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that devours all, and reftores nothing; whence it comes to pass, that no man is in general fo much despised while he lives as a mifer, and no man's death is fo much defired as his. He never opens his treasures, till he is leaving the world, he therefore can never receive the fruits of gratitude, becaufe his favours are never conferred til his death.

3d. Farther, this vice not only renders a man ufeless to society; but it even makes him hurtful and pernicious to it. There is no right fo inviolable, no law fo holy, which he will not violate greedily to amafs riches, and cautiously to preserve them. How many violent incroachments! how many criminal defigns! how many dark and treafonable practices! how many infamies and wickedneffes have proceeded from this perverfe inclination! If a covetous man is barren in kindnesses, he is fruitful in fins and iniquities. There are no boundaries, which he cannot pass, no barriers which he cannot readily go over to fatisfy his base paffion for money. (1)

(1) Avarice is burtful to fociety. The writer, who firft affirmed that private vices were publick benefits, was certainly either a very fuperficial reafoner, or a very bad man. Avarice, for example, fubverts both the throne of God and the bafes of human fociety. Trade Trade depends on publick faith, and publick faith on private virtues. A mifer, by fubverting private virtues, fubverts publick faith, and with it foreign and domeftick com

4th. By

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This vice has given occafion to a famous cafuistical question concerning ufury,

4th. By this we may already perceive how incompatible this vice is with true faith, and with the genius of christianity. (2.) The spirit of chriftia

which, fay fome, is prohibited by the exprefs command of God. Exod. xxii, 25. Lev. xxv. 35, 36. Prov. xxviii. 8. Pfal. xv. 5. Ezek. xviii. 17. Some of our divines reply, " 1. The law prohibiting ufory was given to the Jews, it was merely forenfick, and it has no force beyond that economy. 2. It was given with limitation to the Jews, and confined to the poor; if thou lend money to any of my people, that is poor by thee, thou shalt not be to him as an ufurer, neither fhalt thou lay upon him ufury. 3. God, who never allows fin, did allow the Jews to lend upon ufury; thou fhalt not lend upon ufury to thy brother, ufury of money, ufury of victuals, ufury of any thing, that is lent upon ufury; unto a stranger tbou mayeft lend upon ufury. Deut. xxiii. 19, 20." The fum feems to be, the Jews might not lend money upon intereft to the poor; they might not lend it upon exorbitant intereft to the wealthy trader, or to the probable adventurer, whether Jew or heathen. An ufurer with us is one, who lends money upon unlawful interest. Vid. Wendelini Philof. Moral. lib. i. cap. 25. Riveti Explic. Decal. ad Exod. xx. 15.

nity

(2) Avarice is incompatible with chriftianity.-Mr. Saurin obferves, that though the fcripture fpeaks of fome monsters of mankind, who died feemingly in rebellion against God, fuch as Pharaoh, Belshazzar and others, yet it is not for us to pronounce certainly concerning their eternal tiate, as it is not in our power to comprehend the treasures of divine mercy, "there is but one (adds he) one only without exception, of whom I would venture to say, he is certainly damned. This one is Judas, of whom Chrift said, it had been good for that man, if he had never been born and the fin, which carried Judas to his own place, was. avarice."The scripture, which tells us of many fins, into which pious men have fallen, does not (as I recollect) tell us of any one regenerate perfon left to this; nor is there fuch an awful mark fet upon any other fin as that above-mentioned by Mr. Saurin. Well might he bid his people pray, Lord incline my heart unto thy teftimonies, and not to covetousness. Pfal. cxix. 36.

Incompatible with the genius, or spirit of christianity. The gofpel may be truly called the liberality of God,

and

nity is a spirit of love and charity, always beneficent, always ready to prevent the neceffities of our chriftian brethren, kind and full of compaffion, inquiring into the wants of others, and, without asking, feeking means to prevent them. But avarice on the contrary makes a man hard, cruel, pitilefs, beyond the reach of complaints and tears, rendering the mifer not only

jealous

nity, and fuch were formerly in this country the papifts, and afterwards the highchurch faction, would ruin a nation to fecure a party. Strangers to benevolence, they were fons of violence, and, if they could obtain their own fafety, they never confidered what their fafety coft the rest of mankind. Á certain writer in the dispute between Hoadley and Blackall ftates the accounts of queen Ann, the established church, and the nation, in mercantile fashion, and proves that all three had been great lofers by the jacobites, and were great gainers by the Revolution. This, I confefs, is ad homines; and fome weight fhould be allowed to the reafoning: but, after all, there are nobler, that is, there are difinterested motives. It would require too much room to infert the whole account : and that of THE fhall fuffice for a specimen. CHURCH.

