

you ever read this ancient law from the book o f

Deuteronomy : ‘ When thou buildest a new house,

then thou shalt make a battlement for thy roof ’?

Why was that ? The roof o f an Eastern house was

flat,and if there were no protection some o ne walking

o n it might fal l over and be kil led ; therefore, said

the law,

‘ thou shalt make a battlement fo r thy roof

that thou br ing no t blood upon th ine ho use, ifany man

fall from thence.’ Not fo r the owner’s sake simply

he might walk in safety,—but for the sake o f others,the battlement must be built. Yo u may drink wine

and play cards and do many things without risk to

yourself ; but before yo u final ly settle the matter,what

about your children ? what about the young men and

women who visit at your house ? will they not need

the battlement ? Take heed ‘ that thou bring n o t

blood upon thine house.’ Or,l isten to this that God

spake unto Israel by H is prophet : ‘ I f the watchman

see the sword come, and blow no t the trumpet, and

the people be not warned,and the sword come

,and

take any person from among them he is taken away

in his in iquity, but his blood wil l I require at the

watchman’s hand .

’ Every o ne has somebody to

answer fo r : the minister his people, the leader his

THE SI! TH COMMANDMENT 12 9

members,the teacher his class

,the parents their

children. M inisters,leaders

,teachers, parents, can

we stand up and testify as Paul did before the

Ephesian elders,

‘ I am pure from the blood o f al l

men ’

? Can we ? Yonder in the city o f Bethel is a

double grave where l ie the bones Of a man o f God

who turn ed aside from duty and was slain , and beside

them the bones o f an Old prophet who should have

been his friend but was his tempter,and led him down

to death. The young man was taken away in his

iniquity,but his blood wil l be required at the watch

man’s hands. Are we making for ourselves an unquiet

grave l ike that in which to l ie down at the last ?‘ I t was said to them Of o ld time

,thou shalt not

kil l —this time it is Christ who is the speaker,

but I say unto you,that every o ne who is angry with

his brother shall be in danger Of the judgment.’

And John puts it even more strongly : ‘Whosoever

hateth his brother is a murderer.’ Ah ! brethren,

this Old commandment has more teeth than we

thought. Pride,envy

,malice

,hate—these are murder

microbes give them their Opportunity and they will

bring forth death.

‘Whosoever hateth his brother is

a murderer —does not that word judge some o f us ?

Yo u never l ifted a hand against a fellow-man ? NO ;but you struck at his fair name

,his honour

,his re

putation yo u thrust at him with the shafts o f envy,

you stabbed him with the poisoned daggers Of hate ;and if the tel l-tale crimson stain had followed the


stroke,you would be sitting red -handed in church

to-night. IS there o ne o fus who can wipe his mouth

and say,‘ I have never done this wickedness Have

we not al l need to cry aloud,Del iver me from blood

guiltiness,O God

,thou God o f my salvation

,

’ and to

pray with al l the passion of o ur being,

‘ Incl ine our

hearts, 0 Lord , that in al l its breadth and length and

depth and height, we may keep this law o fThine


THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT

IT was pointed o ut in the previous address that the

Sixth,Seventh

,E ighth and N inth Commandments

were meant to safeguard , as far as law can , man’s

l ife,his home

,his possessions

,his character

,re

spectively. The Seventh Commandment h ings up

its rampart round the home,by declaring the sanctity

and inviolabi l ity o fthe marriage tie.

I

It is very interesting and instructive to mark the

various steps by which the high Christian ideal o f

marriage has been attained. Only by slow and

painful stages has man entered into ful l possession

Of the truth. When we turn to the O ld Testament

we find that the patriarchs had their concubines.

Moses,

‘ because Of the hardness o f their hearts,

’

suffered a man to give to his wife a bil l of divorce

ment,and to put her away

,sometimes even o n the

most trivial pretext. Yet even in the O ld Testament

J we can trace the movement towards a purer ideal.One o fthe favourite figures under which the prophets

133


delight to set forth the relation Of Jehovah to H is

people is that Of husband and wife ; and the beautiful

S ong of S ongs—o n e o fthe most misunderstood books

o f the Bible—is in real ity a lovely poem in honourOf a simple maiden’s love which

,through al l the

al lurements Of Solomon and his court,remains stead

fast to its fi rst and early choice.

But it was not until Christ came that the Christian

law o fmarriage was fully revealed and to the key o f

H is great words al l the New Testament teaching o n the

subject is pitched. Husbands are to love their wives‘ even as Christ also loved the Church

,and gave H im

sel f up fo r it.’ The Church,according to Paul’s tender

and beautiful image,is the Bride o f Christ ; and the

holy estate o f Matrimony—as the marriage serviceOf the Anglican Church

,paraphrasing the Apostle’s

words,puts it—s ign ifies un to us the mystical union

that is between Christ and H i s Church. H igher than

this i t is impossible to go . From the coarse animal ism

Of a bygone day we have reached at last the ideal Of

a high,mysterious union

,which nought o n earth

may break,

’ the pure espousal Of Christian man and

maid Of which John ! eble sings.

No t only has there been a development in the

marriage ideal itself,but there has been

,since Christ’s

day,a steadily growing apprehension

,by Christian

men and women,Ofthe ful l significance of H is teach

ing. Let me give an il lustration Of what I mean.

Modern readers o fShakespeare are sometimes shocked



to this direct advocacy o f the claims o f whatsoever is

vile and bestial in man we add the S ickening revela

tions Of o ur courts o f j ustice,the increased facil ities

fo r Obtaining divorce,the worse than pagan immoral ity

o f some Of o ur l iterature, the hideous social vice

wh ich is the foulest blot o n the l ife Of o ur great cities,

and the grinding poverty which,at o ne end o f the

social scale,makes common decency as difficult

as,at the other end

,idle luxury makes the grossest

sensual ism easy,it is no wonder that the hearts o f

some o f us who are not pessimists sometimes fail us,

and we begin to ask what the end o f these things

wil l be. Robertson of Brighton once declared that

there are two rocks upon which every man must

either anchor o r spl it—God and woman . This is n o t

less true o f the community than Of the individual .

I do not wish to indulge in mournful prophecies,but

if doctrines l ike those Of which the above is an ex

ample should ever become the commonly accepted

bel iefs o f the people Of this land—which God in H is

mercy forbid —this great nation wil l assuredly end

at last among the breakers. I t is no sour and narrow

Puritan,but o ne of the ripest scholars and thinkers of

o ur time,who has told us that ‘ when home life

,with

its sanctities, its simplicity, its calm and deep joys and

sorrows,ceases to have its charm fo r us in England

,

the greatest break-up and catastrophe in English

history will not be far o ff.’

THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT

I I

This is why it is impossible fo r a Christian minister

to be silent o n the subject raised by the Seventh

Commandment : the issues involved are so tremendous

and far-reaching. Yet the difficulties in the way o f

plain and honest speaking are well-nigh insuperable.

A man may resolve to shun idle and toothless gener

al ities and tel l the whole truth in simple and un

equivocal language,and he may do so with al l

sincerity Of purpose and singleness o f aim ; and yet,when he has finished

,he may be haunted with the

fear that,so far at least as many Of those who have

l istened to him are concerned,it were better if he had

never spoken at al l,for they wil l but wrest his best

intentioned words to their own destruction . How is

it possible for me—how is it possible for any one—tosay

,in the presence o f a mixed and miscel laneous

throng, o ne-half Of what somebody ought to say to

us al l ?

What somebody ought to say to us al l ’ : but that

somebody is no t the preacher,but yo u fathers and

mothers. That which is not possible in the pulpit

ought to be felt to be imperative in the home. I f

parents did their duty there would be l ittle need fo r

others to speak at all . God forbid that I should

speak harshly in a matter where the right way must

always be a difficult way ; but there is something

almost criminal in the blank ignorance concerning


themselves in which fathers and mothers so Often

al low their sons and daughters to go o ut into the

world. I know what keeps so many of us silent ;it is that same feel ing of reticence to which I have

already referred ; and under other circumstances it

can easily justify itsel f ; but here reticence may mean

ruin . But, yo u say, wil l they n o t find o ut these things

soon enough fo r themselves ? They will—yo u can

not keep your children tied to the table leg al l their

days—but with this d ifference : that instead Of having

yo u as their teacher, they wil l learn the lesson per

chance at the devil ’s desk , and some day, when your

heart aches fo r consequences that a wise and timely

word might have averted , they wil l turn upon yo u

and ask ,‘Why did not y ou tel l us o f these things ?

Yo u who knew,why did you send us o ut

,ignorant as

babes,into the midst Of a cruel and seducing world ? ’

And therefore I shal l make no attempt,by anything

that I say now,to carry any other man’s responsibil ity.

Every parent must bear his own burden. The proper

sermon o n the Seventh Commandment can never be

proclaimed o n the house-tops by the preacher ; it

must be whispered in secret by l ips of love. I have

very l ittle to say, therefore, Of the particular s in

named in this commandment,o r Of its kindred sins

and at the risk o f myself lapsing into ‘ general ities,

I must be content to translate this law o f God into

the language o f St. Peter : ‘ I beseech yo u, abstain

from flesh ly lusts which war against the soul’

o r Of



quotation at second-hand only) in which a man who

had dwelt in Sodom in his younger days tries in vain

to win the woman who could and would have loved

him had he been the pure man she bel ieved he was

Yo u would have loved me, then, i f I had l ived a

different l ife ? he said.

“Yes,

” she answered simply,

“ I should have loved

yo u . Yo u were born fo r me. Why, o h why, did you

n o t l ive for me ?“‘ I wish to God I had , he answered.

You meant to marry always,

” She said.

“Yo u

treasured in your heart your ideal o fa woman. Why

could yo u not have l ived so that yo u would have been

her ideal to o , when at last yo u met ?”

‘ “I wish to God I had, he repeated And that,

’

says the writer from whose pages I make the quota

t ion,was his retribution

,the fiery hail that swept

over his l ife and left it scorched and sterile : they lose

the power o f loving, and become unfit fo r any pure

and noble love.’

And besides all this, it may be that some of us wil l

need to practise a rigorous self-discipl ine and self

suppression.

‘ I f thy right eye causeth thee to

stumble,pluck it o ut, and cast it from thee. And if

thy right hand causeth thee to stumble,cut it o ff

,and

cast it from thee : fo r i t is profitable for thee that o ne

o f thy members should perish, and not thy whole

body go into hell .’ And just as a commander wil l

sometimes abandon and destroy his outworks that he

THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT 14 1

may concentrate al l his forces o n the citadel ; so

sometimes a man must l imit himsel f that he may be

safe. Precisely how this principle is to be appl ied

each o ne must determine fo r himself. For some o f

us it may mean that there are columns o f the daily

paper that we had better never read , and pictures o n

which we had better never look , and books between

whose covers we had better never glance, and com

pan io n ships we may no t safely cherish another

twenty-four hours, and places o f amusement which,

harmless as they may be to some, are to us the very

vestibule o fhel l . Do not mistake me. This is n o t the

parrot-cry o f a sour and crabbed Puritanism that

would ro b l ife o fal l its colour and leave it only a dul l

and dreary drab ; it is the simple dictate o fprudence

and o f common-sense. First o f al l make l ife safe ;decorate it afterwards if yo u will . But if we are more

anxious about what we cal l the many-sidedness o f

l ife than about its secur ity, some day the crash wil l

come and decorations and al l wil l topple into the

dust together.

But we have n o t reached the root o f the matter

even yet. I t is o ut o fthe heart,

’ Christ said,proceed

evil thoughts , fornications , adulteries, al l the things

that defi le a man ; and therefore it is at the heart’s

door that the sentinel must be set and the ceaseless

vigi l kept ; keep thyself‘ My strength is as the

strength o f ten —so sang the brave Sir Galahad‘ because my heart is pure.’ But when through the


heart’s Open door troops of evil thoughts enter

unchallenged,then

,in the day when the battle rages

fierce and loud around the city o fManso ul,she wil l

find a traitorous host entrenched within her midst,

ready and eager to betray her into the hands o fher foe.

How then shal l a young man keep h is heart ? Let

him learn to avoid the empty heart . Yo u remember”

Christ’s parable o fthe chamber swept,garnished

,and

empty,into which enter the seven devils in al l their

diabol ical completeness. Whatsoever things are

true,

’ says St. Paul,whatsoever things are honourable

,

whatsoever things are just,whatsoever things are pure

,

whatsoever th ings are lovely,whatsoever things are

o f good report—think o n these things’ that is

, fillup your l ife with high and holy interests, bind your

self by a hundred ties to the good,the beautiful

,and

the true. There is always peril to a ship in a storm

when it is held by a single cable. Have al l your

anchors o ut,and you may outride the wildest n ight

of temptation . Or, to change the figure,let a man

make to himself friends o f the things that are just/ and pure and lovely and o f good report

,and in the

day o fbattle he wil l find that they have b ecome his

all ies to stand by h is s ide and to fight fo r his salvation .

