UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS LIBRARY Class Book Ja 09-20M Volume , ?* Return this book on or before the Latest Date stamped below. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2019 with funding from University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign https://archive.org/details/davidpoetkingOOhill I A am* ( r#: 1 •«* f w \ I I I I it I • D AVI D POET AND KING NEWELL DWIGHT HILLIS fLLC7 vj* V. .Jw DAVID BRINGS THE ARK TO JERUSALEM . . . *3° NATHAN TELLS DAVID OF HIS SIN ...... 35 DAVID’S CHILD DIES ... 38 THE DEATH OF ABSALOM . . 43 DAVID MOURNING FOR ABSALOM 46 DAVID ANOINTED BY SAMUEL AT BETHLEHEM / David, the Poet and King THE ROMANCE AND TRAGEDY OF HIS ^CAREER AND FALL, AND THE GfciiY OF HIS RECOVERY ALSO Y common consent David is one of the most fascinating figures in his¬ tory. He stands forth w °f genius, ample in faculty, ferlttl-! in resource, and rich in all tho§£ qualities that stir admiration and evoke love. His life was full of contrasts, honours, misfortunes, sufferings and victory. He was a poet, and, like Robert Burns, the Hebrew minstrel was as sensitive as an /Eolian harp, now thrilling with the keenest delights and now throbbing with the sharpest ago¬ nies ; like Burns, too, David was slain at last by the stormy splen- dours of his youthful passions. He was a soldier, and, like Napoleon, he moved among his fellows clothed with that irresistible fas¬ cination that only the greatest leaders have possessed. He was a king, and, like England’s Alfred, he found his people a group of rude outlaws and unorganized tribes; yet by sheer force of leadership he transformed the mob into an army, organized customs into laws, de¬ veloped a commerce for his people, and made a place for himself among those whom Lord Bacon called “the architects of states.” Early in his career he was overtaken by misfortune, and finding himself a target for jealous attack, David went forth a wanderer upon the face of the earth, the leader of a band of outlaws, with a price set upon his head. LIBRARY • - tilJa'; I -I * >>*, bi M I'lii ?S Hjjg! KHgOHi Ji V \^>C --feSSo^s: ^Sij&Jtvy f UfcasBfc- ^k2?vi ; f®ff» $ij S^^/ %Fr-S» /JMl DAVID PLAYING THE HARP BEFORE SAUL iOBERT BRUCE, sleep¬ ing peacefully in the cave in front of which the spi- - der was spinning his web, ^fjjflrile his enemieswere search- ing^pt his hiding place, won the ad- minpon and almost worship of his clansmen through his disregard for his own life and his solicitude for the lives of his followers. But to personal bravery David added chiv¬ alry. In the hour when King Saul, overcome by exhaustion, fell asleep in the cave, and fortune gave the royal enemy into his hands, David’s spirit rose above jealousy and ha¬ tred. He cut off the skirts of Saul’s garment, and passed on, doing his enemy no injury. His brave heart and his stainless life remind us of Tennyson’s Sir Galahad, whose “ hand was as the strength of ten, because his heart was pure.” ii *,«*«» 'm - 1 1^— F, like Dante, David was bard and singer, he was also like the great Flor¬ entine in the sorrows of ht^jsfTe.- Having no abiding place, anSps^andering like a partridge on the mountains, the poet journeyed from village to village heart-broken because he was unloved and un¬ cared for. Even King Lear, going forth from his palace into the dark¬ ness, the falling snow and pitiless hail, knew less of sorrow in the hour when he realized that his daughters had ceased to love him than King David at the moment his favourite son Absalom fomented rebellion and plotted against his father’s life. To the end of time the agonies of broken-hearted fathers will find their most perfect expression in David’s lament for his son : “ Oh, Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! 