Proverbs will sometimes outrun and implicitly anticipate conclusions, which are only after long struggles and efforts arrived at as the formal and undoubted conviction of all thoughtful men. After how long a conflict has that been established as a maxim in political economy, which the brief Italian proverb long ago announced: _Gold’s worth is gold_.[137] What millions upon millions of national wealth have been as much lost as if they had been thrown into the sea, from the inability of those who have had the destinies of nations in their hands to grasp this simple proposition, that everything which could purchase money, or which money would fain purchase, was as really wealth as the money itself. What forcing of national industries into unnatural channels has resulted from this, what mischievous restrictions in the buying and selling of one people with another. Nay, can the truth which this proverb affirms be said even now to be accepted without gainsaying—so long as the talk about the balance of trade being in favour of or against a nation, as the fear of draining a country of its gold, still survive? Here is a proverb of many tongues: _One sword keeps another in its scabbard_;[138]—surely a far wiser and far manlier word than the puling yet mischievous babble of our shallow Peace Societies, which, while they fancy that they embody, and they only embody, the true spirit of Christianity, proclaim themselves in fact ignorant of all which it teaches; for they dream of having peace the fruit, while at the same time the root of bitterness out of which have grown all the wars and fightings that have ever been in the world, namely the lusts which stir in men’s members, remain strong and vigorous as ever. But no; it is not they that are the peacemakers: in the face of an evil world, and of a world determined to continue in its evil, _He who bears the sword_, and though he fain would not, yet knows how, if need be, to wield it, _he bears peace_.[139] One of the most remarkable features of a good proverb is the singular variety of applications which it will admit, which indeed it challenges and invites. Not lying on the surface of things, but going deep down to their heart, it will be found capable of being applied again and again, under circumstances the most different; like the gift of which Solomon spake, “whithersoever it turneth, it prospereth;” or like a diamond cut and polished upon many sides, which reflects and refracts the light upon every one. There can be no greater mistake than the attempt to tie it down and restrict it to a single application, when indeed the very character of it is that it is ever finding or making new ones for itself. [Sidenote: Scriptural proverb.]