A mother's maxims
The mother's heart, deep in emotions of affection and urgent solicitude, is expressed in the passionate form of the address.
I. ON WOMEN OR THE DUTY OF CHASTITY. (Proverbs 31:3.) The weakness of this passion was one of the things, Alexander the Great was wont to say, which reminded him that he was mortal David and Solomon were both warnings and beacon lights against yielding to it.
II. ON WINE, OR THE DUTY OF TEMPERANCE. (Proverbs 31:4. sqq.) Here is a sin in close affinity to the former (Hosea 4:11).
1. A vice degrading in all, drunkenness is most especially unbefitting those in high station. Elah (1 Kings 16:8, 1 Kings 16:9), Benhadad (1 Kings 20:16), and Belshazzar (Daniel 5:2-4), were all dark examples of the danger (comp. Hosea 7:5).
2. It may lead to moral perversion. (Proverbs 31:5.) The woman wrongly condemned by Philip of Macedon exclaimed, "I appeal from Philip drunk to Philip sober." Ahasuerus (Esther 1:10, Esther 1:11) and Herod (Mark 6:21-28) appear to have been guilty of arbitrary conduct under the same besotting influence. Men "err through strong drink" (Isaiah 28:7).
3. The true use of wine. (Proverbs 31:6.) It is a medicine for the fainting. It is a restorative under extreme depression. The Bible tolerates and admits the blessing of wine in moderation as promotive of social cheerfulness. It "maketh glad the heart of man," and is even said to "cheer God" ( 9:13). Hence libations were a part of the sacrificial feast offered to the Majesty on high. As an anodyne it is admitted here (Proverbs 31:7). But all this does not exempt from close circumspection as to time, place, persons, and circumstances in its use. The priests, when performing their sacred functions in the tabernacle and temple, were to abstain from wine. But here, as in other matters, there is large latitude given to the exercise of the private judgment, the personal Christian conscience. Any attempt to overrule the right of personal freedom creates a new class of evils. Let those who see their duty in that light adopt total abstinence; and others labour according to their ability to strike at the indirect and deeper causes of what many regard as a national vice. Wherever there is a widespread vice, it is rooted in some profound misery. The surest, though longest, cure is by the eradication of the pain of the mind which drives so many towards the nepenthes, or draught of oblivion.
III. ON THE FREE AND FULL ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE. (Proverbs 31:8, Proverbs 31:9.) The royal heart and hand are to be at the service of those who cannot help themselves—the widow, the orphan, the poor, and "all that are desolate and oppressed" (Job 29:15, Job 29:16). He is to be both advocate and judge. He is to be an earthly type of God. "Let his representatives on earth study the character of their King in heaven, and be conformed more fully to his image of forgiveness and love."—J.