12 God I had died for thee, Qja||ft$alom, my son, my son.” HAT contrasts in this strangely coloured ca¬ reer! He was a peasant boy, court minstrel, chos- e'f^fiipurite of the young prince, the chs^tpion of the army, the con¬ quering hero, borne upon the shoulders of the people through the streets, the rival of the king himself for the affections of the people; then leaping into the throne itself, he becomes law-maker, \ general, bard, commercial leader, i statesman: Made soft by luxury, weakened by flattery, in an evil hour David yields to his passions, ! and sin sweeps through his life like a conflagration sweeping through a city and leaving only blackened timbers and ashes be¬ hind. Then comes the swift, sharp 8f»SS aw repentance, the open restitution, the instant and public confession, the self-abasement, the years of pain, the Psalms and prayers that plead for man’s pity and for God’s pardon. Never was there a more lovable youth! Never a career so rich and romantic! Never man who climbed so high and fell so low 1 Never one whose repent¬ ance was more absolute and all- inclusive. Never one who fought his way so persistently back toward the heights where good men dwell. Grateful to God for the lives of all the Old Testament heroes from Moses to Paul, to the end of time the prodigal and publi¬ can will be chiefly grateful for the life and career of David, the Old Testament prodigal, who epito¬ mizes for us man’s defeats through *4 DAVID, WITH A SLING, KILLS GOLIATH . ✓ ' m A sin,Hpd his recovery also through Qo^pi^edeeming mercy. " ' 'I^REAT as were David’s achievements in the realm of commerce and government, his influ- eB^pftiefly manifest in the realm of ia|[jigion, through his songs and Psal'fis. What the Iliad did for Greece ; what Dante’s Inferno and Paradiso did for the Renaissance in Italy; what the Niebelungen did | for the German tribes; what the J legends of King Arthur did to de¬ velop the age of Chivalry; that and more David’s songs did for the 1 ancient Church and the Jewish people. For religion is chiefly of the heart and conscience. What the soldier, the king, and the law¬ maker cannot do, the poet easily accomplishes. Tools, laws, mate¬ rial wealth, are only the exterior I manifestation of an interior wealth. Civilization, therefore, begins with the enrichment of the affections and of the aspirations. It ends with the culture of the intellect and the development of comforts and conveniences. If Moses’ laws laid the foundation, David’s Psalms and songs built the superstructure. It is given to no historian to write the full story of the influence of David’s Psalter. Singing the 46th Psalm, Polycarp went toward his funeral pile as did Savonarola. Strengthened by this psalm, Martin Luther braved his enemies at Worms. Cromwell’s soldiers also marched forth to their battle and victory at Marston Moor, chanting the Psalms of David. Dean Stanley tells us that with the words of a psalm upon their lips, Columba, Hildebrand, Bernard, Francis of As¬ sisi, Huss, Columbus, Xavier, Me- laamon and Locke breathed their la$fc*S .... LL the experiences of hu¬ man life seem to have been emptied into Da¬ vid’s single career, that know how to interpret the unfvtej$al elements of the human rac§|> : ‘Coming from the sheep pas¬ tures, made a leader and conqueror, enthroned in the palace, exiled in the wilderness with its solitude, he en¬ tered into sympathy with peasants and shepherds, with princes and kings, with poets and jurists, and was fitted to be the inspirer and comforter of the early martyrs, the Huguenots and Waldenses, hiding in their dens and caves in time of revolution, while the exiled mourn¬ ers, the unknown minstrels, the disappointed leaders, have alike turned toward the Psalms of David for medicine, guidance, comfort and inspiration. “ He only who knows the number of the waves of the ocean and the abundance of tears in the human eye, he who sees the sighs of the heart before they are uttered, and he who hears them still when they are hushed into silence, he alone can tell how many holy emotions, how many heaven¬ ly vibrations have been produced and will ever be produced, in the souls of men, by the reverberation of these marvellous strains, of these predestined hymns, read, meditat¬ ed, sung in every hour of day and night, in every winding of the Vale of Tears. The Psalter of David is like a mystic harp, hung on the walls of the true Zion. Under the breath of the Spirit of God it sends forth its infinite varieties of devo¬ tion, which, rolling on from echo 18 SAUL CASTS HIS JAVELIN AT DAVID mi m to echo, from soul to soul, awakes in each a spirit note, mingling in that one prolonged voice of thank¬ fulness and penitence, praise and »*/•♦) • V'Y** • OR the most part the songs of David are carols ofjoy and victory. They are full of praise and ex- They see God’s good- nea^verywhere and delight in it. Midst all the din and upheaval of life, the tranquility of the Shepherd Psalm seems deep and pure as a river. But if the early Psalms rep¬ resent the freshness of the soul’s love, the unfaded spiritual