The sorrow of the weary King Ecclesiast has never seemed to me
altogether noble; it is piercing in its insight--and I understand how
youths who are coming to manhood find in the awful chapters a savage
contrast to the joys of existence. Young men who have reached the
strange time of discontent through which all of us pass are always
profoundly affected by the Preacher; and they are too apt to pervert
the most poignant of his words; but men who have really thought and
suffered can never help feeling that there is a species of ingratitude
in all his splendid lamentations. Why should the mighty king have
bidden the youth to rejoice after so many awful words had been penned
to show the end of all rejoicing? Every pleasure on earth the king had
enjoyed, and he had drained life's chalice so far down that he tasted
the bitterness of the lees. But had he not savoured joy to the full?
Was there one gift showered by the lavish bounty of God which had not
fallen on the chosen of fortune? We revere the intellect of the man
who chastens our souls with his sombre discourse; but I could wish he
had veiled his despair, and had told us of the ravishing delights
which he had known.
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