THE book of Proverbs was the fruit of experience, not fancy. Between the antithetical proverb in the seventh verse of the first chapter and the far-seeing demand in the last verse of the last chapter, that in justice woman be given the fruit of her hands,—a demand that is only now being at all fully granted, —the book runs the gamut of human experience. The folly, weakness, and extravagance of human life are first portrayed, and then opposed by the true concept of the spiritual reality, hidden or obscured by the mortal seeming; for the compilers of the book were wise enough to give the remedy for the false concepts of life. Accordingly the admonition, "Forsake the foolish, and live," is followed by the exhortation to "go in the way of understanding."
Many of the proverbs are attributed to Solomon, and this vast and fruitful experience may have come to him as the result of his experiment in seeking happiness by the pursuit of material pleasures. He was in what every worldly-minded person would call the enviable position of being able to satisfy his every wish. In the second chapter of Ecclesiastes, verses 1-10, we read of the Preacher that whatsoever his eyes desired he kept not from them, and withheld not his heart from any joy. What an enjoyable position to be in: he could do as he pleased! But farther on he says that he hated life because the work that was wrought under the sun was grievous unto him, "for all is vanity and vexation of spirit." "Vanity and vexation of spirit"—the fruits of indulging material desire without stint! Solomon traveled a disappointing road, and he was compassionate enough to leave a signpost clearly marked: Impassable, because impossible. Then why need we desire to travel along that road?
Now let us consider some of the foolish things to be avoided or forsaken if we would truly live. From the merely frivolous amusements dangled before the eyes of those who are lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God, there are all the intermediate grades of folly, up through the foolish excesses of the bibulous and the gluttonous, and the killing blasts of crime, to the consummate folly of him of whom the Psalmist says, "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God." Here is one who seems to have cast aside that which is really worth while. Yet he is only a little more foolish than the one who has other gods besides the true God. The gods of this world constitute a subtle claim on mortals, and lead them into many an experience of foolishness. In its efforts to find happiness and prosperity in the flesh, the world has gorged itself with materiality; but its cry of vanity is as lusty as ever; and it will never find relief until it forsakes the foolish endeavor to find happiness and peace outside of God, Spirit.