instincts, the days “when the heart was young”; the later songs represent the great deep things of remorse, conscience, penitence, and pardon. What a tragedy is the story of David’s sin against Uriah, and Nathan's indictment of the guilty king through his story of the peas¬ ant with his pet lamb 1 What re¬ morse in the 6th Psalm ! How is every line blotted with tears, and heavy with grief and shame 1 The 51st Psalm seems like the sob of a heart wounded nigh unto death. Analysis of its broken confessions and bitter cries for pardon seems cold-blooded. It is as if a photog¬ rapher should intrude a camera into the death chamber, to snap the button in the moment of su¬ preme grief. It is as if some scientist should stealthily take note before the door beyond which prays some broken-hearted prodi¬ gal. David, the king, crowned with all the genius of the world’s greatest powers, through passion has been shorn of his goodness and beauty. Self-indulgent, be linger¬ ed in his luxurious palace at the very hour when stern duty called him to the battle-field. Tempted, the king was untrue to his people, the soldier false to the chivalry of arms, the friend betrayed his friend. Uri^h, first spoiled of his happi- nesllcwas set in the forefront of bflltevand made to fall on death. arose Nemesis, the avenger. Conscience scourged the wicked king out into the night with its and its hissing storm, lere was no softness in the midifight sky for guilty David ; only cold, blue marble that steadily blazed and never relented and was never tired. Because conscience was in him, like a thousand flam¬ ing swords, the man feared to risk himself out under the accusing stars. His anguish was the anguish of Eugene Aram, “ exceeding bit- ter.” His woe the woe of Macbeth, who, sleeping, moaned and still moaned, “This red right hand, the multitudinous seas it would encar- nadine, making the green all red.” The guilty secret that crushed him seemed like the burden of a thou- sanJpPonatellos and Lady Mac- bptS^Qjled into one. ^OARSE men and unthink¬ ing have despised David for his crimes, and con¬ fessed surprise that his sotigsiat'e in the Psalter, and that hist6M has made a place for David amolg the heroes of the faith. Ig¬ norance and shallowness may sneer that the gifted poet made up for black crime by psalms, and that God thinks lightly of foul sins, since these songs, red with blood 4 and black with guilt, are bound up in his Bible. But the sneer is both I THE PARTING OF DAVID AND JONATHAN superficial and unjust. Let us con¬ fess that David’s songs are rooted in foul crimes, and that, like the “ bruised reed,” he is broken by in¬ iquity. 'Nevertheless there is a sense in which heroic men and heroic deeds are sparks struck out in sin's fierce fires. It is only the black thunder clouds that have rainbows in their depths, when the sun smites them. The native richness of a field is shown by the wealth of thorns and thistles, not less than by the wealth of wheat. The su¬ premely magnificent way in which Satan plays the devil in “ Paradise Lost,” tells us that essentially he is an angel who has fallen. Stones do not decay, they are too low in the scale of being. But apples de¬ cay, and the depth of decay to which they fall proves the height of juicy richness to which they first&ose. Men fall 1 Ah 1 that ntfjaifefthat they first rose. ^ ^ ® ^ ® ||S)HE names of the great men are the names of men who struggled unto blood, resisting passions ^{tti|h?®dnd temptations without. Th&jgreat epic dramas are less than a sc@re in number, and all are based upon some experience akin to David’s. In jurisprudence we men¬ tion Moses. Now Moses was a murderer. In song, David walks with Dante. Now David com¬ passed Uriah’s death. In literature no writing is more famous than Paul’s ode to “the love that never fail- eth.” But Paul’s garments were stained with Stephen’s blood. In the dramas, we mention Hamlet and Lear and Macbeth, but all these pages are dark with grievous sins. The great epics are three. But the “Iliad,” the “ Inferno,” and “Para- disjpk.ost,” are all stories of con- flidj^r^ith sin and passion. rf r r^l^ ROM David to Paul, the heroes are not soft youths lingering on languorous violet beds. They are M^taS'pushing their way into the thic||;of battle, and either slaying sin, or are carried off the field upon their shields. Not that heroism and character are impossible with¬ out sin ; rather that the noblest human