<S. 2.<<^. 
 
 1^ PRINCETON, N. J. *% 
 
 Presented b7V?(£.\^ . CKx^Vv^V^V^^oV-Vs 
 
 BV 772 .A79 1857 
 Arthur, William, 1819-1901 
 The duty of giving away a 
 stated proportion of our 
 
THE 
 
 DUTY OF aiYINO AWAY 
 
 A STATED 
 
 PROPORTION OF OUR INCOME. 
 
 BY WILLIAM ARTHUK, A.M. 
 
 PHILADELPHIA : 
 PRESBYTEPvIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION". 
 
 1857. 
 
ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 Bomb changes, not aflfecting the sense, have been made ; such as the reduction 
 of " pounds " to " dollars," and the omission of a few local names and references 
 to books. 
 
THE 
 
 DUTY OF GIYIIG A¥AY 
 
 A STATED PROPORTION OF OUR INCOME. 
 
 I PROPOSE to submit a few observations on the 
 duty of giving away a stated pi'opm'tion of our 
 income. For the practical liandling of the subject, 
 I know not that I can do better than attempt to 
 
 Explain the duty, 
 
 State the grounds whereon it rests, and 
 
 Plead for practical attention to it. 
 
 When we speak of the duty of giving away a 
 stated proportion of our income, we do not mean 
 that all jpersons having equal incomes are hound to 
 give away equal sumSy however their other circum- 
 starices tnay vary. Power to give away may be 
 modijSed by three circumstances, — family, locality, 
 and station. Of two persons, each receiving a thou- 
 sand dollars a year, one has seven children, the other 
 is a bachelor. It would be strange if the single man 
 miglit justly spend upon himself as much as the 
 Other must spend on his family, and might inno- 
 
4: MUST ALL GIVE THE SAME PROPORTIONS 
 
 cently give away only as much as lie contrives to 
 give. This is a difference of family. 
 
 Of two persons having the same family and the 
 Bame income, one lives in a large city, where rent, 
 taxes, and provisions are high ; the other in an agri- 
 cultm-al village, where these are all cheap. Is the 
 latter to take the full advantage of his easier circum- 
 stances for his private purse, and give none of it to 
 benevolence ? This is the difference of locality. 
 
 Again, two persons have each five thousand a 
 year. One from small beginnings has reached that 
 point by industry and saving. Without hereditary 
 claims, without public expectations, and with inva- 
 luable habits of economy, he is royally rich on his 
 five thousand a year. The other has inherited the 
 same income from a father who was in the habit 
 of spending fifty thousand a year. A number of 
 servants, retainers, and tradespeople have what 
 amounts to a vested interest in his revenue ; the 
 public have expectations ; and, worst of all, his 
 habits are formed on a costly model, so that he is 
 not only perplexed, but really poor, with his five 
 thousand a year. This is the difference of station. 
 
 Each of these three branches of modification has 
 innumerable offshoots, going to show, that to require 
 all who have equal incomes to give away equal 
 sums, would be neither just nor generous. 
 
 Not do we mean that all persons are to give away 
 the same proportion of their income^ however its 
 gross amount may va7"y. Two brothers live in the 
 same town, and have the same family. In this case 
 
MUST ALL GIVE THE SAME PROrORTION? 5 
 
 station, locality and family are equal. Tlie elder is 
 just able to provide liis children with a small house, 
 frugal fare, homely clothing, and a passable educa- 
 tion. He is quite unable to lay up anything which 
 would help to open their way in life, when the criti- 
 cal period of settlement shall come. Yet, knowing 
 to whom he and his owe their daily bread, he grate- 
 fully devotes a tenth of his income to the service of 
 God. 
 