The young men and women fo r whom I fear in a big

city are they who do not know what to do with their



catchword ; i t is a truth writ large in the l ife o f

every day.

Some o f you will remember Charles ! ingsley’s

description o f Sir Richard Grenvil le : ‘ Lovely to all

good men,awful to al l bad men in whose presence

none dare say o r do a mean o r ribald thing ; whom

brave men left feel ing themselves nerved to do their

duty better,while cowards sl ipped away

,as bats and

owls before the sun . We have al l known men l ike

that,men whose very presence was a cal l to purity

,/

/whom only to be with made it easier to do right

,

lharder to do wrong. But to have Christ with us

,no t

at rare and far-Off moments o f o ur l ife,but with us

‘ al l the days ’ by our side and in o ur heart—whatmight that n o t do for us ? And that it is which in

the Gospel is offered to al l.

D

DO I speak to any who have been tempted and

have fallen,whose hour Oftrial has been their hour o f

weakness,who had not learned to say with Joseph ,

How can I do this great wickedness,and sin against

God ? ’ Do not confess to me it is not for me to

pry into the secrets of any man s heart ; make your

confession unto God . And though because o f your

s in you may have to go softly al l your days,and

though there be consequences that even confession

cannot undo, yet with H im there is mercy, with H im

there is cleansing.

There is a wonderful l ittle story in the O ld Testa

THE SEVENTH COMMANDMENT 145

ment which tel ls how,when David had fallen into

grievous s in,the Lord sent Nathan unto him .

‘Wherefore,

’ cried the prophet,

‘ hast thou despised

the word of the Lord,to do that which is evi l in H is

sight ? Now therefore,the sword Shal l never depart

from thine house. And David said unto Nathan,

/I have sinned against the Lord.

’

One short,sharp

cry of penitence—only two words in the Hebrew

and then, swift as the thunderclap answers the

l ightning-flash ,‘ Nathan said unto David

,The Lord

also hath put away thy sin : thou shalt not die.’ ‘ And

if we confess o ur sins,H e is faithful and just to

forgive us o ur sins,and to cleanse us from all

unrighteousness.’


THE E IGHTH COMMANDMENT

IT is a very superficial view o f the Ten Command

ments that regards them only as a string o f negative

precepts. They are rather the embodiment and

expression o f certain great D ivine ideas. Thus,the

First and Second set forth respectively the unity and

spiritual ity o f the D ivine Being ; from the Fifth we

learn that the family is a D ivine institution ; the

Sixth stands for the sacredness of human l ife ; and ,similarly

,the E ighth is the embodiment of the idea

which underlies o ur phrase,

‘ the sacredness ofxproperty.

’

I hesitate somewhat to use the phrase sacredness

o fproperty,’ because o fthe greed and tyranny which

have so Often sheltered themselves behind it. And

in these days,when property is so well able to take

care o f itself, it is usually more necessary to draw

attention to its duties than to plead for its rights.

Nevertheless , however the phrase may have been

abused,it represents a great truth. The Old distinc

tion between meum and tuum is recognized and

sanctioned by Scripture. The Bible lends no support149


to the famous saying of Proudhon that property

is theft ’ I f a man had not secured to him the results

o fthe work o fhis own hands o r brain,i f no o ne could

say that the things which he possessed were his own ,commerce would be paralyzed

,civi l ized societies

would cease to exist. I t may Often be impossible to

/defend the methods by which many have come into

their possessions—and no book in the world speaks aplainer language o n that matter than does the Bible

yet this does not affect the general principle o f the

right o f individual ownership. And it is this principle,

that a man may enjoy possessions which belong to

himself alone,and which no other may take from

him,which l ies behind the prohibition o f the E ighth

Commandment.

A l l that appears simple and obvious enough,and

,

so long as o ne is content to deal in general principles

o fthat kind , few wil l d isagree. But it is the minor

premise in the syllogism Of morals that is usually the

most important. Say D ishonesty is wrong,’ and

nobody dissents ; but go o n to lay your finger o n

ind ividual practices that are dishonest, and im

mediately you are greeted with a chorus of angry,protesting voices. Yet

,difficult as the attempt may be,

it is o f l ittle use preaching o n the E ighth Command

ment unless o ne is prepared to make it. Without,therefore

,being unmindful o f general principles, my

chief business just now is,i f I may so put it, to lay

J this commandment alongside our modern l ife, and to



more enl ightened , we shal l be compel led to address

ourselves. The problem is this : how to secure a

juster distribution o f the fru its o f industry among

those by whose toil , whether o f hands or o f brain,they have been produced. As we bel ieve that the

E ighth Commandment is a law o f Go d,we canno t

much longer put that pro b lem'

by. Of course,we are

not without many proffered solutions ; and some of

them are nothing if they are not drastic. In which

o f these the real solution l ies—if,indeed

,it l ies in

any o fthem—it is not for me to say. The time for

a final judgment is not yet come. But meanwhile we

are slowly feel ing o ur way to o ne o r two great truths.

In the first place,we know now that there is a

problem to be solved. We are no t bl ind to what has

been done. Our boasted progress during the last

sixty years,o f which we have lately heard so much,

is not a myth,thank God

,but a splendid real ity.

Neither are we the victims o f fool ish delusions

seeking after an unreal and impossible ‘ equal ity.

And yet it is idle to pretend that we are satisfied.

While wealth accumulates in the hands o f the few at

the same time that multitudes, o f whose labour that

wealth is in large part the creation,are left to struggle

in a slough o f poverty from which there is no escape

save the workhouse or the grave—I say, so long as

these things are so,because we bel ieve in God we

dare not be satisfied. I t must be possible to find a

larger and a truer justice.

THE E IGHTH COMMANDMENT 153

I t is o ur search fo r this wider justice that is

revealing to us the great truths of which I speak,and o f which, significantly enough, the most fitting

expression is often to be found in the language o fthe

New Testament. The husbandman that laboureth,’

says St. Paul,

‘ must be the first—the first—to partake o f the fruits.’ The pol itical economist may

shake his head ; but the conscience o f this nation is

yielding its assent more and more to this doctrine o f

the Apostle,and the day is not far distant when it

will be accepted as a first principle in the adjustment

o f the rival claims o f capital and labour. Indeed,

the pol itical economists themselves are beginning

to recognize its j ustice. This is how o ne o f them

Professor Graham,o f Belfast—addresses the great

capital ists o f o ur day : ‘ Your great capital,

’ he says,

‘ by giving you a kind o f monopoly,enables you to

crush o r keep o ut rivals,to raise o r keep up prices

,

and to a considerable extent to dictate terms to your

hands. But would it not be more prudent to concil iate

the latter,and to draw them to your side by good

wages If yo u do no t, it may be the worse fo r you .

