"Most noble Felix;" or, the power of the flatterer.
Felix was not noble at all. Tacitus says of him that "in the practice of all kinds of lust, crime, and cruelty, he exercised the power of a king with the temper of a slave." Tertullus had an end to gain, and adopted flattery as a means. He was a hired pleader, and selected for the sake of his glib eloquence. He could talk well. Men of his class were found in most of the provincial towns of the Roman empire, They were necessary because the local lawyers would not be sufficiently familiar with the proceedings at the Roman courts, or with the minute details of Roman law. Tertullus had "learned the trick of his class, and began with propitiating the judge by flattery." Canon Farrar says, "Tertullus was evidently a practiced speaker, and St. Luke has faithfully preserved an outline of his voluble plausibility. Speaking with polite complaisance, as though he were himself a Jew, he began by a fulsome compliment to Felix, which served as the usual captatio benevolentiae. Alluding to the early exertions of Felix against the banditti, and the recent suppression of the Egyptian false Messiah, he began to assure his excellency, with truly legal rotundity of verbiage, of the quite universal and uninterrupted gratitude of the Jews for the peace which he had secured to them, and for the many reforms which had been initiated by his prudential wisdom." The subject suggested for our consideration is this—What are the limits of praise? How far may we go in conciliating others by words of approval and congratulation? At once it may be answered that no praise may go beyond the truth or be out of harmony with the truth. But in practical life we have to remember that different persons have different estimates of personal character.
1. Some are incompetent to form sound judgment, and such persons give praise that is simply unsuitable, but is not spoken with any purpose of flattering.
2. Others are prejudiced, and can only see the evil sides of a man's character and actions. Their estimates are wholly unworthy.
3. Others are just as blind to the evil and as prejudiced to the good, and their estimates, though seemingly flattering, are really only exaggerated and untrustworthy; they lack criticism, but are not insincere.
4. Yet others praise with some object which does not appear; they have an end to gain, and the praise is regarded simply as a means towards obtaining the end. These are the flatterers, and their characteristic is insincerity. The following points may be illustrated concerning the power of the flatterer:—
I. HIS MOTIVES. Always some personal end is in view. Usually the flatterer seeks to get something that is not in itself right. It is an agency to use when a man's case is bad. If a man lacks arguments, he will flatter the judge. He means to throw him off his guard, and to get him into a favorable mind by praises.
II. HIS AIDS IN THE PERSON FLATTERED. There is in us all, even in the best of men, a self-love that makes praise pleasant. If the flattery is kept well in hand and skillfully disguised, even noble natures, even humble natures, may be swayed by it. If the flattery is too open and intense, good men are put on their guard and resent the insult.
III. THE MORAL MISCHIEF OF HIS WORK. Show the injury that is done to the flatterer himself, who is confirmed in his insincerity when he finds flattery succeed. A man may get into such a habit of flattering that he will lose the power to recognize the truth, and come to believe in his own exaggerations. Show the injury that is done to the person flattered, who may be led to form an undue estimate of himself, and so be placed in positions of extreme moral peril when the hour of temptation comes. If it is wrong for us to think of ourselves above that which we ought to think, it must be wholly wrong for any one to flatter us so that our self-opinion is unduly raised. Felix was really pushed a little nearer to his fall by. this flattery of Tertullus. For Scripture teachings concerning flattery, see Psalms 36:2; Psalms 78:36; Proverbs 2:16; Proverbs 20:19; Proverbs 26:28; Proverbs 29:5, etc. Press the apostolic counsel, "Speak every man truth with his neighbor: for we are members one of another" (Ephesians 4:25).—R.T.