 His younger brother has been otherwise pros- 
 pered. His children sleep in spacious rooms, and 
 play among their own flower-beds ; their clothing is 
 rich, their board generous, and their education costly. 
 For each of them he is able to lay up in store, and 
 knows that, if they do not pass through life with 
 comfort and respect, it will be their own fault. And 
 is this man, for whom Providence has done so much 
 more than for his brother, to content himself with 
 rendering the same proportionate acknowledgment 
 as he ? For the latter to give a tenth of all is an 
 efibrt ; an effort which he feels, and his children feel, 
 in " their coats, their hosen, and their hats." For the 
 other to give a tenth would be no effort whatever ; 
 it would never affect his comforts, nor even his luxu- 
 ries, no, not the crumbs that fall from his table. It 
 would affect nothing but his hoarded money. If we 
 hold that his brother should give a tenth, and he 
 should give no more, then we hold that the lesser 
 mercies demand the more touching acknowledg- 
 ment, and that God's superior bounties may sit more 
 lightly on our hearts. 
 . Take another case : You visit a friend when he is 
 
6 MUST ALL GIVE THE SAME PROPORTION? 
 
 twenty-five years of age, spending little on bis estab- 
 lishment, and giving away a tenth to Him who gives 
 him all. You return to his house when he is fifty. 
 Now he is spending on bis establishment ten times 
 as much as before. Why ? Because the Lord " hath 
 blessed the w^ork of his hands, and his substance is 
 increased in the land." The same labour which, 
 twenty-five years ago, yielded him a modest income, 
 now brings a twentyfold return. When Providence 
 has thus multiplied the proportionate productiveness 
 of his soil, is he to confine his acknowledgments to 
 the same proportion which he rendered when his 
 efi'orts w^ere far less fruitful? If he does, gratitude 
 diminishes as bounties enlarge. We would, there- 
 fore, strongly contend that when Providence greatly 
 increases the return of labour, or throws abundance 
 into our lap without labour, we are bound to acknow- 
 ledge such mercy — mercy which distinguishes us 
 above the ordinary lot of men — not by thank-offer- 
 ings adjusted to the scale of those whose blessing is 
 less than ours, but by aiming to keep pace w^ith the 
 peculiar bounty which, while some pine and others 
 struggle, . gives us " all things richly to enjoy." 
 One man's tenth is more than another man's third. 
 I know one venerable man — one of the men whom 
 my soul loveth — who, at the outset of life, adopted 
 the vow of Jacob, " Of all that Thou shalt give me, 
 I will surely give the tenth to Thee ;" but so far from 
 confining himself to this, I know that some years 
 ago, he was for that jear giving away not a tenth, 
 but four tenths. How Providence has dealt with 
 him you may judge from the simple fact, that on 
 
AEE WE BOUND TO GIVE ALL? 7 
 
 one day lie might be seen in the morning giving 
 away a thousand dollars to one religious society, and 
 in the evening five hundred to another. 
 
 On the other hand^ we do not mean that persons 
 are hound to give away all their income^ so as to 
 admit of no i^icrease of cajyital, or extension of pro- 
 perty. There is a large class of promises which 
 attach temporal advancement to humble and godly 
 industry, as a reward from Providence. " By humi- 
 lity and the fear of the Lord are riches, and honour, 
 and life." (Prov. xxii. 4.) " Such as are blessed of 
 Him shall inherit the earth." (Psalm xxxvii. 22.) 
 "Blessed is the man that feareth the Lord, and 
 delighteth greatly in His commandments. "Wealth 
 and riches shall be in his house." (Psalm cxii. 1, 3.) 
 Liberality itself, the very virtue for which we are 
 pleading, is encouraged by the prospect of abun- 
 dance. " Honour the Lord with thy substance, and 
 with the first-fruits of all thine increase: so shall 
 thy barns be filled with plenty, and tliy presses shall 
 burst out with new wine." (Prov. iii. 9.) One of 
 the punishments threatened against improperly got- 
 ten wealth is its decrease, while lawful labour is 
 stimulated by the hope of plenty. " Wealth gotten 
 by vanity shall be diminished, but he that gathereth 
 by labour shall increase." 
 
