Canonicity of the Epistle
are scattered abroad, greeting.
REV. ALBERT BARNES.—The particular proof of the canonical authority of this epistle is contained in the evidence that it was written by one of the apostles. It was early received as of authority in the churches. It was included in the old Syriac version, the Peshita, made either in the first century or in the early part of the second. Ephrem, the Syrian, in his Greek works, made use of it in many places. It is quoted as of authority by several of the Fathers, as by Clement of Rome, by Hermas, and by Jerome (see Lardner, Vol. VI., p. 195-199).—Introd. to James, p. xiv.
PROF. FREDERICK MEYRICK, M. A., Oxon.—Eusebius bears witness that it was publicly read in the churches, and in his time accepted as canonical. Origen bears the same testimony as Eusebius. It is quoted by nearly all the Fathers of the fourth century. In A. D. 397 the Council. of Carthage accepted it as canonical, and from that time there has been no further question of its genuineness on the score of external testimony: and the objection on internal grounds proves nothing except against the objectors, for it really rests on a mistake.—Smith's Dict. of Bible, p. 1208.
Wavering
EPICTETUS.—No man can improve while he is-wavering. Whichever way you decide to be preferable, incline to that way altogether, and let no other kind of reasoning draw you aside.—Epict., lib. iv., c. 2.
CICERO.—A mind that disagrees and quarrels with itself, cannot taste any portion of clear and unrestrained pleasure.—De Fin., I., 18.
Whence Temptations Spring
HOMER.—
Perverse mankind! whose wills, created free,
Charge all their woes on absolute decree;
All to the dooming gods their guilt translate,
And follies are miscalled the crimes of fate.
—Odyss., I., 32.
PLATO.—To say that God, who is good, is the cause of ills to any one, this we must by all means oppose, nor suffer it to be said in our state.—De Rep., II., 19.
All Good From God
MAXIMUS TYRIUS.—There is nothing good given to man which does not proceed from God.— Diss., 22.
PLATO.—We have no good 'at all which the gods did not impart.—Ruth., c. 18.
The Hearer Only
PLAUTUS.—Not only for the sake of the face were it right for men to have a mirror for themselves, but one with which they might be able to examine the heart of discretion and the resources of the mind; when they had looked in that, they might afterward consider how they had passed their lives in guilt.— Epidic., act iv., scene I.
The Friend of God
was called the Friend of God.
PLATO.—As respects the gods, the unjust man will be a foe, but the just man a friend.— De Rep., I., 23.
EPICTETUS.—I am free and the friend of God, so as to obey him willingly; but I must not value any other things; for it is not his will that I should value them.—Epict., IV., 3.
MAXIMUS TYRIUS.—The pious man is a friend to the Deity; but the superstitious man is a flatterer only.—Diss., 4.
The Tongue a World of Iniquity
EURIPIDES.—From a small beginning the tongue furnishes a mighty dispute to men.— Androm., v. 642.
PLUTARCH.—By means of a little spark you might set Mount Ida on fire: so a word spoken to one man may reach to every ear in the city.—De Garrul., C. 10.
All Living Creatures Tamable
James 3:77For every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind: (James 3:7).—For every kind of beasts, and of birds, and of serpents, and of things in the sea, is tamed, and hath been tamed of mankind.
EURIPIDES.—Small is the power which nature has given to man, but by various acts of his superior understanding, he has subdued the tribes of the sea, the earth, and the air.—In Barnes.
DR. JOHN KITTO.—There is perhaps no kind of creature, to which man has access, which might not be tamed by him, with proper perseverance. The ancients seem to have made more exertions to this end, and with much better success, than ourselves. The examples given by Pliny of creatures tamed by men, relate to elephants, lions, and tigers, among beasts; to the eagle among birds; to asps and other serpents: and to crocodiles, and various fishes, among the inhabitants of the water (Nat. Hist. VIII., 9, 16, 17; and X. 5, 44.) The lion was very commonly tamed by the ancient Egyptians.—Pict. Bib., In loco.
The Tongue Untamable
REV. ALBERT BARNES. —The allusion here seems to be to the bite of a venomous reptile. Nothing would better describe the mischief that may be done by the tongue. There is no sting of a serpent that does so much evil in the world; there is no poison more deadly to the frame than the poison of the tongue is to the happiness of man. Who, for example, can stand before the power of the slanderer? What mischief can be done in society that can be compared with that which he may do?—In loco.
SHAKSPEARE.—
'Tis slander;
Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile; whose breath
Rides on the posting winds, and Both belie
All corners of the world: kings, queens, and states,
Maids, matrons, nay, the secrets of the grave
This viperous slander enters.
—In Cymbeline.
MAXIMUS TYRIUS.—The human soul is most near and most similar to divinity. —Diss., 38.
Whence Come Wars
PLATO.—Nothing else but the body and its desires occasion wars, seditions, and contests; for all wars among us arise on account of our desires to acquire wealth.—Phœdo, c. I I.
MAXIMUS TYRIUS.—All things are full of war and injustice: for desires wander everywhere, exciting in every land an immoderate desire of possessing; and all places are filled with armies marching to invade the property of others.—Diss., 13.
CICERO.—Desires are insatiable, and ruin not only individuals but entire families, and often overturn the whole state. From desires arise hatred, dissensions, quarrels, seditions, wars. Nor is it only out of doors that these passions vent themselves, nor is it only against others that they run with blind violence; they are often shut up, as it were, in the mind, and throw that into confusion with their disagreements.— De Fin., I., 13.