Fo r there is a kind o f feel ing arising that your lot

in modern days is real ly too fortunate ; and then

there is a doubt as to the sources o f your capital,a

suspicion that,however juridical ly unimpeachable its

title,it is no t al l moral ly yours ; and when such a

feel ing arises,i f n o t overcome by your good deeds

in other directions, there are ways in which it can


make itself felt to your disadvantage. Correct,then

,

the possible defects in your title by justice to your

workers,and afterwards by generous benefactions ;

lest the time should come when your profits may

be taken from yo u, and you may have to content

yourself with the manager’s salary,o r less than the

present scale o f remuneration.

’

Yo u may cal l that

Social ism if you l ike—real ly, o fcourse, it is nothing

o fthe kind— but whatever name yo u give to it, i t wil l

be well for al l o f us if they to whom these words are

addressed give heed to them .

Another great truth,the ful l significance o f which

is perhaps only yet beginn ing to come home to us,may also be stated in the words o f St. Paul : None

o f us l iveth to himself.’ A l l are dependent upon the

service o fothers therefore do al l owe serv ice of o ne

kind o r another. That does n o t mean that the

artist is to lay aside his brush,and the poet his pen,

and turn hodman o r scavenger. NO ; our gifts

indicate o ur service and bind us to it ; what a man

can best do he Should be left free to do,for in so

doing he best serves the community. But inasmuch

as al l l ive by the community,al l are bound

,in their

own measure and capacity,to l ive fo r i t ; he who is

cont inually receiving from it,and yet y ields to it

nothing in return,is an enemy o f society o f the very

worst kind ; and therein is that startl ing saying

justified,that every man l ives by o ne o ftwo methods ,

labour or theft. We hear a good deal sometimes



I do not know. I bring no sweeping charges against

the world o f commerce,nor shal l I discuss the

charges that are often brought by others ; how far

they are true you know better than I . But I want to

suggest two o r three questions for Christian men o f

business to ponder. These tricks o ftrade ’ —no,Iam

going to mention no examples ; I might name half

a dozen,and yet leave o ut the o ne you know most

Of—what does Christ think o f them,how wil l they

square with H is law ? That long advertisement yo u

sent to the paper o r the printer yesterday—ifHe hadstood by your side as you drew it up

,how much

would He have struck o ut ? A l l the chartered

accountants in the city may be ready to sign your

books ; but when Christ comes to audit them

what ? Oh, the sham and shoddy that is in the

world o f commerce to-day ! One does not need

to be a business man to find that o ut ; it is enough

if he be a customer. Yo u remember the grim

irony o f Carlyle’s prayer to Beelzebub which he

puts into the lips o f men to-day : ‘ Help us, thou

great lord o f shoddy,adulteration

,and misfeasance,

to do o ur work with a maximum o f sl imness, swift

ness,profit

,and mendacity

,for the devi l’s sake.

Amen .

’ And with al l these things,doubtless , the

devil is wel l pleased but Christ—Christ—what doesHe think about them

But perhaps I shal l be told that,as things are

nowadays,it is impossible to have unvary ing regard

THE E IGHTH COMMANDMENT 157

to high Christian principles,and that

,as a matter

o f fact,i f an apprentice o r a salesman persisted in

introducing considerations o f that k ind he would

speedily be sent about his business,while

,so far

as the tradesman himself is concerned,the only

result would be to turn the tide of custom from his

own door to that o f some less scrupulous rival.

Has i t come to this, then, that it is impossible

for a business man to be both honest and success

ful -for that is what a statement o fthis kind means,

if it means anything at al l. I decl ine to bel ieve it.

There have been,and there are stil l , thank God ,

thousands—and among them many o f the kings and

princes o fthe world o f commerce—who have refusedto bow the knee to the Baal o f trickery and fraud.

Take the case o f A lexander Balfour, o f Liverpool.

Balfour went as a young man from the East o f

Scotland to the banks o f the Mersey,determined

to succeed ; and succeed he did , til l at last he stood

upon the top rung o f the commercial ladder ; and

yet at every step from first to last—as any one maysee who will read his Life—he held himself bound bythe moral law o f Jesus Christ. And if A lexander

Balfour,why not others ?

Yet suppose the choice has to be made—that theonly alternatives that face a man are ruin or dis

honesty—what then ? I do not want to speak

l ightly o r forgetful o f the temptatio ns that come

to some o f yo u ,from which I am del ivered. But


I know that your own conscience is with me when I

say that a Christian cannot hes itate ; it is n o t neces

sary to make money ; i t is necessary to do what

is right in the sight o f God . Yo u had better break

stones than break the commandments. Money you

can get,and get easily

,especial ly if you are prepared

to act Upon the wicked o ld adage that says,

‘ Get

money,get it honestly if you can

,but—get money

but the words o f the Hebrew prophet are not yet

o ut o f date, as many a man has found to h is cost

He that getteth riches,and not by right

,shal l leave

them in the midst o fhis days,and at his end shal l be

afool .’ You are afraid lest some day yo u should be

gazetted as a ‘ failure ’

? Take heed that be n o t the

judgment of the last great day ! I have read o fo ne

who left this world,his pockets bursting with yellow

gold,but across his l ife God wrote

,Thou fool

Thou shalt n o t steal,

’ and when the final balance

is struck it wil l be well with them,and with them

alone,who at al l costs have obeyed that law.

I I I

Let me conclude with one or two further il lustra

tions o f the need there is among all classes to-day

fo r a more rigorous appl ication o f the E ighth

Commandment.

I have already pointed out that this command

ment has something to say to employers o f labour ;



o f the returns o f their income-tax paper,that is

almost taken as a matter o f course. But if it is

wrong to defraud a shopkeeper,is it not also

wrong to defraud a railway company ? And if it

is wrong to steal a loaf of bread,is i t only a

matter of indifference to ride,say, from Edinburgh

to Portobello without paying fo r your ticket, o r o f

inconvenience,if you happen to be found o ut ? And

as for the dues justly claimed by the State,we have

no more right to escape their payment than we have

to escape the payment o fo ur butcher’s or our grocer’s

bi l l. I f the laws that regulate taxation are unjust,

let them be altered but so long as the laws remain,

and so long as we continue to enjoy the benefit

o f the State’s protection,we are bound to take our

share o f the cost o f its maintenance. ‘ Render to

al l their dues,

’ said the Apostle Paul ,‘ tribute to

whom tribute is due ’

; and a greater than St. Paul

bade us render unto Ca sar the things that are

Caesar’s.