and no man can (to ufe an expreflion of St. Paul, 1 Cor. xii. 13.) drink into the Spirit of it, without imbibing a certain expanfibility of foul, a generofity of fentiment; and this will operate, I do not fay a holy indifference to gain, and a free diftribution of money but a magnanimity of religious action, which the little tiny foul of a bigot can never comprehend. I doubt whether a mercenary bigot have a foul. It should feem, he has only a hole to hide money in. Seriously, I cannot account for the partial felfishness, the unfeeling principles of fome, who are reputed men of eminent piety, and who yet are actuated by motives of intereft, that tend to perfecution. Covetous fervants of a generous mafters how dare they monopolize the deity, and coolly commit the reft of their brethren to deftruction! Such pretenders to chriftia66 THE Debtor.

1. To God, his word, and his providence for her being,

Creditor.

CHURCH

1. By her firm adherence to God, and the true protef

tant

jealous of the profperity of his neighbour: but even making him confider the pittances of the miferable as objects of his covetous defires. (3)

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5th. It

her doctrine, and her prefer- tant religion in king James's vation.

2. To the nation, for her privileges, and her revenues.

3. To our civil liberties, and the conftitution and interest of our native country.

4. To her account of profit and lofs, upon the defection and apoftacy of fome of her fpiritual guides, and her lay-members.

The writer of the above was a friend to religious liberty, I therefore revere him, and make no remarks, except that, if the church gained by trading in revolution principles, the ought to have repaid her partners the nonCORS for their fhare of the

ftock. From the dawn of the Reformation to the abdication of James II. the nonconformists rifqued all on revolution principles, and, when their accounts were fettled, they obtained a toleration, with a corporation, and a teft act! They are conVOL. II.

reign.

2. By her humble fubmiffion to the civil power, and her gratitude to the nation for her establishment and protection.

3. By her oppofing the invafion of our liberties under King James, and joining with the nation in refifting popery, and arbitrary power.

4. By parting with her fpurious fons, thofe falfe brethren, from whom she has been in continual peril, and by a fupply of learned and fober perfons, who heartily love their religion and na tive country." Divine rights of the British nation and confitution vindicated, 1710. tent: but then their content does not arife from motives of fecular intereft "In quo differunt paftor et mercenarius? In quatuor funt diffimiles. In caufa-in ftudio in vita-in PERICULO." Hemming. Paftor. par. 2

(3) The mifer covets the poor man's pittance. This circumftance aggravates the crime of avarice, and the difpofition is beautifully depicted in Nathan's parable, 2 Sam. xii. 1, &c. and as finely exemplified in Ahab's conduct to Naboth, 1 Kings xxi. 1. &c. Salluft well defcribes

K

5th. It is not without reafon, that St. Paul calls avarice, idolatry; for one of the principal characters of this curfed inclination is a making gold and filver one's God. It is money, in effect, which the covetous adores, it is this that he fupremely loves, this he prefers above all other things, it is his laft end, his life, his confidence, and all his happiness. He, who fears God, confecrates to him his first thoughts, and devotes to his glory and service the chief of his cares, to his interefts the whole of his heart, and for the rest commits himself to the care of his providence. It is the fame with a covetous man in regard to his treasures, he thinks only of them, he labours only to increase and preferve them, he feels only for them, he has neither reft, nor hope, which is not founded on his riches, he would offer incenfe to them, could he do it without expence. (4)

fcribes avarice in this view. Et bellua fera, immanis, intoleranda; quo intendit, oppida, agros, fana atque domos vaftat; divina cum humanis permifcet, neque

(4) A mifer deifies gold.

6th. It

exercitus, neque monia obftant, quo minus vi fua penetret; fama, pudicitia, liberis, patria atque parentibus, cunctos mortales fpoliat.”

For fordid lucre plunge we in the mire ?
Drudge, fweat, thro' ev'ry fhame, for ev'ry gain,
For vile contaminating trash; throw up

Our hope in heav'n, our dignity with man?

And defy the dirt, matur'd to gold?

Ambition, av'rice, the two demons thefe,

Which goad thro' ev'ry flough our human herd,
Hard-travell'd from the cradle to the grave.

How low the wretches floop! how fteep they climb!
Thefe demons burn mankind.

St. Paul calls avarice idolatry, Eph. V. 3, 5. Let

Night Thoughts, n.6.

not covetousness be once named among you. A covetous man

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