 This passage not only offers to industry the prize 
 of increase, but states the true relation of labour 
 and capital. "He that gathereth by labour shall 
 increase." Labour creates capita] ; capital rewards 
 labour. Where there is no labour, capital is lumber ; 
 where there is no capital, labour is beating the air. 
 
8 CAPITAL AND LAJ30UR. 
 
 The effect of well-directed labour is to increase capi- 
 tal ; the effect of increasing capital is to lighten the 
 burden and raise the pay of labour. These effects 
 depend not on the will of men or masters, but are 
 wrought deeper than either can permanently reach, 
 into the groundwork of human relations, by the 
 Builder of all. That accumulation of capital which 
 results from^^the blessing of Providence on lawful 
 industry, so far from contravening the purposes of 
 benevolence, directly and most efficiently serves 
 them. Two brothers enter this city, each with a 
 capital of $100,030. The one seeks out twenty 
 thousand poor families in the city and country, and 
 gives away all his capital among them, -Q.ye dollars 
 to each. The other invests his hundred thousand in 
 a factory. Return in five years, and mark the effect 
 of the two sums upon the people. Of the first 
 hundred, the only trace you can find is here a 
 decayed bonnet, there a worn-out cloak, and in some 
 humble homes a very grateful recollection ; but no 
 permanent public benefit, no sensible improvement 
 in the condition of the labouring poor. As to the 
 other, it fed and clothed many families from the first 
 day ; to-day it is feeding and clothing many families, 
 and it is promising to do so in perpetuity. At the 
 same time, the profits which are known to have 
 accrued to its owner, are attracting other capital to a 
 like investment, so as further to improve the pros- 
 pects of all the labouring population of the neigh- 
 bourhood. 
 
 It is possible, and more than possible, that in this 
 case the one who gave away his all, did it from the 
 
IS CAPITAL USEFUL OR HUPwTFUL ? 9 
 
 "noble motive of self-denial ; and most assnredly he 
 will have his reward. It is also possible that the 
 other acted from the commonest selfishness, and can 
 look for no credit beyond that of worldly wisdom. 
 But the fact, that he who acted from a noble motive 
 did no permanent good to the poor, while he who 
 acted from a low one did much, forces us to inquire, 
 Did not the one unconsciously violate, and the other 
 unconsciously follow, a law of Providence? Does 
 not the one case indicate the existence of a law 
 against the dispersion of property in indiscriminate 
 gifts, and the other a law in favour of its employ- 
 ment to elicit and reward useful labour? Land and 
 money are the two bases of wealth. Cultivation is 
 to the one what commercial investment is to the 
 other. Religion does not require that either should 
 be made away with, or neglected ; but that, when 
 laid out for increase, the Lord should be honoured 
 with the first-fruits of all the increase. 
 
 But here many sincere and admirable Christians 
 will tell me, "You are arguing directly against the 
 words of our Lord. He commands us, * Lay not up 
 for yourselves treasures upon earth ;' and to do as 
 you say, is plainly to break this very clear com- 
 mand." If that be so, all my reasoning on the point 
 falls to the ground ; and he who permits riches to 
 increase is no Christian. But is it so ? 
 
 We have already seen that a class of promises 
 exist which must be nullified, if no servant of God 
 is to permit his possessions to increase ; and such 
 commands as, " Provide things honest in the sight of 
 all men;" "Charge them that are rich that 
 