Owe no man anything.

’ That is the next injune

tion of the Apostle—to which if men would give heed

it would often save them from the peril o f breaking

the E ighth Commandment. The credit system may

be a necessity and a boon to some,but it would

reduce the worry and anxiety o f the world and the

temptations to dishonesty by o ne-fourth o r o ne-half,

if at least those o f us who know to a penny what

o ur income is made it a rule to purchase nothing

THE EIGHTH COMMANDMENT 16 1

until we have the money in o ur pocket with which

to pay for it.

‘ Render to all their dues ’

; but is there not o ne

Creditor whom we are always forgetting ? How

much owest thou un to my Lo rd

‘Will a man ro b God ? ’ the Old prophet asked

in hot indignation ; yet we are doing it every day.

God has parcelled H is estate among us,and some of

us have got a l ittle plot,and some o f us a big o ne ;

but l ittle o r big,the plots are al l H is

,n o t ours ;

He 15 the Owner ; we are only agents, trustees.

Yet we use them for ourselves alone,without o ne

thought o f H im who let them o ut to us,o r o f those

fo r whose sakes we hold them . And deeper down

than that o ur obl igation to H im goes : ‘ Thou owest

unto Me even thine own self besides.’ DO we ever

think o fpaying that debt ? Ah ! brethren , I tel l yo u ,when we judge righteous judgment we shal l cease to

count that man honest who pays the debts he owes

his fellow-men and forgets the debt he owes his Go d.


Thou shalt not bear false witness against—Exo DUS xx. 16.

THE N INTH COMMANDMENT

I

IF al l men’s s ins,

’ Mr. Spurgeon once said ,‘ were

divided into two bundles, half o f them would be

sins of the tongue.’ I t is against these ‘ sins of the

tongue,

’

o r, to speak more accurately, against some

o fthem,that this N inth Commandment is directed .

I say against some of them ,

’ for Obviously there are

many sins o f which the tongue is the instrument

which are not covered by the prohibition .

‘ Thou

shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.’

The commandment forbids , n o t untruthfulness in

general,but o ne particular form o f untruthfulness.

According to its primary meaning, it has in View

tribunals of justice, before which men may be sum

mo ned to bear witness, and it enjoins upon them—inmodern phraseology—to speak ‘ the truth

,the whole\

truth,and nothing but the truth.

’

We have already seen that, according to the most

probable interpretation,the Third Commandment is

a prohibition , not only of profanity but also of per

jury. The heinousness o f the latter s in is thus twice165


brought home to us in the Decalogue,which in the

fi rst table condemns it as a sin against God,and in

the second as a crime against man . And it may not

be amiss to emphasize this fact in a day when false

swearing in o ur law-courts is said to be o f painful

and growing occurrence. When we remember that

perjury renders impossible that due administration

o f justice upon which society depends as the first

condition o f its existence,we begin to understand

how great an enemy to al l social wel l-being is he

who defies and breaks this law. The instinct o f

self-preservation alone would justify society in in

flicting o n the Offender the heaviest and severest

penalties.

But though this is the primary meaning, it by no

means exhausts the significance o f the command

ment. There are multitudes o f us who never stood

in a witness-box in o ur l ives,who have never been

under the temptation o f swearing falsely. But

there is another court o fjustice which sits informally

every day and every hour —I mean the court o fPubl ic Opinion

,and every day in that court, in o ur

intercourse with others,we are bearing witness

that is true o r false.

Do not let us affect a fool ish contempt fo r, o r

indifference to,the decisions of that court. I t is true

that at times we must ignore it,at times even act in

defiance o f it. Nevertheless,it has a great and serious

function in l ife ; judgment,n o t indeed upon the motives,



finished we shal l be ready to admit that,after all

,he

was not far from the truth.

If

Mark, in the first place, how many and grave are

the evils that group themselves under ‘sms o f the

tongue ’

! Where many witnesses might be called,

I must be content to summon two : Language and

Scripture.

( I) Rarely can we find a more vivid and impressive

revelation of a people’s innermost thought and heart

than is to be Obtained from a careful examination

o f its language. A nation’s l ife is mirrored in its

speech. I f,eg.,

a people be strangers to certain

shades of thought and feel ing,the fact wil l be reflected

in a corresponding poverty o f language ; and o f

course vice versd. Similarly, as Archbishop Trench

has pointed o ut, in what is perhaps the most inter

esting chapter in his interesting book o n Words,

language is a most faithful reflex o f the moral l ife o f

those who use it. And since,alas ! every language

possesses,as he says

,

‘ words which are the mourn

ful record o fthe strange wickedness which the genius

o f man, so fertile in evil , has invented,’ I know o f

no better annotation o f this N inth Commandment

which we could make for ourselves, than just the

ugly catalogue of Engl ish words that describe the

many varieties o f sins of the tongue. The Larger

Catechism makes special mention o f unseasonable

TH COMMANDMENT 169

s eech o r tale-bearing,laack

-biti111n ,g de

traction,aggravatingsmall faults, disco verin“

riginfirmi

thei r d isgrace “and infamy ; while a recent writer,himself a distinguished student o f language

,sets forth

the evidence from the words of o ur mouth in stil l

more striking fashion. Calumny,slander

,m isrepre

scutation,vituperation

,contumely, insult, scurri l ity,

rail ing,detraction , whispering, backbiting, false wit

ness,depreciation, vilificatio n

,insinuation

,innuendo

,

abuse,tattle

,insolence

,obloquy

,sneering

,taunting

,

j ibes,jeers, personal ities , defamation, l ibel , satire,

sarcasm,lampoon , censoriousness , slashing criticism ,

pasquinade,tale-bearing

,malevolent spitefulness

,evil

surmisings,attributing motives, the base gossip o f

busybodies—these,

’ he says,‘ and I know no t how

many more expressions,

’ show the ugly exuberance

o f o ur language to express the varieties o f malice as

it finds vent in malignant utterance.

