Bread on the Waters

“Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days.” — ECCLES. XL 1.

WERE you going at the right season to Mysore or China, you would see thousands of people planting the corn of those countries. They sow it in the mud or on the dry soil, and then immediately they turn on a flood of water, so that the whole field becomes a shallow pond. You would think the seed was drowned. But wait a few weeks, and then go and view one of these artificial lakes, and from all its surface you will see green points rising, and day by day that grass shoots taller, till at last the wrater is no more seen, and till eventually the standing pool has ripened into a field of rich and rustling grain. So that in its literal sense the farmers of these lands are every year fulfilling the maxim of the text. For should the spring come on them, and find their supply of rice-corn scanty, instead of devouring it all, they will rather stint themselves. They will rather go hungry for weeks together, and live on a pinched supply: for the bread which they cast on the waters this spring, creates the crop on which they are to subsist next autumn and winter; and they are content to cast it on the waters now, for they are sure to find it after many days.

Or suppose that you are in the South Sea Isles, where the bread-fruit grows,* and that by chance or on purpose, you scatter some of its precious bunches on the sea. At the moment you may feel that they are lost: but should the winds and waters waft them to one of those reef islands with which such seas are thickly studded, the wandering seeds may get washed ashore, and beneath those brilliant suns may quickly grow to a bread-fruit forest. And should some disaster long years after wreck you on that reef, when these trees are grown and their clusters ripe, you may owe your sustenance to the bread which you cast on the waters long ago.

Such is God’s husbandry. Do the right deed. Do it in faith, and in prayer commend it to the care of God. And though the waves of circumstance may soon waft it beyond your ken, they only carry it to the place prepared by Him. And whether on an earthly or a heavenly shore, the result will be found, and the reaper will rejoice that he once was a sower.

Dr. Dwight of America tells how, when the country near Albany was newly settled, an Indian came to the inn at Lichfield, and asked for a night’s * The cultivated sort, however, has seldom any seeds.

shelter, — at the same time confessing that from failure in hunting he had nothing to pay. The hostess drove him away with reproachful epithets, and as the Indian was retiring sorrowfully, — there being no other inn for many a weary mile, — a man who was sitting by directed the hostess to supply his wants and promised to pay her. As soon as his supper was ended, the Indian thanked his benefactor, and said he would some day repay him. Several years thereafter the settler was taken a prisoner by a hostile tribe, and carried off to Canada. However, his life was spared, though he himself was detained in slavery. But one day an Indian came to him, and giving him a musket, bade the captive follow him. The Indian never told where they were going, nor what was his object; but day after day the captive followed his mysterious guide, till one afternoon they came suddenly on a beautiful expanse of cultivated fields, with many houses rising amongst them. “Do you know that place?” asked the Indian. “Ah, yes it is Lichfield;” and whilst the astonished exile had not recovered his surprise and amazement, the Indian exclaimed, “And I am the starving Indian on whom at this very place you took pity. And now that I have paid for my supper, I pray you go home.”

And it is to such humanities that the text has primaiy reference; for the context runs, “Give a portion to seven and also to eight; for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth,” That is, miss no opportunity of performing kind actions. Though you should have bestowed your bounty on seven, — on a number which you might deem sufficient, — should an eighth present himself, do something for him also; for you know not what evil shall be upon earth. You know not in this world of mutation how soon you may be the pensioner instead of the almoner. You know not how soon you may be glad of a crust from those who are at present thankful for your crumbs. Beneficence is the best insurance. When Jonathan was young he was the heir-apparent of the throne; and in those days his favourite friend was a young Bethlehemite, whom they had brought to the palace to amuse the monarch with his minstrelsy. The young Bethlehemite was brave and high-hearted, and Jonathan loved him for his genius and his lofty piety, till he and the Prince Royal were fast and firm as any brothers. At length one morning Jonathan embraced a meriy boy some five years old, and donning corslet and casque he followed his own sire to the battle. Next morning their corses lay stiff on the blasted heights of Gilboa, and the young minstrel was monarch of Israel. Years passed on, and the new sovereign found him self in SauFs old palace; and whichsoever way he looked there rose upon his spirit touching memories. Here was the very throne before which he had often kneeled, harp in hand, and watched the grim tyrant’s features; and there was the wainscot in which his furious javelin had hung and quivered. And now he trode again the terraces where he and Jonathan had paced together, and sworn eternal friendship as they dreamed out a radiant future. He visited again the field in which they had set up their target and contended in friendly rivalry. He visited again the bovver in which they took sweet counsel, and where they sang “The Lord is my Shepherd,” and “Make a joyful noise,” whiles yet these psalms were new. And everything brought back that pure and noble friend so tenderly, that the whole soul of the sovereign yearned for some living relict on whom to lavish his regretful fondness. “And is there none?” No, none; except this feeble, limping youth, the little boy that was, and who dates his lameness from his father’s funeral. Yes, but fetch him! Fetch Mephibosheth. He is all of Jonathan which now survives on earth; and for his dear father’s sake, he shall possess again his patrimony, and, if he must not be the King, he shall never eat bread at meaner board than mine. And as he looked on the countenance so suggestive of one yet dearer; and as he rejoiced to see the poor youth reinstated in that home of which he was the natural heir; and as he eyed Mephibosheth filling in the banquet-hall the place which Jonathan had filled, whilst as yet him self was but a menial, David could sing with much significance, “I have been young and now am old; yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread. He is even merciful and lendeth, and his seed is blessed.” And David’s own son, when he saw that sight, — when he saw Jonathan’s old kindness requited in this princely provision for his child, — Solomon might say, as here he says, “Cast thy bread on the waters, and thou shalt find it after many days.”