10 IS IT A SIN TO GROW KICn ? 
 
 thej be ready to distribute, willing to communi- 
 cate," &c., enforce duties which exist not, if no 
 man has a right to have possessions, except only in 
 such a degree as will enable him to continue alive. 
 No command ever contradicts another command ; 
 and no command is ever meant to supersede a whole 
 class of promises. With these two principles in 
 view, we take this command, " Lay not up for your- 
 selves treasures upon earth," and place it beside 
 another which is like unto it : " Take no thought for 
 to-morrow." Am I to be told that I break this latter 
 command, if I take thought for duties and responsi- 
 bilities which do not press to-day, but will to-mor- 
 row? Without 'doing so, I cannot fulfil my duty to 
 God, to my neighbour, or to myself. The highest 
 obligations which are laid upon me, require thought, 
 and action, too, for the morrow. This runs through 
 all the ways of Providence. Most of the duties for 
 which he holds us responsible, call us to work for 
 the morrow. For to-morrow the plougher ploughs, 
 for to-morrow the sower sows, for to-morrow the 
 reaper reaps, for to-morrow the miller grinds, for 
 to-morrow the weaver plies his loom, for to-morrow 
 the builder frames his roof ; and did we put a stop 
 to all labour which is for to-morrow, we should at 
 once reduce the activity of the human race to a few 
 of the most menial occupations. The call to take 
 no thought for to-morrow, is certainly not a call 
 to neglect duties, and evade responsibilities ; but a 
 call to trust in Providence when the time only to 
 trust has come. When I have done for to-morrow 
 all that is laid at my door, then let me not encroach 
 
TAKE NO THOUGHT FOR TO-MORROW. 11 
 
 upon tlie province of Him who alone can rule the 
 future and the contingent, by troubling myself with 
 them. Let me simply do this day the work which is 
 this day due ; and though long and impenetrable 
 months may lie between me and its result, for that I 
 must trust Him whom the sparrows trust; saying 
 cheerfully, " The Lord will provide !" 
 
 "When in the one of these two glorious words of 
 Christ the letter is so plainly to be interpreted by 
 the spirit of all Scripture, it is not probable that in 
 the other the letter is all we are to look to. But if 
 you will appeal to the letter, then to the letter you 
 shall go. That letter is, " Lay not up for yourselves 
 treasures upon earth, where Tnoth and rust do cor- 
 ru^ty Now moth and rust do not corrupt property 
 employed in active service, as commercial invest- 
 ment. They only corrupt hoards which are heaped 
 up idle, not doing the purposes of Providence, not 
 contributing to the welfare of men. Against such 
 stores only does the letter of this precept bear, and 
 against them let all denunciations peal ! 
 
 But though we do not believe that the letter of 
 our Lord's precept was ever meant to prevent His 
 servants from accepting such increase of their goods 
 as His bounty might give them, while they glorified 
 Him with their first-fruits ; we deeply feel that in 
 the spirit of that precept many weighty lessons lie. 
 It seems to say, ''^ Do not resolve to he richy To 
 you, young man, it seems clearly to say, "Do not 
 make up your mind to die worth thirty thousand or 
 a hundred thousand dollars." Any such resolution 
 is evil, and out of it woes will come. " They that 
 
12 HOW TO GET RICH. 
 
 will he rich fall into temptation and a snare, and 
 man J foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in 
 destruction and j)erdition." (1 Tim. vi. 9.) It also 
 Bays, 
 
 Do not mahe haste to he rich j even without for- 
 mally resolving to win a high prize of wealth, do 
 not follow after riches eagerly, or long to see your- 
 self enriched with abundance. "He that maketh 
 
 haste to be rich shall not he innocent He that 
 
 hasteth to be rich hath an evil eye^ and considereth 
 not that poverty shall come upon him." (Prov. 
 xxviii. 20, 22.) 
 
 Do not adoj)t selfishness as a means of wealth. 
 Our natural reason and the carnal mind prompt us 
 to say, " If I am to be rich, all that I get I must 
 keep. Holding, nursing, guarding all that comes 
 into my hands, it must grow to be of some account 
 at last." Such a mode of calculating is confronted 
 by the spirit of faith and love which breathes all 
 through the Bible. Yiewing a Power infinitely 
 above the petty advantages of hoarding, it cries, 
 " There is that scattereth, and yet increaseth ; there 
 is that withholdeth more than is meet, and it tendeth 
 to poverty." Take this proverb to your heart. There 
 is joy and glory in it. It links your hope of i^ersonal 
 comfort with the Father of all benevolence. Say, 
 *' If there is wealth to be gotten by greed, by hold- 
 ing, by shutting my heart against gushes of gene- 
 rosity, and my hand against self-forgetting acts of 
 goodness, then such wealth be to others, and its fruits 
 be far from my children !" Say, " Wealth so gotten 
 is no wealth : it is but a metal coffin for the affec- 
 
TRUSTma IN RICHES. IS 
 
 tions. If wealth come to me, let it come from the 
 Great Giver, at whose bidding I cast mj bread upon 
 the waters !" "The blessing of the Lord it maketh 
 rich, and He addeth no sorrow with it." 
 