( 2 ) The evidence o f Scripture is even more im

pressive,though I am afraid that few o f us have any

conception o fthe large place which this subject fi l l s

in the sacred writings. Open the book o f Proverbs

and you wil l find scarcely a single page without some

reference to it. Turn from Proverbs to the Psalms,

and as Dr. Whyte says ,‘ Yo u would think that the

Psalmists scarcely suffer from anything else worth

speaking about but the evi l tongues o f their friends

and their enemies.’ The Apostle James, as every


reader o f the New Testament knows,is very bold

when he touches o n this matter. Indeed, as Jowett,the late Master o f Bal l iol

,once said

,his words are

rather to o strong fo r o ur nerves to-day. Nevertheless

,let us hear them again in all their uncompro

m ising directness : I f any stumbleth not in he

says,

‘ the same is a perfect man,able to bridle the

whole body also and again,I f any man thinketh

himself to be rel igious,while he bridleth not his

tongue, b ut deceiveth his heart, this man’s rel igion is

vain .

’ But of course Scripture’s greatest word o n the

subject—which I wil l not weaken by any comment o fmy own—was spoken by the Master H imself : ‘And l

say unto you ,that every idle wo rd that men shall speah ,

they shall give accoun t thereof in the day of udgm

Fo r by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy

words thou shalt be condemned.

’

Not less manifold than their variety is the mischief

that is wrought by these ‘ sins o f the tongue.’ The

slanderer,the tale-bearer

,the backb iter, these men

Slugs and human serpentry —their sl imy trai l iseverywhere ! Chattering, gossiping busybodies are

the devil’s best al l ies. One in a church can make a

minister’s best work fru itless,and do more mischief

than twelve months’ preaching can undo. Where

they come nothing is sacred,and nothing safe. They

poison the wine o f friendship. They mingle worm

wood and gal l in the cup o fthe saintl iest. They ro b

l ife of its choicest treasures,its trust, its confidence,



o ur tongue,n o t because we plan

,but because—as

Bishop Butler says, in a great sermon which D r.

Whyte declares ‘ ought to be read at least once a

month by al l the men and al l the women who have

tongues in their heads —we fai l to govern andcontrol o ur tongues. Let me spl it up that general

statement into two o r three particulars .

( I ) There is, first,the habit of unrestrained

talkativeness,o r

,as Butler puts it, the disposition to

be talking abstracted from the consideration o f what

is to be said,with very l ittle o r no regard to

, o r thought

o f,doing either good or harm .

’

I should be sorry to say a single word that could

be construed into a depreciation o f the art o fconver

sation . There is nothing more del ightful,o r more

truly educational,than what Johnson calls ‘ good

talk and the conversational art is certainly o ne

which we in this country are far from being pro ficie

A great deal has been said and written in praise o f

the virtues o fs i lence ; yet si lence may be as barren/

as any speech ; and, after all, what is the writing

o f books but another way o f talking ? Every o ne

knows Mr. Morley’s l ittle pleasantry at the expense

o fThomas Carlyle and his golden gospel o f si lence

effectively compressed in thirty-five volumes.’ Never

theless,as the wise man says

,In the multitude o f

words there wanteth n o t S in .

’ The loquacious tongue

had need be well bridled and bitted . Great talkers

who enjoy the exercise o f their gift are always o n

THE N INTH COMMANDMENT 17 3

the edge o fsaying more than they know, and, as Paul

says about tattlers and busybodies,o fspeaking things

which they ought not. Mr. Talkative may n o t be an

altogether bad fel low,but he is a so n o fSaywell, who

dwells in Prating Row,and he is related both by

blood and marriage to many questionable characters ;and if we are wise we shal l not cultivate too close

an acquaintance with him .

( 2 )'

Again,there is what Butler cal ls the givingof

charactggs’ he strong inc linatiog mos; have tq

be talking o f the concerns and behm ur o f their;W W W ” W W W V !

Judgment upon the conduct o f others we are

sometimes co mpelled to pass. To discuss ideas

principles whol ly apart from individuals by whom

they are i l lustrated,and in whom

,so to speak

,they

take shape,is never possible for long. Begin to talk

pol itics,and in less than five minutes yo u will find

yourself talking about pol iticians. Conversation

would be a cold and colourless thing indeed if it

were always confined to the realm o f abstract ideas.‘ Women

,

’ says a distinguished woman-writer,

‘ are

born to take an interest in “persons,

” whatever men '

may be.’ And men , whatever they may say, are n o t

very different. Let al l this be granted ; yet wil l

any o ne deny that ‘

personal talk’ fi l ls far to o largg

{151 C eral cmi versatipgl ? When we

remember h ow wholly gratuitous and uncalled fo r

most of o ur judgments o fothers are ; when we think


how difficult—often , how impossible—it is to judgerighteous judgment ; when we cal l to mind what we

ourselves have suffered at the hands o f ignorant and

fussy busybodies,shal l we not do wel l to seek to turn

the rising tide o f conversation into less dangerous

channels ? Yo u rememb er what Wordsworth says

‘ I am n o t o ne who oft o r much delightTo season my fires i d e wi th personal talk.

Better than such discourse doth s il en ce long,Lo ng, barren s i l ence, square wi th my desi re.

No r can I not bel i eve but that h e rebyG reat gains are m ine for thus I l ive remoteFrom evi l-speaking ; rancour neve r sought,Comes to me not mal ignant t ruth , or li e.H ence have I genial s easons, hence have ISmooth pass i ons, smooth d iscourse and joyous thoughtAnd thus from day t o day my l ittle boatRocks i n its harbour lodging peaceab ly.

’

(3) One other source o f evil-speaking may be

referred to in a sentence—I mean the habit gfexa c ration. Exaggeration, to some o f us

,may

appear a very venial Offence but as one whose

command o f exact and accurate speech is equalled

by the depth and clearness o f his Spiritual insight

says,he who by habitual

,unregarded

,unconscious

untruthfulness of language breaks the great law that

\Iword and fact ought to correspond,’ wrongs andwounds himself even when he does not injure others.

I t may seem a trifl ing matter to sacrifice accuracy o f



the difficulty o f investing it with the importance and

seriousness which real ly belong to it. And yet,

surely,no one who hears these solemn words o f

Christ which I have already quoted By thy words

thou shalt be justified,and by thy words thou shalt

be condemned —can fail to real ize how serious ‘ and

important the subject is. And just as ‘ we in stinc

tively lower our voice and l imit o ur words when we

are in the presence o f o ne whose wisdom o r whose

greatness awes us,

’

so let us,real izing at al l times th

presence o f Christ,not only act

,but speak

,as thos

who shal l o ne day give account.

And,above all

,let this be o ur daily prayer

,Create

within me a clean heart, 0 God.

’

Eyilwzfspeaking js ,

the fruit o f evi l-thi mg;cast o ut a new spirit,that ‘ thinketh o evil; I t has been suggested

,I

bel ieve,that there may be in the cry o f the prophet

I saiah,

‘Wo e is me ! for I am undone ; because I am

a man o f unclean l ips ,’ some reference to the s in o f

profanity in his early l ife. I do not know that there

is any truth in the suggestion ; but sure I am that

we have al l need of the purify ing fire that touched

the prophet’s l ips,that so o ur iniquity may be taken

away and o ur s in purged .

