holies, which was thirty feet cube.  The whole external dimensions of the building were only sixty feet by one hundred and twenty, or less than many an ordinary parish church.  The explanation is that it was copied from the Tabernacle, which was a small building, and was necessarily somewhat related to it in size.  The walls were of stone, on extensive stone foundations.  Inside it was lined with cedar, with floors of cypress, highly ornamented with carvings and gold.  The brass work consisted of two ornamented pillars called Jachin and Boaz, a brazen tank supported by twelve brass oxen, and ten baths of brass, ornamented with figures of lions, oxen, and cherubim.

The Book of Kings says of Solomon (1 Kings iv. 32) that “he spake three thousand proverbs, and his songs were a thousand and five.  And he spake of trees, from the cedar-tree that is in Lebanon even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall:  he spake also of beasts, and of fowl and of creeping things, and of fishes.”  He was, according to this account, a voluminous writer on natural history, as well as an eminent poet and moralist.  Of all his compositions there remains but one, the Book of Proverbs, which was probably in great part composed by him.  It is true that three books in the Old Testament bear his name,—­Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Songs.  But of these Ecclesiastes was probably written afterward, and though the Song of Songs may have been written by Solomon, it was probably the work of another, living at or near his time.

But of the Book of Proverbs there cannot be much doubt.  It contains some of the three thousand of which Solomon was the reputed author.  It shows his style of mind very clearly,—­the cool understanding, the calculating prudence, the continual reference to results, knowledge of the world as distinguished from knowledge of human nature, or of individual character.  The Book of Proverbs contains little heroism or poetry, few large ideas, not much enthusiasm or sentiment.  It is emphatically a book of wisdom.  It has good, hard, practical sense.  It is the “Poor Richard’s Almanac” of Hebrew literature.  We can conceive of King Solomon and Benjamin Franklin consulting together, and comparing notes of their observations on human life, with much mutual satisfaction.  It is curious to meet with such a thoroughly Western intellect, a thousand years before Christ, on the throne of the heroic David.

Among these proverbs there are many of a kindly character.  Some are semi-Christian in their wise benevolence.  Many show great shrewdness of observation, and have an epigrammatic wit.  We will give examples of each kind:—­

    PROVERBS HAVING A SEMI-CHRISTIAN CHARACTER.

    “If thine enemy be hungry, give him bread;
    If thirsty, give him water to drink,
    For thou wilt heap coals of fire on his head,
    And Jehovah will reward thee.”