 Do not trust in riches. In the forms of popular 
 speech, we may often trace real and important dis- 
 tinctions. Nothing is more common than to hear 
 persons speak of a man idolizing various objects of 
 earthly affection. Yet of many such objects we never 
 hear it said they are made gods. We often hear of 
 a man making an idol of his child ; but people do 
 not say he makes a god of his child. With regard 
 to money, however, it is quite otherwise ; they 
 readily say, " He makes a god of his money." Yes ; 
 for he not only loves the money and doats on it, but 
 he puts his trust in it. All the faith he has centres 
 in it. It is his Providence ; on it his future depends; 
 it is his hope for his children ; his hope of name and 
 honour after death. Assail it, and you assail his 
 rock, his strong tower, his reward. Take it away, 
 and in his own feeling you have bereft him of all his 
 dependence. Surely this is idolatry ! " Charge them 
 that are rich in this world, that they be not high- 
 minded, nor trust in uncertain riches^ but in the 
 living God, who giveth us all things richly to enjoy ; 
 that they do good, that they be rich in good works, 
 ready to distribute, willing to communicate ; laying 
 up in store for themselves a good foundation against 
 the time to come, that they may lay hold on eternal 
 life." (1 Tim. vi. 17-19.) 
 
 These seem to me to be some of the chief lessons 
 taught us in this precept of our blessed Master \ and 
 
14 IS INDEFINITE INCREASE UNLAWFUL? 
 
 he who cordially follows these, glorifying God, and 
 benefiting man with liberal first-fruits of all his 
 increase — on him, for my part, riches and plenty 
 may freely come. In his progress all good men will 
 rejoice ; the poor will bless his riches. If, like 
 Abraham, he has an old servant, he will say, with 
 smiles, " The Lord hath blessed my master greatly ; 
 and he has become great : and He hath given him 
 flocks, and herds, and silver, and gold, and men- 
 servants, and maidservants, and camels, and asses." 
 (Gen. xxiv. 35.) 
 
 We do not mean tliat Christians are hound to draw 
 a line^ and say, ''^Beyond this limit, no matter what 
 the bounties of Providence may he, my possessions 
 shall never goP O, what a blessing it had been to 
 thousands had they adopted such a resolution ! 
 Many who prospered up to a point which they 
 would have once thought affluence, not then content, 
 pressed forward, and by a few errors dispersed the 
 gatherings of a lifetime. Many for years employed 
 their growing wealth to do good ; but at length they 
 had outgrown their religious strength, and, like a 
 youth failing under his own stature, their virtues 
 died of decline. Happy would it be for many, did 
 they set a limit to their aims, and add nothing be- 
 yond ! Whenever this is done in the spirit of hum- 
 ble faith, surely it is good and acceptable to God. 
 But I cannot undertake to teach that it is laid down 
 in Scripture as an incumbent duty. 
 
 Away on the very horizon of sacred history, in the 
 glory of its dawn, we see — shall I say, a group ?^ 
 three personages ; the first, shrouded with that excel- 
 
THE CASE OF JOB. 15" 
 
 ling light which no man can approach unto; the 
 second, dark with that darkness which^ tbank God, 
 neither our words nor our imagination can picture ; 
 the third, a man of like passions with ourselves. To 
 this man the Maker of all 23oints the tempter of all, 
 and says, '' Hast thou considered my servant Job, 
 that there is none like him in the earth, a perfect 
 and an upright man, one that feareth God and 
 escheweth evil?" And who is this of whom we 
 Lave such testimony as never was borne to other 
 man — who is held up to the accuser of saints, as a 
 triumphant instance of the redeeming power of 
 grace ? He is one whose wealth is almost countless, 
 w^ho has distanced every contemporary, and is the 
 greatest of all the men of the East. It is plain that 
 his immense possessions were no stain upon his " re- 
 cord " which was " on high." But ere you exult, in 
 the belief that you may innocently accumulate to an 
 indefinite amount, carefully mark how he employed 
 his wealth. 
 
