it yet actually existing, although we must suppose that a mind capable
of forming proverbs could not have been entirely insensible to it. We
may define a proverb to be a moral statement, instructive in object, and
epigrammatically expressed. It is always somewhat controversial, and
when it approaches a truism scarcely deserves the name.

A great many of Solomon's proverbs may be regarded in two lights, and I
think a comparison between some of them will show that he was aware of
the fact, and if so he could scarcely have avoided feeling some sense
of the ludicrous, and even of having a slight idea of humour in its
higher phases. I shall allude in illustration of this to a proverb often
quoted ironically at the present day. "In the multitude of counsellors
there is wisdom," and which we have combated and answered by a common
domestic adage.

Again Solomon is rather hard upon the failings of the ladies, "The
contentions of a wife," he says, "are a continual dropping." "It is
better to dwell in the corner of a housetop than with a brawling woman
in a wide house." "It is better to dwell in the wilderness than with a
contentious and angry woman." The meaning of all these sayings must be
that women are of a very irritable and vexatious character. But did
Solomon really believe in the strong terms he used towards them. We
should say not to judge by his life, for he had "seven hundred wives,
and three hundred concubines;" and although he says that, "as a jewel of
gold in a swine's snout, so is a fair woman that is without
discretion"--a very strong comparison--we may be sure that he had a
great many of these despicable creatures domiciled in his own palace.

Solomon's strictures with regard to money may also be regarded as of
somewhat uncertain value:--"How much better is it to get wisdom than