Although so often exemplified in cases of common humanity and kind-heartedness, the maxim of our text is especially applicable to the efforts of Christian philanthropy. These are pre-eminently amaranthine. There are seeds which, after being borne on the current for a few days or weeks, lose their vitality; they rot and sink and disappear. So is it with much of human effort. So is it with many a worldly scheme, many a plausible suggestion, many a patriotic enterprise. It finds little favour in its day; it cannot get deposited in a sufficient number of appropriate minds; and thus, ere long, it becomes old and obsolete; the thought perishes, the seed dissolves and vanishes. But not so with pious effort. It is more than the lucky thought of fallible and short-sighted man; it is more than the wrell-meaning purpose of a feeble and sinful worm. It is a thought suggested by God’s owrn Spirit; it is a purpose sustained and animated by One whose wisdom is infinite and who is alive for evermore. And though the mind in which that wish or effort first originated may long since have passed from these scenes of mortality; — though forgetful of its cunning, the hand which first launched on the tide of human thought that project or that principle, may long since be crumbling in the clay, a heavenly life is at its core-, and, as it journeys on its buoyant path, a covenant God will keep alive its little ark till it reach the predestined creek, and after many days be drawn forth from the waters, — a Moses of the mind.

So was it with the first Reformers. Searching in their Bibles they found truths of God which had vanished from the memories of men, — great truths and glorious, no longer current in the vernacular of Christendom. But after their own understandings and hearts had been filled and expanded by them, they gave them utterance. That it is through the justified Surety that a sinner is just with God; that betwixt that sinner and that Surety nothing mediates nor intervenes, neither Mary in heaven nor mother Church on earth, neither the sainted mediator of the Calendar nor the sacerdotal mediator of the Confessional; but that to his great High Priest, the God-man, Immanuel, the sinner may come boldly and may come direct; that in order to receive the atonement and rejoice in Christ Jesus no preliminaries of penance, or pilgrimages, are requisite, but that for this great salvation, conscious sin is sufficient fitness, and the Word and will of God sufficient warrant: these and other golden truths, fresh gleaned from the Bible, they published, some preaching them from pulpits, some proclaiming with their pens. And the hosts of darkness took alarm. Wickliff went to the dungeon; Huss and Jerome to the flaming pile. But, though the witnesses perished, the Word of God could not be bound: the truth of God was neither burned, nor buried: but over the troubled deep of a dark and stormy century this bread of life, these seeds of saving knowledge floated on, till God the Spirit landed them and planted them in minds prepared, and from these rescued waifs there sprang the glorious Reformation.

It were only to tell the same tale a little varied to rehearse how once upon a time every enterprise of Christian charity was once a project in some solitary and prayerful mind; and how, when cast forth on the waters of thought and opinion, it first halted and hovered, and looked as if it would never get to sea: and how, after touching at one point after another, and finding momentary favour only to be rebuffed again, some great gulf- current swept it clean away, and its author hoped to see it no more. And away it went; and it was bandied on the billows, and it was battered on the rocks, and it was frozen in the iceberg, and it was roasted in the tropic, till at last the Eye that watched it and the Hand that steered it from above, conducted it to its sunny haven, and, safely landed on an honest soil, it burst and hour geoned and waxed a mighty tree.

So understood, the principle admits of boundless application; and it should be very cheering to all who are engaged in labours of Christian love. For instance, if you are engaged in teaching your own children, or the children of other people, and your great anxiety is to see some good thing towards the Lord — some dawn of pious feeling, some development of personal earnestness; — but notwithstanding all the endearment which you throw into your words, and all the prayer with which you follow up your in structions, you dare hardly say that you perceive any hopeful sign. Be not discouraged. It is God’s own truth, and if all your heart be in it, it is living truth, and will blossom up some day. It may be in that soul’s salvation out and out. It may be in restraining it from much sin, or in urging it to duties which it would otherwise have never thought of doing. And it may be after many days. It may be after your own day altogether. It may be on the shores of another continent. It may be on the shores of another world. But still, God’s Word shall not go forth a living power, and come back a vacant nullity. That Word shall never go forth without returning, and when it returns it shall never be void. “In the morning, then, sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thy hand: for thou knowest not which shall prosper, this or that, or whether both shall be alike good.” Sow thy seed. Sow tracts and Bibles, and good books. Sow friendly hints and words in season. Sow cordial looks and substantial services. And sow beside all waters. Cast thy bread not only on Jordan’s flood, but on the streams of Babylon. Cast it on the Thames and the Ganges. Let thy field be the world; let it also be thine own family.

March 30, 1851.