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can afford. He had reached the highest summit of distinction to which human ambition can aspire, in wealth and power, in wisdom and renown. He was surrounded with all the means of gratification for the senses, the taste, and the intellect. He gave full scope to the indulgence of his appetites and desires. And what was the re

sult of the experiment? Hear his own words. "Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity." "I was great, and increased more than all that were before me in Jerusalem: also my wisdom remained with me. And whatsoever mine eyes desired I kept not from them, I withheld not my heart from any joy; for my heart rejoiced in all my labor; and this was my portion of all my labor. Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labor that I had labored to do; and behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun;" no substantial and abiding good in such a life of worldly pleasure and ambition, which could meet the demands of conscience, or on which the immortal soul could repose in peace and happiness.

"Let us hear," he says, in winding up his discourse, "the conclusion of the whole matter. Fear God, and keep his commandments; for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work

into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it. be good, or whether it be evil.”

He wrote, my young friend, for you. He wrote, too, under the influence of a divine inspiration. Consider, then, that it is not Solomon alone, but God who addresses you in these affecting and momentous words:

"Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth; and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thy heart, and in the sight of thine eyes; but know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment. Therefore remove sorrow from thy heart, and put away evil from thy flesh; for childhood and youth are vanity. Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, while the evil days come not, nor the years draw nigh, when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them."

Forget thy God and Saviour; reject the offers of mercy through Christ; live only for thyself and the world die in this state, and what indescrib able ruin and wretchedness await thee!

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CHAPTER LI.

SOLOMON'S DEATH-WHETHER HE BECAME A

TRUE PENITENT-CONCLUSION.

WE are told nothing more of the events of Solomon's life, but simply that he reigned in Jerusalem over all Israel forty years, that he slept with his fathers, and was buried in the city of David his father; and that Rehoboam his son reigned in his stead.

He died when about sixty years of age, and not quite a thousand years before the birth of Christ. Of all his children, and he must have had many, the names of only three are found in the sacred history-Rehoboam the son of Naamah an Ammonitess, and two daughters, Taphath, who was married to the son of Abinadab in the region of Dor, and Basmath, married to Ahimaaz in Naphthali; both these individuals being among the principal officers of the king.

Whether Solomon, before his death, became a true penitent, is left in uncertainty. Very different opinions have been held with regard to it. The Scriptures contain no direct assertion on the subject. Some have maintained that the name

which the prophet Nathan gave to him by the diving command, affords presumptive proof that he was indeed a child of God. For, otherwise, they ask, how could this name, "Beloved of the Lord," be with propriety applied to him?

But it may have meant nothing more than that he should in many important respects, and especially with regard to his temporal condition, receive numerous and signal blessings. Surely, during that portion of his life when he committed such flagrant sins, he could not, in his personal character and conduct, have been beloved of the Lord in the strict sense of the expression; and yet, in its general import, and as one of his appellatives, he might still be entitled to this name which was given to him in infancy.

When our Saviour was on earth, he loved, as we are told, the young man who came to him to inquire what he must do to inherit eternal life. He saw in him many amiable and interesting qualities, and regarded them as such. But this same young man was far from being a child of God. He could not endure the test which was proposed to him. He would not follow Christ as a disciple, but went away still to cling to his possessions.

The appearance of piety which Solomon exhibited in the early part of his reign; the declaration of Scripture, that he "loved the Lord, walking in

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the statutes of David his father;" the sacrifices which he offered up so abundantly and zealously at Gibeon, with his humble and acceptable request, not for long life and riches, but for an understanding heart, that he might faithfully discharge his arduous duties; the devoted fidelity with which he erected the temple and dedicated it to the service of the true God; the worship in which he then engaged; the fervent and sublime prayer which seems to have come from his inmost soul; the solemn religious feast which he held, and the blessing that he pronounced on the people, with the divine assurance that his supplications had been heard by Jehovah; his strict observance, certainly for a long time, of the three prescribed public solemnities in each year-all these would seem to furnish probable evidence that his heart had been renewed by divine grace, and to lead to the charitable conclusion' that, like David his father, he became a true penitent before he left the world.

If, as is maintained by some of the best authorities, Solomon wrote the book of Ecclesiastes after his fall into gross sensuality and the worship of idols, we find in this much to sanction the belief that he sincerely repented of his sins and made his peace with God. It could hardly have been written by any other than a pious man: it exhibits such just views; it is full of such divine truth;