comprehensive intellect, acquainted with all the experiences of life.
Such moral wisdom would be imperishable in any literature. Such
utterances go far to redeem all personal defects; they show how
unclouded is a mind trained in equity, even when the will is enslaved by
iniquity. What is still more remarkable, the Proverbs never apologize
for the force of temptation, and never blend error with truth; they
uniformly exalt wisdom, and declare that the beginning of it is the fear
of the Lord. There is not one of them which seeks to cover up vice with
sophistical excuses; they show that the author or authors of them love
moral beauty and truth, and exalt the same,--as many great men, with
questionable morals, give their testimony to the truths of
Christianity, and utterly abhor those who poison the soul by plausible
sophistries,--as Lord Brougham detested Rousseau. The famous writings of
our modern times which nearest approach the Proverbs in love of truth
and moral wisdom are those of Bacon and Shakspeare.

In striking contrast with the praises of knowledge which permeate the
Proverbs, is the book of Ecclesiastes, supposed to have been written in
the decline of Solomon's life, when the pleasures of sin had saddened
his soul, and filled his mind with cynicism. Unless the book of
Ecclesiastes is to be interpreted as ironical, nothing can be more
dreary than many of its declarations. It even seems to pour contempt on
all knowledge and all enjoyments. "In much knowledge is much grief, and
he that increaseth knowledge increaseth sorrow.... What profit hath a
man of all his labor?... There is no remembrance of the wise more than
of the fool.... There is nothing better for a man than that he should
eat and drink.... A man hath no pre-eminence over a beast; all go to the
same place.... What hath the wise man more than the fool?... There is a
just man that perisheth in his righteousness, and there is a wicked man
that prolongeth his life in wickedness.... One man among a thousand have