‘ The tongue can no man tame !’ Nay, veri ly ;therefore the more earnestly do we need to pray

,

Set Thou,O Lord

,a watch before my mouth ; keep

Thou the door o fmy l ips.’

TENTH COMMANDMENT

‘ Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s hOuse, thouthy neighbour’s wife, nor h is manservant, nor h is maidservant, nor h iso x , nor his ass, nor anything that is thy neighbour

’s. —E! ODUS xx. 17.



occas ion,wrought in me

,thro ugh the commandmen t,

al l manner of coveting.

’ In the days of his youth,

when he sat,an eager student

,at the feet o fGamaliel

,

Paul knew himself innocent of all outward trans

gressio ns . As the words o f the law fel l upon his

ear,

‘ Thou shalt have none other gods before Me,

’

‘ Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image,

’

Honour thy father and thy mother,

’ Thou shalt not

kil l,

’ Tho u shalt n o t steal ,’ l ike the rich young ruler

he could say,‘ A l l these have I kept from my youth

up in al l these things he was blameless. But when

commandment,

‘Thou shalt n o t covet,

’ came home

to him,straightway young Saul of Tarsus knew him

self a sinner before Go d. Like an electric search

l ight,i t flashed its piercing ray into the dark

,unswept

corners o fhis heart,and evil he had never dreamed of

lay discovered to his sight : The law is spiritual but

I am carnal,sold under s in . 0 wretched man that I am

,

who shal l del iver me o ut o fthe body o fthis death ? ’

This Tenth Commandment forbids all forms o fevi l

des ire whatsoever—as the S hor ter Catech ism has ital l discontentment with our own estate, envying or

/ grieving at the good o f o ur neighbour,and all in

ordinate motions and affections to anything that

his.’ I t is a fact of dark and profound significance

that,twice over in his Epistles

,Paul should name

this s in o f covetousness in the same breath with

fornication,uncleanness

,passion

,ev i l desire.’ 1 The

1 Co l. iii. 5 Ephes. v. 3 , 5.

THE TENTHCOMMANDMENT

connection is not o ne of mere chance. Paul is not a

writer who spri nkles his words at random over the

page and when he brackets covetousness with these

deadly sins o f the flesh,what he means to imply is

that these bitter,poisonous fruits grow o n the same

tree and spr1ng from the same root. Covetousness

( envy, pride, wrath al l these four elements o f self,

says Will iam Law,are tied together in o ne insepar

able band they mutually generate and are generated

from o ne another ; they have but o ne common l ife,/

and must al l o fthem l ive o r al l die together.’ I

feel no ‘ love o f pelf,

’ but ‘ i f I desire anything b

that which God would have me to be and do,

stick in the mire o fcovetousness.’

A l l this is most true,and we shal l do well to lay it

to heart. But inasmuch as it is the spirit of Mam

monism,the lust for gold

,the passion for getting

,

at whatever cost to ourselves o r to others,which

forms o ne o f o ur gravest spiritual perils to-day,it

is against this particular form o f the s in Of covet

o usness that I want special ly to turn this sharp

two-edged sword o fthe Word o fGod.

And let no o ne say o r think that that is an appli

cation o fthe commandment suitable enough if I were

addressing an audience of mill ionaires,but somewhat

o ut o f place here. ‘Yo u are more greedy over your

mess o f pulse,’ said Thomas a Becket to a monk

o ne day,‘ than I am over my partridge.’ And it

is n o t necessary to have ten thousand pounds a year


to forget what Christ said, that a man’s l ife con

not in the abundance o fthe things that he poss

The cankerworm o f covetousness may devour in

the poor man’s cottage as wel l as in the rich man’s

palace. A penny-piece is not very big,but if you

hold it near enough to your eye it wil l shut o ut ‘

the

whole heavens from your vision,and wil l do it just as

effectual ly as a golden guinea. Therefore it is to the

men and women who are holding the penny-pieces o f

this l ife so near to them that they never catch so

much as a gl impse o f what l ies beyond that I speak

to-day.

Thou shalt not covet —note how the Bible itselfital icizes that commandment for us.

Have you observed how the Tenth Commandment

bends round—if I may so put it—to meet the First ?What is the First Commandment Thou shalt have

none other gods before Me.’ What is the Tenth

Thou shalt not covet.’ NOW ,what says the Apostle

Paul ? ‘ Covetousness, which is ido latry .

’ So,then,

he who breaks the Tenth Commandment breaks l ike

wise the First,fo r he sets up an idol in the place of

God. This identification o f covetousness with idola

try—which,perhaps

,more than aught else may help

some o fus to realise its true character, its hatefulness

and heinousness in the sight o f God—is not un

common in the New Testament. ‘ Ye cannot serve



grave o fAnanias and Sapphira in Jerusalem,comes

the solemn warning cry,Take heed—take heed—and

beware o f covetousness .’ Now I saw in my dream,

that at the further side o fthat plain a del icate plain

called Ease was a l ittle hil l cal led Lucre,and in

that hill a si lver-mine, which some o f them that had

formerly gone that way, because o f the rarity o f

it,had turned aside to see ; but going too near the

brink o f the pit,the ground being deceitful under

them,broke

,and they were slain ; some also had

been maimed there, and could no t to their dying day

be their own men again.

’

But the most impressive commentary o f al l o n the

Tenth Commandment is to be found in the words

o fJesus. I shal l not soon forget the shock o fsurprise

with which,some years ago

,I read an article in

o ne o f o ur theological magazines in which the writer

pieced together the teaching o f Jesus concerning the

use o f money. Never before had I real ized how

large a place that subject fi l led in H is publ ic ministry

and if any o ne is disposed to murmur because,instead

o f ‘ preaching the Gospel ,’

1 have turned aside to

speak o f this curse o f Mammonism , let me say to

him that,if we preachers spoke about it as Christ

d id,there would be not merely an occasional pulpit

reference,but a sermon o n the subject at least once a

month. We might have thought,’ says John Ruskin

,

‘ if we had been asked what a D ivine teacher would

be most l ikely to teach, that He would have left

THE TENTH COMMANDMENT 185

to inferior persons to give directions about money,

and H imself only spoken concerning faith and love

and the discipl ine o f the pass ions and the guilt of

crimes o f soul against soul. But no t so . He speaks

in general terms o f these. But He does not speak

parables about them fo r al l men’s memory, nor per

mit H imself fierce indignation against them in all

men’s sight. The Pharisees bring H im an adulteress.

