[XXXI.]
A GOOD WOMAN.
"O woman-hearts, that keep the days of old
In living memory, can you stand back
When Christ calls? Shall the heavenly Master lack
The serving love, which is your life's fine gold?
"Do you forget the hand which placed the crown
Of happy freedom on the woman's head,
And took her from the dying and the dead,
Lifting the wounded soul long trodden down?
"Do you forget who bade the morning break,
And snapped the fetters of the iron years?
The Saviour calls for service: from your fears
Rise girt with faith, and work for His dear sake!
"And He will touch the trembling lips with fire,—
O let us hasten, lest we come too late!
And all shall work; if some must 'stand and wait,'
Be theirs that wrestling prayer that will not tire."
R. O.
The last chapter of the book of Proverbs consists of two distinct compositions, and the only connection between them is to be found in their date. The words of King Lemuel, "a saying which his mother taught him,"[695] and the description of a good woman,[696] must both be referred to a very late epoch of Hebrew literature. The former contains several Aramaic words[697] and expressions which connect it with the period of the exile; and the latter is an alphabetical acrostic, i.e., the verses begin with the successive letters of the alphabet; and this artificial mode of composition, which appears also in some of the Psalms, is sufficient of itself to indicate the last period of the literature, when the Rabbinical methods were coming into use.
About the words of Lemuel, of whom it may be observed we know nothing at all, enough has been said in previous lectures. We need here only notice that the mother's influence in the education of her son, even though that son is to be a king, comes very suitably as the introduction to the beautiful description of the good woman with which the chapter closes. It is said that the mother of George III. brought him up with the constantly-repeated admonition, "George, be a king," and that to this early training was due that exalted notion of the prerogative and that obstinate assertion of his will which occasioned the calamities of his reign. Kings have usually been more ready to imbibe such lessons than moral teaching from their mothers; but whatever may be the actual result, we all feel that a woman is never more nobly occupied than in warning her son against the seductions of pleasure, and in giving to him a high sense of duty. It is from a mother's lips we should all learn to espouse the cause of the helpless and the miserable, and to bear an open heart for the poor and needy.[698]