character has a dark back¬ ground. All the great events of history and all the beacon fires that guide the generations upward, are lights shining out of sin’s darkness. Liberty itself seems the more glori¬ ous, standing out against the dark¬ ness of the slave market and the cotton field. Florence Nightingale mmmm is more of an angel of light in con¬ trast with the demonism of war in crimes. We should never have had the beautiful parable of the prodigal son but for the boy whose bitter repentance rests back upon PtolMtsTiving and swine and husks. of the vineyards about Naples is burnt lava. There the rich grapes, from which the wine is made, grow out ofogtyptions which tore out the moiifltain side and darkened all the sky. Our sweetest nuts be¬ come edible only through the sharp blows of frost. Lincoln always loved his country, but the people did not know that liberty was a name engraven on his very heart. Since war came, we half hail our country’s woe, because it gave Lincoln a chance to reveal himself. m K / r DAVID ANOINTED KING IN HEBRON Calvary itself is a light that shines the . brighter, because of the dark background of cruelty and sin against which it is projected. When scholars can square the cir¬ cle, turn dust into gold, make motion perpetual, make a stick with one end, or a board with one side, then will they know why evil was permitted. Until then, earth’s purest souls, like Thomas a Kempis and Fenelon, will chiefly love the psalm of David’s blood- guiltiness. Its words also will have transference to our classic hymns and literature, and these pages that tell the story of the weeping poet will be worn by the reading, and wet by the tears of innumerable pilgrims toward per¬ fection. Earth’s roses grow white out of black soil. Earth’s snow¬ drops spring up where great trees 4ii \c2 fee**) (fa IC3\2/eD\ m 1 V%§7 fell down. God’s law seems the whiter, His mercy the brighter, over^against the blackness of David’s cry^ijand the bitterness of his re- shame. Ki-invii'isu.-ia^N’S hemispheric nature has strange exhibition in David’s life and career. O wondrous contradic- mingled good and bad in ! Like our planet, the soul is a’f£ orb, one-half midday, one- half midnight. In the morning the finest sensibilities are uppermost. At eventide the worst passions con¬ trol. Now man sings just beside heaven’s gate, now he wallows in the mire. The words of Robert Burns are ever in the mind : “ Half beast, half saint; half demon, half divine.” Now the soul, sending its pure thought upward, seems like the sea exhaling white mists 28 heavenward ; now the soul seems an orb, falling “three times the space twixt sunny noon and dewy eve.” In vision hour the ancient poet saw man as an image, half bronze, half iron. But the modern scientist beholds man as half gold, half clay. But yesterday, Words¬ worth reflected, “ In the highest moods of the best, the germs of the worst deeds lie quiescent.” To which Emerson replies, “In our deepest degradation there remains in us some divinely good, the pledge and prophecy of future great¬ ness.” Our best literature is filled with these strange contrasts. Dick¬ ens studies this two-fold develop¬ ment. His Oliver Twist, the em¬ bodiment of purity and innocence, is made to come from the work- house and Fagin’s den : this dove was reared in a nest of wasps. But <9S@ ms Monks, whose foot was on the spring of the trap-door, which would let his enemy into the dark well beneath, beguiles his victim by recollections of childhood and the sweet home delights : here, a serpent who was reared in a dove’s nest. In his famous hymn, Byron sings like a seraph, but his “Don Juan ” is the song of seven devils. Lingering in Geneva, the poet's heart was touched to issues celes¬ tial, ; but only a week later, in Ve- vayf%e began his songs of “the ■yM&.the flesh, and the devil.” AN anything be more sublimely beautiful than Coleridge’s Hymn to Mont Blanc ? Can aught brutish than the poet crazed by|pm eating? Reading Chau- cer’^and Shakespeare’s creations, ideal in their perfect beauty, our DAVID BRINGS THE ARK TO JERUSALEM - ■ ' . - . ■vl . 