2. The Jewish proverbs throw out a challenge to the present age in the demand they make for commercial honesty and consideration of the general welfare of the community. This claim is put forward in a variety of ways, and there is no mistaking its earnestness; as in the famous saying, _A false balance is an abomination unto the Lord, and a just weight is His delight_ (Pr. 11^{1}), a maxim reiterated in similar language in Pr. 20^{10, 23}. Again it is said, _The getting of treasures by a lying tongue is a vapour driven to and fro: they that seek them seek death_ (Pr. 21^{6})--_Better is the poor that walketh in his integrity than he that is crooked in his ways though he be rich_ (Pr. 28^{6}); and memorably--_Better is a little with righteousness than great revenues with injustice_ (Pr. 16^{8}); to which add this startlingly modern protest against the food-profiteer, _He that withholdeth corn, the people shall curse him; but blessing shall be upon the head of him that selleth it_ (Pr. 11^{26}). “Ah! but the times have changed, and the complications and stringency of modern business often render the employment of perfectly honest methods impractical. In those byegone days a man of industry and ability had perhaps little temptation to double-dealing, or at least was not compelled to follow the tricks of the trade in order to squeeze out a livelihood.” But no! that shortcut out of the difficulty is barred. Ben Sirach puts the matter bluntly: _A merchant_, says he, _shall hardly keep himself from wrong-doing, and a huckster shall not be acquitted of sin_ (E. 26^{29}). “Well, then, have the proverbs any remedy to suggest? It is easy for the purist to _talk_. No one wishes to deny the courage of him who maintains a life-long protest against sharp practice, and we grant you the desirability of the protest; we can even admit the success of one here and there who has undertaken it. But it may seem doubtful if such unbending rectitude could be carried out generally; and at any rate, as matters stand, there must be thousands of well-meaning men who to keep themselves and their families from want and hunger must bow themselves slightly in the modern house of Rimmon”--so may a plea for a reasonable latitude be advanced.