 While his children were holding family feasts, and 
 the joy of abundance was in all their homes, he was 
 " continually " rising early, going to the altar of God, 
 and offering up offerings in large number. And 
 how did he live among his neighbors, while thus 
 honouring his God ? " When the ear heard me, then 
 it blessed me ; and when the eye saw me, it gave 
 witness to me: because I delivered the poor that 
 cried, and the fatherless, and him that had none to 
 help him. The blessing of him that was ready to 
 perish came upon me: and I caused the widow's 
 heart to sing for joy . .1 was eyes to the blind, 
 
IB now TO HALLOW GEEAT WEALTH. 
 
 and feet was I to the lame. I was a father to the 
 poor; and the cause which I knew not I searched 
 out." (Job xxix. 11, &c.) 
 
 Go thou and do likewise. Tlius continually and 
 liberally offer unto God ; thus bountifully and 
 actively distribute to man; and so long as we see 
 you so doing, " may your garners be full, affording 
 all manner of store !" I, at least, will cheerfully 
 leave it to Providence to fix the limit of your in- 
 crease. But one word: as you proceed upwards, 
 one earnest word: "Walk warily on those heights ! 
 Heads are often turned up there ; and fearful gulfs 
 yawn under you if you fall ! 
 
 "While, however, we do not contend that to let 
 *' riches increase " is forbidden, or even that to per- 
 mit that increase to an indefinite amount is contrary 
 to clear Scripture, we do contend : — 
 
 That not to give away any part of our income is 
 unlawful : 
 
 That to leave what we shall give to be determined 
 by impulse or chance, without any principle to guide 
 us, is unlawful : 
 
 That to fix a principle for our guidance, by our 
 own disposition, or by prevalent usage, without seek- 
 ing light in the word of God, is unlawful : 
 
 That when we search the Scriptures for a princi- 
 ple, the very lowest proportion of our income for 
 which we can find any show of justification, is a 
 tenth of the whole : 
 
 That, therefore, it is our duty to give away statedly, 
 for the service and honour of our God, at the very 
 
GROUNDS OF THE DUTY. 17 
 
 least one-tenth of all "vvliich He commits to our 
 stewardship. 
 
 These are my views as to the duty for which I am 
 now pleading ; and are, I presume, however shades 
 and points may vary, in substance the views of the 
 gentlemen by whose call I stand here. 
 
 As TO THE GROUNDS ON WHICH THIS DUTY EESTS. 
 
 Let us suppose that it does not rest on any grounds 
 whatever ; that the idea of such a duty is without 
 foundation ; that we are each at liberty to choose 
 what proportion of his possessions he shall give 
 away, from the nearest approach to nothing upwards; 
 so that if one give a tenth, another a nineteenth, and 
 a third one thousandth part, they differ not in this — 
 that one is liberal, the other covetous, and the third 
 a wretch ; but in this — that the one is liberal, the 
 other less liberal, and the other less so still ; each of 
 them practising a virtue, a voluntary virtue, only in 
 various degrees. This a plain meaning and practical 
 application of a notion which floats in undefined 
 thought, and is often expressed in vague language, 
 by many excellent people, — a notion about Chris- 
 tianity leaving the amount of liberality to the private 
 will and disposition of each individual. 
 