4 • ■ =,\' .' ;• , . wonder grows with our growing life. But even our Chaucer and our Shakespeare are read in expurgated editions. Humble men, too, repre¬ sent mingled good and bad. There is honour among thieves. Robbers who have no hesitancy in waylay¬ ing a belated citizen, will, when brought to the prisoner’s dock, ex¬ hibit the keenest sense of honour in shielding each other. Most won¬ drous man’s hemispheric nature! Called by the writers of old, flesh and spirit; called by scientists, brain and body; called of poets, “our better nature” and “our worse ” : a double nature exhibited in this scene of the sinning poet and the weeping king, who, despite his sins, has helped all the genera¬ tions heavenward. Perhaps David’s sins are danger-signals, set in life’s tangled perplexing wilderness. >i«A « « HROUGH David we learn that innocence is not character. Indeed, the comparative worthless- n'es^ifInnocence has here a strik- ing5§ftxhibition. Plainly, mere ab¬ sence ot scars through sin is not goodness. The boy David, steal¬ ing like a sweet sunbeam into Saul’s palace, brought with him the shep¬ herd's flute and his innocent heart. But his armour against evil was an ice armour. It quickly melted in the heat of temptation. Soon the throne and the sceptre brought opportunity for indulgence. Then into the mire he straightway plunged. His innocence proved to be mere lack of opportunity. The youth who led his flocks to the hills, greeting the morning with burst of song, was not one whit better than David the king, who set Uriah in the forefront of battle, 3 i who first broke his friend’s heart and- then slew him. Innocence and character stand widely apart, even as the weedless furrows of April are separated far from the August fields, white unto the har¬ vests. Innocence is a white page, unspotted to be sure. It is white because no pen has been laid there¬ on. Character is the same page, blotted indeed with ink, and thick with scars where the keen knife cut out the black stains. Innocence is unhewn marble. It is spotless because untouched of chisel. Char¬ acter is the marble carved by the tookof temptation, struck by fierce bIoffes.of passion, and fashioned at IffS&Mto the likeness of sons of God. RON newly digged out of the hills and innocent of the fire is worthless to¬ ward the battlefield. It f i§8f 33 **^JV* ; into hissing water, slowly temper¬ ed toward sharpness, that flashes a blade worthy of the patriot’s hand. Character and culture are like colours on beauteous porcelain, they must be burned in. Tempt- able men are not contemptible. Men’s vices are often their unripe virtues. Multitudes are slain through geniality and openness, through exuberant kindness and cordial good fellowship. Often¬ times the rise of virtue means the expenditure of the vital forces. Many subdue their flaming passions, as travellers cross mountain streams, by waiting until the freshet has subsided, and they can go over dry shod. David, pure for want of oppor¬ tunity to be impure, stands for inno¬ cence, but character is represented in Jesus Christ, who resisted unto blood, striving against sin. I * / ■ : . /S'. • ■■ ■ • ” : * ' ’ " ; .A: NATHAN TELLS DAVID OF HIS SIN (M M ERILY, that youth who carried an unsullied heart was not nearly so good a man as the David who 'fed, but afterward struggled upwptl, and, midst fierce attacks, maintained his integrity. Life’s most beautiful sight is not the child, pure and sweet though it be. Childhood is a bough of unblos¬ somed buds. Youth is a bundle of ungrown roots. Life’s most beautiful sight is not the child crowned with beauty and full of all exuberant song. Youth also wants in richness and variety, lacks ripe¬ ness and fullness. Life’s most glorious sight is a man ; standing in life’s waning light, softened by suffering, cultured by adversity, with faculties tempered by temp¬ tation ; it may be scarred deeply by the sins of his youth, but whose deepest hunger is for righteousness, and who confesses himself a pilgrim toward perfection. Therefore, Dr. Hitchcock said, "good men are veterans of the Old Guard, coming in frpm life’s fierce frontier, batter- ed jfel scarred, to j udge the angels, duty at home.” EFLECTING upon life’s critical hours, each aspir¬ ing heart will ask what goes to make up a great Sm|$Jpiinly, not rude, outbreaking crih|^ nor tumultuous transgres- sion|:’ Extraordinary sins quickly repented of are not quickly repeat¬ ed. Donatello pushed no second stranger over the battlement. Jean Valjean robbed no second bishop of his silver candlesticks. David never sent a second Uriah in the forefront of battle. Society is not devastated by great dramatic crimes. 