The Spurgeon Series 1859 & 1860. Charles H. Spurgeon

to stretch on; and that they have also tried to make coverings for themselves which have turned out to be too narrow that they cannot wrap themselves in them.

      4. We shall speak, first, of what man has done, and of his vain and futile attempts to find rest and clothing for his soul; and then, afterward, we shall briefly attempt to show how God has accomplished this, and has given to the believer a couch upon which he can stretch himself to his utmost length, and yet find that the bed is long enough, and how the Lord has given him clothing in which he may grow, but he shall always find that, broad as he shall become in the magnitude of his experience or of his sin, yet shall this covering be always broad enough to cover him.

      5. I. Well, then, let us take the first figure. “The bed is to short to stretch out on.” MEN TRY, THEN, TO MAKE BEDS ON WHICH THEIR SOULS MAY REST. One of the most uncomfortable things in the world, I should think, would be a spare bed — a bed so spare that a man should not have room stretch himself out on it. I cannot conceive how miserable a poor wretch must be who would be condemned to seek an unresting rest, an uneasy ease on a couch shorter than his body. But that is just the condition of all men while they are seeking a rest anywhere else but in the “rest that remains for the people of God.” With reference to a man’s present aims, and present attainments, all that he can ever get on earth is a bed too short to stretch out on it. Then, in the next place, we shall notice as to the future world, that all that man can do, if we come to consider it, is too little to give ease to the heart.

      6. First, then, as to the present world, how many beds are there of man’s own invention. One man has made himself a bedstead of gold; its pillars are of silver, its covering is of Tyrian purple, the pillows are filled with down, such as only much fine gold could buy him; he has embroidered the hangings with threads of gold and silver, and the curtains are drawn upon rings of ivory. Lo, this man has ransacked creation for luxuries, and invented for himself all manner of sumptuous delights. He acquires for himself broad acres and many lands; he adds house to house, and field to field; he digs, he toils, he labours, he is hoping that he shall get enough, a sufficiency, a satisfactory inheritance. He proceeds from enterprise to enterprise, he invests his money in one sphere of labour, and then another. He attempts to multiply his gold, until it gets beyond all counting. He becomes a merchant prince, a millionaire, and he says to himself; “Soul, take your ease; eat, drink, and be merry; you have much goods laid up for many years.” Do you not envy this man his bed? Are there not some of you, whose only object in life is to get such a couch for yourselves? You say, “He has well feathered his nest; oh that I could do the same for myself!” Ah, but do you know that this bed is too short to stretch out on? If you lay down on it for a moment, the bed is long enough for you, but it is not long enough for him. I have often thought that many a man’s riches would be sufficient for me, but they are not sufficient for him. If he makes them his God, and seeks in them his happiness, you never find the man has money enough, his lands are still too narrow and his estate too small. When he begins to stretch himself, he finds there is something still lacking; if the bed could only be made a little longer, then, he thinks, he could rest and have room enough. But when the bed is lengthened, he finds he has grown longer, too; and when his fortune has grown as big as the bedstead of Og, king of Bashan, even then he finds he cannot lie upon it easily. No, we read of one man who stretched himself along the whole world which he had conquered; but he found there was not enough room, and he began to weep because there were not other worlds to conquer. One would have thought a little province would have been enough for him to rest in. Oh, no; so big is man when he stretches himself, that the whole world does not suffice him. No, if God should give to the avaricious all the mines of Peru, all the glittering diamonds of Golconda, all the wealth of worlds, and if he were then to transmute the stars into gold and silver, and make us emperors of an entire universe until we should speak of constellations as men talk of hundreds, yes, and speak of universes as men often talk of thousands, even then the bed would not be long enough so that we might stretch out our ever lengthening desires. The soul is wider than creation, broader than space; give it all, it would be still unsatisfied, and man would not find rest. You say, “That is strange: if I had a little more I would be very well satisfied.” You make a mistake: if you are not content with what you have, you would not be satisfied if it were doubled. “No,” one says, “I would be.” You do not know yourself. If you have fixed your affection on the things of this world, that affection is like a horseleech; it cries, “Give! give!” It will suck, suck, suck for all eternity, and still cry, “Give, give!” and though you give it all, it has not had enough. The bed, in fact, “is too short to stretch out on.”

      7. Let us look in another direction. Other men have said. “Well, I do not care for gold and silver; thank God I have no avarice.” But they have been ambitious. “Oh,” one says, “if I might be famous, what would I not do? Oh, if my name might be handed down to posterity, as having done something, and having been someone, a man of note, how satisfied I would be!” And the man has so acted, that he has at last made for himself a bed of honour. He has become famous. There is scarcely a newspaper which does not mention his name. His name is become a household word; nations listen to his voice; thousands of trumpets proclaim his deeds. He is a man, and the world knows it, and stamps him with the adjective “great”: he is called “a great man.” See how soft and downy is his bed. What would some of you give to rest upon it! He is fanned to sleep by the breath of fame, and the incense of applause smokes in his bedroom. The world waits to refresh him with renewed flattery. Oh, would you not give your ears and eyes if you might have a bed like that to rest upon? But did you ever read the history of famous men, or hear them tell their tale in secret? “Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown,” even though it is the laurel coronet of honour. When the man is known, it is not enough; he asks for wider praise. There was a time when the approbation of a couple of old women was a fame to him; now the approbation of ten thousand is nothing. He speaks of men as if they were but flocks of wild asses, and what he looked up to once as a high pinnacle is now beneath his feet. He must go higher and higher, and higher, though his head is reeling, though his brain is whirling, though his feet are slipping, he must go higher. He has done a great thing; he must do more. He seems to stride across the world; he must leap further yet, for the world will never believe a man to be famous unless he constantly outdoes himself. He must not only do a great thing today, but he must do a greater thing tomorrow, the next day a greater still, and pile his mountains one upon another until he mounts the very Olympus of the demigods. But suppose he gets there, what does he say? “Oh, that I could go back to my cottage, that I might return to obscurity, that I might have rest with my family and be quiet. Popularity is a care which I never endured until now, a trouble that I never guessed. Let me lose it all; let me go back.” He is sick of it; for the fact is, that man never can be satisfied with anything less than the approbation of heaven; and until conscience gets that, all the applause of senates and of listening princes, would be a bed to short to stretch out on.

      8. There is another bed on which man thinks he could rest. There is a witch, a painted prostitute, who wears the richest gems in her ears, and a necklace of precious jewels around her neck. She is an old deceiver. She was old and shrivelled in the days of Bunyan; she painted herself then, she paints now, and paint she will as long as the world endures. And she gads around, and men think her to be young and fair and lovely, and desirable: her name is Madam Wanton. She keeps a house where she feasts men, and makes them drunk with the wine of Pleasure, which is as honey to the taste, but is venom to the soul. This witch, when she can, entices men into her bed. “There,” she says, “there, how daintily have I spread it!” It is a bed, its pillars are pleasure; above is the purple of rapture, and beneath is the soft repose of luxurious voluptuousness. Oh, what a bed is this! Solomon once laid in it, and many since his time have sought their rest there. They have said, “Away with your gold and silver: let me spend it, that I may eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow I die. Do not tell me about fame, I do not care for it. I would sooner have the pleasures of life, or the joys of Bacchus, than the laurel of fame. Let me give myself up to the intoxication of this world’s delights, let me be drowned in the cask of Burgundy of this world’s joys.” Have you ever seen such men as that? I have seen many and wept over them, and I know some now, they are stretching themselves on that bed, and trying to make themselves