A Time to Frown and a Time to Smile
“The north wind driveth away rain: so doth an angry countenance a backbiting tongue.” — xxv. 23.
THERE is a use for everything. There is a use for the north wind, and for an angry countenance. Rough visaged, ungainly messengers both are; but when sent 011 necessary errands, they fulfil their mission well. When David wanted a weapon, Ahimelech, the peaceful priest of Nob, having no other than the sword of Goliath, which he kept as a relic, apologized as he offered it, thinking it not sufficiently slim and fashionable for a soldier from the court. “There is none like that,” said David; “give it me.” The man of war had seen hard service, and expected more: the sword that could deal a heavy blow was the sword for him.
According to the translation in the text, which is perhaps on the whole as free from difficulties as that in the margin, it appears that in the climate of Palestine the north wind carries the rain clouds away, and prevents them from discharging their burden on the land. The same phenomenon is to some extent observed in our own island. This meteoric fact is framed into a proverb, and employed to describe an analogous feature in the action of moral forces upon human life: “An angry countenance driveth away a backbiting tongue.”
There is a place for anger as well as for love. As in nature a gloomy tempest serves some beneficial purposes for which calm sunshine has no faculty; so in morals a frown on an honest man’s brow is, in its own place, as needful and useful as the sweetest smile that kindness ever kindles on a human countenance. A gentle, loving character, is much admired, and, where it is genuine, deserves all the admiration it has ever gotten yet. These features, however, constitute only one side of a man, and we must see the other side ere we can pronounce an intelligent judgment on Ids worth. If he has not another side, he will not leave Ms mark on the world. If he has not the faculty of frowning, I would not give much for his smile. A worthy matron once showed me her own portrait set in a massive frame, and suspended in the most conspicuous place of her best room. Her sons had secured the services of an eminent artist to fix their mother’s features on the canvas that filial piety, in a future day, might have the double aid of sense and memory in the effort to recall the past. The old lady, after asking her visitor’s opinion, frankly pronounced her own: “It is not in the least like me; I never had such great black blotches in the middle of my face.” The artist’s shade offended her. A shining disc of red and white would have pleased her better. She excelled more in the management of family economics than in judging a work of art. Such, in a more important sphere, is the taste that demands only gentleness in human character, and would dispense with virtues of swarthier hue.
We don’t want a fretful, passionate man; and if we did, we would find one without searching long or going* far. We want neither a man of wrath, nor a man of indis criminating, unvarying softness. We want something with two sides; that is, a solid, real character. Let us have a man who loves good and hates evil, and who, in place and time convenient, can make either emotion manifest in his countenance. The frown of anger is the shade that lies under love and brings out its beauty. The wisdom that is from above, whether as doctrinally revealed in the Bible or practically operating in a Christian’s life, “is first pure and then peaceable.” Salt is worthless when it has lost its saltness. The double command of the Lord, corresponding to the two constituent elements of a disciple’s character, is, “Have salt in yourselves, and have peace one with another” (Mark ix. 50). The gentleness which will have peace on any terms, is neither pleasing to the Lord nor beneficial to men; if there is no pungency there will be no purifying.
An angry countenance is a specific for taking the venom out of a backbiting tongue. The disease is painful and dangerous; the medicine which cures it worth its weight in gold. An angry countenance is not in itself and for its own sake a blessing to its possessor. Like some valuable medicines, it is a fiery and dangerous thing. It is not safe to harbour it in large quantities, or carry it about in company; there is imminent risk of explosion. But it is good to have a supply of the tincture always within reach, and wherever a backbiting tongue shows itself, resolutely to administer the dose.
A backbiting tongue would be comparatively harmless if it should never meet with itching ears. Alone, it would be like seed without a soil; the mischief would soon die out if it wanted, the power to propagate its kind. To speak evil is, in this department, the first and great sin; but the second, which is like unto it, is to hear evil. Knit your brows at the backbiter’s approach, and he will soon sneak away: if you do not take the venom in, he will not long continue to give it out. Frown like the north upon the parasite who flatters you by speaking evil of a neighbour: call up the angry countenance to chase the troubler from your presence, as you would unleash the gruff watch-dog to scare the robber from your garden.
In a subsequent proverb this principle is specifically applied to an actual case :* “If a ruler hearken to lies, all his servants are wicked” (xxix. 12). Whether he be the ruler of a family, a shop, a manufactory, or a nation, it behoves him to lay to heart this plainly spoken and homely warning. The practice which this word exposes is very common and very mischievous. It is not enough that you abstain from telling lies to the prejudice of others; to listen to such lies is only one degree less guilty. There is an appetite in human nature for secrets clandestinely obtained: stolen waters are sweet. This tendency should be jealously watched and sternly repressed. It is a man’s interest, as much as his duty, to starve this morbid curiosity out of his own heart. Like other abnormal appetites, if it is indulged it will increase; if you give it much, it will demand more. Nor will the supply of aliment fall short; he who listens to lies will always have plenty of lies to listen to. This habit in a ruler is disastrous directly to his dependants, and indirectly to himself. Those of the servants who tell lies to their master become sycophants; those of them against whom lies are told grow desperate. Confidence is destroyed, and fear has no power to hold the incongruous elements together. The servants are wicked, and the loss falls ultimately on the master.
From this side the responsible head of any large establishment is always exposed to danger. Backbiters are moving about like flies in the sunshine. Timidly at first, and tentatively, and one by one, they alight upon him. If they find him soft, they gather courage and sit down in swarms upon his body. Firmness is a fundamental requisite for the master who has many servants: without it, even genuine kindness will be practically thrown away. A man who has not a frown in reserve cannot turn his smiles to any good account. It is refreshing to see the vermin flying before an angry countenance. When once scared away, this kind do not so readily return. Those masters who give the tale-bearers their desert at first, are seldom troubled with them a second time. One master’s weakness, although not so sinful in itself, may thus be as mischievous in its effects as another master’s wickedness. Many grain-fields have rotted after they were ripe, for want of a sharp north wind to drive the clouds away; and many social blessings have been blighted in the bud, for want of a frown at the proper time upon the ruler’s face.
Such anger, far from being antagonist to love, is the very instrument which love wields. If you have not a frown on your face wherewith to meet the backbiter, you cannot have true kindness in your heart towards the innocent whom he undermines. No man can serve these two masters: to obey the one is to despise the other. You cannot both maintain the cause of the innocent, and open your ear to the traducer’s tale. Love of the true is, on its other side, a north wind that will drive a cloud of lies away. You may as well attempt to admit light into a chamber without expelling the darkness, as to retain affection for the good without becoming a terror to the evil.
Nor do the real interests of the injurer himself require a different treatment; love even to the backbiter demands that you should have an angry countenance ever ready to meet a backbiting tongue. You are cruel to him, and not kind, if by your softness you stimulate still further the growth of a thorn which is already choking whatever good seed has been sown in his heart. Give the devil that possesses your brother a blow, although your brother himself should feel the smart: when he comes to himself he will thank you.