36 The world’s happiness is not ruin¬ ed by colossal sins. Our homes are wrecked by minute faults and petty selfishness. The earthquake that made the beautiful city of Lisbon a heap of ruins did less to impoverish Portugal than the lazi¬ ness of its citizens during a single summer. The selfishness and the meanness of some men who are called blameless, will aggregate greater weight of iniquity than the swpt^low of hands murderous for Qifff|ii6.fpent. ~ w ‘‘‘ ^ Iff ROWN gray and wise, David prays, “Deliver y „lf|!f me from secret sins.” He Sy had learned that hidden like the fungus in the wi^^sks ; the hidden vegetable grotfjm is indeed unsuspected, yet it drinks up all the precious liquor to feed its filthiness and leaves the Tv cask filled only with a foul mass. Travellers tell us that the ants of India will honeycomb furniture, leaving only the thin veneering. It is said that the ants of Africa will pick white the bones of the wound¬ ed deer quicker than the wolf or lion. Engineers tell us the great cables supporting our bridges are not so much threatened by projec¬ tiles hurled against them as by the impact of heat and cold, and the strokes of many falling feet, which at last cause the atoms to loose their grip upon each other. It is the petty enemies that devastate the world. Our roses are ruined by aphides. Our water is vitiated by unseen germs. The fogs that stay commerce are made up of unseen particles. In the moral realm, character is built up by small virtues and torn down by 38 DAVID’S CHILD DIES \ V V 4 \ small vices. There are sharp prac¬ tices in business, trifling deflections from honour, certain lowerings of the standard of truthfulness, a doubtful use of double motives that is more than two-edged swords, and these bring men into a state of character worse than ever David w.aSlat his worst, though he was itn£j^%ably bad. jgw)HE very keenness of Da- “,» vid’s anguish and re¬ morse for his sin, offers the first hope of his re- 'from the mire of sin. A brilfefpt English essayist has writ¬ ten '^m essay on the “ Decline of Lying.” Some who have read his book think it would have been more to the purpose had his theme been “Remorse as a Lost Art.” That author or generation that has lost power to feel badly, has gone 39 very far toward the pit and demon¬ hood. The blame of Judas is that his conscience was hard and horny, like unto some calloused hand that picks up a hot iron. The praise of David is that sin cut a bloody gash in his conscience. Christ looked tenderly upon the poor, bruised reed weeping at His feet, for He kng^ that she who could weep iifefiyittle child at the memory of het?S&;had still much good within. HEN sensitiveness to sin goes, God’s mercy goes also. A paralyzed optic nerve blots out a sun million of miles in dia- Contrariwise, a great as- trorllmer tells us his eye was, through training, so sensitive to the light that, coming from a darkened room to his great tele¬ scope, the beam of sunlight felled 40 him like a blow from a club. Beauty is one-half in canvas, and one-half in the eye that sees. Music is one- half melody, and the other half in the sensitive ear. It has been wisely said that “medicine gets its meaning from sickness, liberty from bondage, culture from a sense of ignorance, pardon from a sense of sinfulness.” Therefore, a bad man is not one who does a bad deed. Witness the mother in whose heart anger may temporarily displace love. Badness means a loss of the sense of badness. Poor David fall¬ en into the mire, wounded grie¬ vously by sin, but longing for good¬ ness with a pilgrim’s longing for the spring, is a wicked man, indeed, but one “not far from the kingdom of God.” When Macbeth falls on the battlefield he weeps bitterly over his sin. Thus the poet tells us Macbeth was not utterly lost, for he, like David and the girl weeping before Christ, could still feel remorse and turn heavenward. Salvation begins with the sense of i sin . a David has been earth’s wis- ies.t.we.a ch e r regarding remorse, faith, and pardon. URlibraries hold the Con¬ fessions of Augustine, Rousseau, and of Tolstoi. But no man has dealt rfr$|||$fernly with himself than Daj\|Hj His pages are thick with the'^expressions, “My transgres¬ sions,” “my iniquity,” and “my sins.” Therefore our generation does well to note the relation be¬ tween crisp, vigorous thinking about sin, and a fine, keen sense of the essential badness of sin. Per¬ haps the milk-and-water terms our generation applies to iniquities have iilii THE DEATH OF ABSALOM helped to make remorse one