 If this view be correct, then it follows that in 
 Christian morals we have one virtue ivhich has no 
 minimum limit^ no expiring point ; which continues 
 to be a virtue down to within a hairbreadth of 
 nothing, no matter how largely mixed with the 
 opposite vice. Shall we apply this principle to the 
 other virtues ? for instance, Truth ? Are we not apt 
 
|9 HAS LICEEALITY A MINIMUM LIMIT? 
 
 to tliink that, however much truth may be in a state- 
 ment, if mixed with a little deception, the virtue of 
 it is gone ? And as to honesty, Do we not feel that 
 whatever amount of honesty may be in a transaction, 
 if mixed with any cheating, the virtue is destroyed ? 
 And are we to hold that any miserable gift, some- 
 what short of nothing, which a covetous man may 
 give, is yet an act of liberality, though in a low 
 degree ? Is liberality the one virtue which Christi- 
 anity has abandoned, in this cold world, to every 
 man's whim, and never pronounces violated, so long 
 as it is not totally renounced and abjured? Surely 
 there is some point far short of nothing, at which 
 gifts cease to be " liberal," and begin to be " vile ;" 
 at which a giver ceases to be *' bountiful," and 
 deserves to be called a " churl !" 
 
 One thing is certain, that if Christianity has set no 
 minimum limit to generosity, it has set a maximum 
 limit. If we are at liberty to press down our gene- 
 rosity to the lowest discernible point, we are not at 
 liberty to push it up without check. Christianity 
 commands plainly, "Owe no man anything;" so that 
 1 cannot give away money while I am unable to pay 
 my debts, without violating the laws of my religion. 
 She also plainly declares that if any man provide not 
 for his own, and especially for those of his own house, 
 he has denied the faith, and is worse than an '^infi- 
 del." Therefore I cannot give away money while 
 my own are unprovided for, or left to be provided 
 for by others, without violating the laws of my reli- 
 gion. Is it, then, probable that Christ's good Gospel, 
 while marking points in the upward progress of 
 
ARE WE BOUND TO A TEKTH ? 1^ 
 
 generosity at which it would pass into injustice, has 
 marked none in its downward progress at which it 
 would pass into selfishness ? 
 
 If Christianity has left benevolence entirely to 
 private decision, it also follows tliat^ while tJiose 
 branches of expenditure which regard our self-interest 
 are regulated hy fixed circumstances^ that which is 
 for the glory of God is at the mercy of chance. The 
 three circumstances already named — fainilj^, locality, 
 station — decide for each of us, to a great extent, the 
 scale of most items of our outlay. Your rent is 
 tolerably well fixed from year to year, your board is 
 not very uncertain, your dress, and every other claim 
 of self-interest, has its proportion not ill defined ; and 
 is it probable that while every outlay that nourishes 
 self is regular, that only outlay which tends to free 
 you from earth, and connect your hopes Avith a bet- 
 ter country, is precisely the one which the religion 
 of Jesus has left to be the football of passion or of 
 accident ? 
 
 " I do not mean," you say, " that we are at liberty 
 to give by mere chance, without fixing some princi- . 
 pie ; I only mean, we are not bound to a tenth." 
 Not bound to a tenth ! No, most surely we are not 
 bound to a tenth. If that be your meaning, then thy 
 heart is as my heart. No principle of the Gospel, no 
 precept of the law, ever glances in the direction of 
 binding us to a tenth. But is it possible that yoa 
 mean something which you do not say ? Is it possi- 
 ble that when you speak of not being bound to a 
 tenth, you mean we are at liberty to make up our 
 minds not to give a tenth, but to give something 
 
20 DOES CHRISTIANITY LOWER VIRTUE? 
 
 less ? Well, so let it be. Suppose that a Christian, 
 without offending against his religion, may spend on 
 Belf-interests more than nine-tenths of his income; 
 then it follows that It is lawful for a Christian to he 
 more selfish than was laufnl for a Jew. This con- 
 clusion may not be agreeable ; but it is clear. Every 
 Jew was blessed with a religion which checked his 
 downward, earthward tendency, at the very least to 
 this extent — that, of his all, one tenth went to sacred 
 things, and thus connected with them his affections 
 and his hopes. Less than that he could not consecrate 
 to the service of his God, without a trespass against 
 his religion. If, then, a Christian may give less, his 
 religion elevates him in a lower degree, leaves him 
 to be more earthly without guilt, and less noble 
 without reproach. 
 