The Proud and the Humble
James 4:66But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. (James 4:6).—God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble. XENOPHON.-Perhaps God has ordained this in order to humble these proud conceited boasters, and to give us the greater glory who derive all our hopes from the gods.—Anab., VI., 3.
DIODORUS SICULUS.—God, I conceive, purposely sets himself, by contrary events, to disappoint the expectations of those who proudly resolve beforehand what shall absolutely be done.—Diod. Sic., XX., 13.
The One Lawgiver
PROF. WILLIAM WHEWELL, M. A.—How incomparably the nature of God must be elevated above any conceptions which our natural reason enables us to form! The Divine Mind must be conceived by us as the seat of those Laws of nature which we have discovered. It must be no less the seat of those Laws which we have not yet discovered, though these may and must be of a character far different from anything we can guess. The Supreme Intelligence must therefore contain the Laws, each according to their true dependence, of organic life, of sense, of animal impulse, and must contain also the purpose and intent' for which these powers were put into play. But the Governing Mind must comprehend also the Laws of responsible creatures which the world contains, and must entertain the purposes for which their responsible agency was given them. It must include the Laws and Purposes connected by means of the notions, which responsibility implies, of desert and reward, of moral excellence in various degrees, and of well-being as associated with right-doing. All the Laws which govern the moral world are expressions of the thoughts and intentions of our Supreme Ruler. All the contrivances for moral no less than for physical good, for the peace of mind, and other rewards of virtue, for the elevation and purification of individual character, for the civilization and refinement of states, their advancement in intellect and virtue, for the diffusion of good, and the repression of evil; all the blessings that wait on perseverance and energy, in a good cause; on unquenchable love of mankind, and unconquerable devotedness to truth; on purity and self-denial; on faith, hope, and charity; all these things are indications of the character, will, and future intentions of that God, of whom we have endeavored to track the footsteps upon earth, and to show his handiwork in the heavens. And if, in endeavoring to trace the tendencies of the vast labyrinth of Laws by which the universe is governed, we are sometimes lost and bewildered, and can scarce, or not at all, discern the line by which pain, and sorrow, and vice, fall in with a scheme directed to the strictest right and greatest good, we yet find no room to faint or falter: knowing that these are the darkest and most tangled recesses of our knowledge; that into them science has as yet cast no ray of light; that in them reason has as yet caught sight of no general law by which we may securely hold: while, in those regions where we can see clearly, where science has thrown her strongest illumination upon the scheme of creation; where we have had displayed to us the General Laws which give rise to all the multifarious variety of particular facts; we find all full of wisdom, and harmony, and beauty: and all this wise selection of means, this harmonious combination of Laws, this beautiful symmetry of relations, directed with no exception which human investigation has yet discovered, to the preservation, the diffusion, the well-being of those living things, which, though of their nature we know so little, we cannot doubt to be the worthiest objects of the Creator's care.—Astronomy and General Physics, p. 193.
See Ex. 20:3-173Thou shalt have no other gods before me. 4Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: 5Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; 6And showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments. 7Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain; for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. 8Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. 9Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: 10But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: 11For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the Lord blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it. 12Honor thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. 13Thou shalt not kill. 14Thou shalt not commit adultery. 15Thou shalt not steal. 16Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. 17Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbor's. (Exodus 20:3‑17); and Deut. 5:7-217Thou shalt have none other gods before me. 8Thou shalt not make thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters beneath the earth: 9Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me, 10And showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. 11Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain: for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. 12Keep the sabbath day to sanctify it, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee. 13Six days thou shalt labor, and do all thy work: 14But the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, nor thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thine ox, nor thine ass, nor any of thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates; that thy manservant and thy maidservant may rest as well as thou. 15And remember that thou wast a servant in the land of Egypt, and that the Lord thy God brought thee out thence through a mighty hand and by a stretched out arm: therefore the Lord thy God commanded thee to keep the sabbath day. 16Honor thy father and thy mother, as the Lord thy God hath commanded thee; that thy days may be prolonged, and that it may go well with thee, in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. 17Thou shalt not kill. 18Neither shalt thou commit adultery. 19Neither shalt thou steal. 20Neither shalt thou bear false witness against thy neighbor. 21Neither shalt thou desire thy neighbor's wife, neither shalt thou covet thy neighbor's house, his field, or his manservant, or his maidservant, his ox, or his ass, or any thing that is thy neighbor's. (Deuteronomy 5:7‑21).
Presuming on the Future
James 4:13, 1413Go to now, ye that say, To day or to morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain: 14Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. (James 4:13‑14).—Go to now, ye that say, To-day or to-morrow we will go into such a city, and continue them a year, and buy and sell, and get gain: whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.
PLUTARCH.—How blind is man to futurity!—Solon, c. 12.
SENECA.—How ridiculous is it to promise ourselves a long life, when we are not certain of to-morrow. O the madness of entering into distant speculations.—Epist., 101.
James 4:1515For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that. (James 4:15).—For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that. CYRUS.—Our design will succeed, if God be willing.—Xen. Anab., VII., 3.
The Latter Rain
REV. ALBERT BARNES.—In the climate of Palestine there are two rainy seasons—the autumnal and the spring rains—called here and elsewhere in the scriptures "the early and the latter rain."—In loco.
James 5:1212But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath: but let your yea be yea; and your nay, nay; lest ye fall into condemnation. (James 5:12).—But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath; etc.
See Matt, 5:34.
The Effectual Prayer
PINDAR.—The gods above with favoring ear The prayers of pious mortals hear.—Olymp., VIII., 10.