de of battle and surprised
the world, till the "fortune of war" has passed into a proverb. The
skillful may not be able at all times to secure even the necessaries of
life; nor does abundance invariably accompany greater wisdom, whilst no
amount of intelligence can secure constant and abiding good.[2]

Time and doom hap alike to all, irrespective of man's purposes or
proposings, and no man knows what his hap shall be, since no skill of
any kind can avail to guide through the voyage of life without
encountering its storms. From the unlooked-for quarter, too, do those
storms burst on us. As the fishes suspect no danger till in the net
they are taken, and as the birds fear nothing till ensnared, so we poor
children of Adam, when our "evil time" comes round, are snared without
warning.

Absolutely true this is, if life be regarded solely by such light as
human wisdom gives: "Time and doom happen alike to all." The whole
scene is like one vast, confused machine, amongst whose intricate
wheels, that revolve with an irregularity that defies foresight, poor
man is cast at his birth; and ever and anon, when he least expects it,
he comes between these wheels; and then he is crushed by some "evil,"
which may make an end of him altogether or leave him for further
sorrows. All things seem to work confusedly for evil, and this caps
the climax of Ecclesiastes's misery.

Here is the sequence of his reasoning:

Firstly, There is no righteous allotment upon earth; the righteous
suffer here, whilst the unjust escape. Nay,

Secondly, There is an absolute lack of all discrimination in the death
that ends all; and,

Thirdly, So complete is that end, bringing all so exactly to one dead
level, without the slightest difference; and so impenetrable is the
tomb to which all go, that I counsel, in my despair, "Eat, drink, and
be merry, irrespective of any future."

Fourthly, But, alas! that, too, is impossible; for no "work, nor
device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom," can assure freedom from the evil
doom that haps, soon or late, to all.

Intensified misery! awful darkness indeed! And our own souls tremble
as we stand with Ecclesiastes under its shadow and respond to his
groanings. For the same scene still spreads itself before us as before
him. Mixed with the mad laughter and song of fools is the continued
groan of sorrow, pain, and suffering, that still tells of "time and
doom."

A striking instance of this comes to my hand even