The preacher began by drawing that distinction between knowledge and wisdom which so many comprehend and allow, and so few apply. He then described the two parties in the great question of popular education. Those who would base all human progress on secular instruction, on knowledge in contradistinction to ignorance, as on light opposed to darkness;—and the mistake of those who, taking the contrary extreme, denounce all secular instruction imparted to the poor as dangerous, or contemn it as useless. The error of those who sneer at the triumph of intellect he termed a species of idiocy; and the error of those who do not see the insufficiency of knowledge, blind presumption. Then he contrasted worldly wisdom and spiritual; with a flow of gorgeous eloquence he enlarged on the picture of worldly wisdom as exhibited in the character of Solomon, and of intellect, and admiration for intellect, in the character of the Queen of Sheba. “In what consisted the wisdom of Solomon? He made, as the sacred history assures us, three thousand proverbs, mostly prudential maxims relating to conduct in life; the use and abuse of riches; prosperity and adversity. His acquirements in natural philosophy seem to have been confined to the appearances of material and visible things; the herbs and trees, the beasts and birds, the creeping things and fishes. His political wisdom consisted in increasing his wealth, his dominions, and the number of his subjects and cities. On his temple he lavished all that art had then accomplished, and on his own house a world of riches in gold, and silver, and precious things: but all was done for his own glory—nothing for the improvement or the happiness of his people, who were ground down by taxes, suffered in the midst of all his magnificence, and remained ignorant in spite of all his knowledge. Witness the wars, tyrannies, miseries, delusions, and idolatries which followed after his death.” “But the Queen of Sheba came not from the uttermost parts of the earth to view the magnificence and wonder at the greatness of the King, she came to hear his wisdom. She came not to ask anything from him, but to prove him with hard questions. No idea of worldly gain, or selfish ambition was in her thoughts; she paid even for the pleasure of hearing his wise sayings by rare and costly gifts.”