He writes her forgiveness o n the dust o f which He

had formed her. Another, despised o f al l fo r known

sin,He recognised as the giver o f unknown love.

But with a whip o f smal l cords He drives o ut o f

the Temple traffickers and thieves while the practical

command to the only seeker o f advice o fwhom it is

recorded that Jesus loved him , is, briefly, about his

prOperty :“Sel l al l that thou hast

,and give to the(

poor,and thou shalt have treasure in heaven.

” Let

us turn to the Gospels for ourselves . We have

already seen how,over against the love and worship

o fGod,Christ sets the love and worship of Mammon.

Listen to H im as He opens H is mouth to teach H is

disciples in the Sermon o n the Mount, and presently

you wil l hear H im say,‘ Lay not Up fo r yourselves

treasures upon the earth,where moth and rust doth

consume,and where thieves break through and steal

but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven,where

neither moth nor rust doth consume,and where

thieves do no t break through and steal .’ The same

truth crops o ut in parable after parable. The seed o f


the Word is choked by the care o fthe world and the

/deceitfulness o f riches ’

; the unforgiving servant is

condemned because,after al l his debt had been

forgiven him,he went o ut, and found one o f his

fel low-servants which owed him a hundred pence,

and laid hold o n him,and took him by the throat,

saying,Pay what thou owest !’ the parables o f the

Rich Fool and the Prodigal Son forbid al ike the selfish

accumulation and the wasteful squandering o fwealth ;and the story o f D ives and Lazarus is the tremen

dous answer o f o ur Lord to the Pharisees who were

lovers o f money,

’ and who scoffed at H is words.

Again and again, and yet again, does Christ l ift

the warning finger and cry,

‘ Take heed , and beware

o f covetousness.’ I f we l isten to H im,i f we receive

H im into o ur house,o ur i l l-gotten gains wil l give usv

no peace til l,l ike ! acchaeus

,we are ready to vow,

‘ Behold,Lord

,the half o f my goods I give to the

poor ; and if I have wrongful ly exacted aught o fany

man,I restore fourfold.

’

11

Do I exaggerate when I say that in thi! spirit gf

.

Mamn.logism l ies o ur gregesgpggflu

tgga ?‘ The

love o fmoney is the root o f al l evi l ’ : the words area mistranslation

,as every reader o f the Revised

Version knows ; yet i f the Apostle had actually so



x destroyed by Mammonism. H is last words to the

Methodist Societies—spoken when , after sixty o r

seventy years o fservice,he was sinking into the dust

consisted o fthe most solemn and impressive warnings

o n this subject ; and assuredly this is n o t the day in

which to forget them. A distinguished evangel ist,

who is at the same time an enthusiastic abstainer,has

recorded it as his del iberate conviction that if,in

the Methodist Church, drunkenness has slain its

thousands, Mammonism has slain its tens o f thou

sands.

Of the effects o f the evil o f covetousness on the

individual I can speak now only o ne word. The heart

/ o f the covetous shrivels and withers within him . I t

was with profound truth that Tennyson wrote o f the

nar row ing Inst o fgold.

’ Every o ne has read o fSilas

Marner,in George E l iot’s lovely story

,withdrawing

himsel f from h is kind,shutting himsel f up with his

guineas,caring and l iving only for them

,unti l his l ife

became ‘ l ike a rivulet that has sunk far down from

the grassy fringe o f its o ld breadth into a l ittle

shivering thread that cuts a groove for itself in the

barren sand .

’ That is the penalty o fthe gold-heaper

\fhe gets h is wealth—at the cost o f himself. D id you

ever ponder that deep saying o f the Psalmist : He

gave them their request,but sent leanness into their

soul ’ ? Earth has not any sight so pitiful as that

the shrinking and shrivel l ing of a soul amid the piled

Up splendours o f material wealth. See you do n o t

THE TENTH COMMANDMENT 1 89

pay that price fo r your getting.

‘Wealth is the

devil’s conjurer therefore take heed

Lest gaining gain on thee, and make thee dimTo all th ings e lse .’

Again I say, it is no question Of amount once let

xthe pass ion to get and to have become supreme, and ,

/l ike a devouring fire

,i t wil l desolate al l the fairest

provinces o f the soul,leaving them only a charred

and blackened waste.

How is the covetous spirit to be conquered and

cast o ut ? Fo r conquered and cast o ut it can be. Said

the Apostle Paul,

‘ I had not known s in,except the

law had said,Thou shalt not covet yet the troubled

sea ceased its unquiet toss ings, and the man who

wrote that l ived to write this also : ‘ I have learned,

in whatsoever state I am,therein to be content. I

know how to be abased,and I know also how to

abound in everything and in al l things have I learned

the secret both to be fi l led and to be hungry,both to

abound and to be in want. I can do al l things in

H im that strengtheneth me.’ Paul had learned the

songthat the pilgrims heard the shepherd-boy sing

in the Valley o fHumiliation

/‘He that is down

,needs fear no fal l,

H e that i s low, no prideHe that is humble

,ever shal l

Have God to be h is guide.


/1 am conten t with what I have,L i t tle b e i t, o r much

And, Lord , contentmen t s t i l l I crave,Becaus e Thou savest such.

Fulness to such a burden isThat go on p i lgrimage

Here l ittle, and h ereafte r b l iss,Is bes t from age to age.

’

Do you hear him ? ” said Mr. Greatheart ;I wil l dare say that this boy lives a merrier

l ife, and wears more o f that herb cal led hearts

ease in his bosom,than he that is clad in silk and

The spirit o f covetousness,I say

,can be cast o ut ;

but how ? Tahe heed and beware o fcovetousness

that is the first thing. The evil seed springeth and

groweth we know n o t how. What a revelation there

is in the statement o fSt. Francis of sales that, in al l

his experience as a confessor,no one had ever

confessed to him the sin o fcovetousness ! And what

need have we al l to pray, with the Psalmist, Cleanse

ho u me from secret faults -from the faults that are

h idden not only from the eyes o f others,but even

from my own eyes ! And again,because covetous

ness is idolatry,we must learn to give to God the

fi rst place in o ur l i fe. And because covetousness is

selfishness,we must learn that love which is utter

selflessness ,‘ the rules for fulfi l l ing al l rules, the new

commandment fo r keeping all the o ld command

ments.’ And,above al l , because covetousness is not

a matter o fthe lips or of the hands,but o f the heart,


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