of our lost arts. Clear thinking opens up the fountains of deep feeling. “My garments are blood-spotted,” David cries, and of course he revolted from such spots. As men go up toward Emerson’s fine scholarship they use Emerson’s keen, discrim¬ inating speech. Growing pure, lik.gfp^nelon, men adopt Ffenelon’s wafiis^.that flash like swords. "" ' ■ E who reads Browning’s “Blot on the Escutcheon” will find his iniquities scorched by words as bta|pg-lightnings scorch the eye- baijfttj The essence of a refined nature is such sensitiveness to re¬ volting things as to forbid any fa¬ miliarity with the synonyms for wrong-doing. Christ was ideal in his purity of thought, and he named men hypocrites, vipers, whited sep- ulchres. By a verbal exhibition of sin’s ugliness, he made men see sin's devilishness. There is a sickly sentimentalism abroad that proposes to cleanse our tenements and our jails and poorhouses by waving lavender handkerchiefs before our alleys. This langourous piety is deeply offended because of David’s plain talk about blood- guiltiness. This sickly tendency emasculates our manhood, takes the iron out of our blood, the brawn out of our politics, the sturdiness out of our ethics, the law and justice out of our theology. We miss the direct, open speech of David and Paul in our modern literature, and we miss also their majesty, their ring and fire and fine fibre. Per¬ haps the weak language of our sen¬ timental age has made our epoch to differ from Cromwell’s and Milton’s m as roses differ from oaks, as pleasure yachts differ from warships. Right thinking determines right conduct a.n : i||gJi;a.racter. , ''** **#*♦'•**« **•.*'*• ' ‘ iAVl D'S career also teaches us that life is a battle* ■from the cradle to the 0 that when the erf%0mes, looking back, the only evei$|; worth remembering will be our floral victories. Then tempta¬ tions conquered will hang on the walls of memory like “the swords and shields of vanquished enemies.” But here and now growth is through struggle. Life means warfare. As of old the hero flung his helmet far into the ranks of the enemy and fought his way through until he regained it; so, for us not to gain new heights is to confess defeat. Earth’s saddest scenes are not bat¬ tlefields covered with heaps of grave 45 dead. Life’s devastations are not storm-swept fields of ' cities con¬ sumed with fire. Earth has no scenes so sad as when some David forgets that God has taken vows for him and plunges into the mire. And man might well lose hope were it not that for all who have been devastated by passion and scorched by sin, there comes the thought of David’s fall and his re¬ covery also. For the wrongdoer there is still hope. God is on the side of him who hath stumbled and gone into the mire. Go where man will, put far away mother, country, conscience, honour, love, but for¬ get not that one heart, the Infinite, still beats true. Die where man may, in the wilderness or garret or cell, one love shines like a star— God’s. DAVID MOURNING FOR ABSALOM ) V . g|gg)HO UGH man’s hand j holds surgery and pun¬ ishment, God’s heart holds healing and recu- ts'ot because man is bet- tenA|§n he thinks, but because he is infinitely worse, God is on his side, whispering : “ It is not too late to mend.” Beholding the reed, tall and slender, and trampled into the mire by foot of beast, He let fly these words: “ Though thou art broken utterly like the III bruised reed, my strength shall be ijs tempered to gentleness and thou " shalt be enabled to stand upright and recover thyself.” Discerning the taper freshly lighted and ready to go out at the slightest breath of wind, He said: “Though thy as- * piration be as feeble as the candle’s flicker, yet will 1 tend and nourish it into flaming strength.” Therefore, man may look up, have hope, and as the traveller journeying toward the frozen North turns toward the tropics, journey toward God. God cared for David, and He cares for us. And what Nathan did for the sinning king, God will cause events to do for us. Think not that God is at one end of the universe and thyself at the other and between a vast void, with no light to come across, no tender voice, no gentle touch. God is nigh unto thee. And God is forgiveness. God is sunshine. No David can fall so low but that Christ’s mercy and God’s love can lift him from the depths of selfish¬ ness and sin back to the throne of manhood and the sceptre of in¬ fluence. **■ A K-— - *