 i One other consequence follows. If a Christian, 
 may, according to his religion, lawfully devote less 
 than a tenth of his income to holy purposes, then 
 Christianity has lowered the standard of a vir- 
 tue, and that the virtue of liberality ! The Jew who 
 gave less than one tenth was branded by his religion 
 a sinner. That system, which we regard as so much 
 more earthly, so much less spiritual and heavenly, 
 than ours, ever held the standard of pecuniary self- 
 denial up to that point, at the very least. And is it 
 come to this, that our Christianity, our religion of 
 love and sacrifice, let down the standard of this 
 special virtue below the point where it stood when 
 she came to warm our world ? We know the thou- 
 sand contrivances to escape from this conclusion. 
 But, however often you cite the difference be- 
 
NO GIYEK, NO CHKISTIAN. 21 
 
 tween an agricultural and a commercial people; 
 however much you talk of Levites, tribes, rent- 
 charges, and adjustments; however many lanes you 
 enter from your starting-point, if you follow any one 
 of them to its end, it will land you in front of this 
 conclusion : Chkistianity has lowered the stan- 
 dard OF A VIRTUE. 
 
 But I will not further follow the supposition that 
 the duty of giving away at least a tenth of our in- 
 come has no grounds ; for the conclusions to which 
 it leads are not satisfactory. I will now assert that 
 it has grounds. They may be thus stated : — 
 
 Giving is an essential part of the Christian 
 RELIGION. This position needs no special argument. 
 In support of it the whole New Testament cries 
 aloud. The system of redemption is, from first to 
 last, one prodigious process of gift. God loved the 
 world, and gave His only-begotten Son. The Son 
 loved us, and gave Himself to death for us all. This 
 giving does not rest at the point of bounty, but 
 passes on to that of inconceivable sacrifice. Every 
 man on whose spirit the true light of redemption 
 breaks, finds himself heir to a heritage of givings, 
 which began on the eve of time, and will keep pace 
 wath the course of eternity: To giving he owes his 
 all ; in giving he sees the most substantial evidence 
 he can offer, that he is a grateful debtor ; and the 
 self-sacrifice of Him in whom he trusts says, far 
 more pathetically than words could say, " It is more 
 blessed to give than to receive." 
 
 It is 07^dained hy Christianity that giving shall he 
 
22 NEITHER SPAJ5E NOK GRUDGE. 
 
 hoth hountiful and cheerful. It does not satisfy the 
 demands of our religion that we give ; we must give 
 much. ^' He that soweth sparingly shall reap also 
 Bparingly." This refers to the amount of gifts ; but 
 having decided that the amount must be unsparing, 
 Christianity is not even then content ; that unsparing 
 amount must be given with a cheerful heart, " not 
 grudgingly or of necessity ; for God loveth a cheer- 
 ful giver." One of the oddest things in all argument 
 is, that this passage is sometimes resorted to as cover 
 by those who claim liberty to give away as little as 
 ever they please. Let them turn to the passage 
 (2 Cor. ix. 5-7), and they will see that it is not left 
 to them or to any man to decide whether giving shall 
 be on a bountiful or a sparing scale. That it is not 
 to be sparing, and is to be bountiful, is settled ; and 
 then a cheerful heart is commanded in addition. 
 The twofold requirement is a gift not scaring as to 
 amount, nor grudging as to feeling. One may cheer- 
 fully give a sparing gift who would grudge a boun- 
 tiful one ; and one who, from " necessity," from 
 pressure, or shame, gives a large gift, may grudge 
 while he gives. Do not spare when you give, and 
 do not grudge when you make sacrifices ! Tliis is 
 the voice of a passage which some would fain use to 
 cloak their unwillingness to make liberality a regu- 
 lated and well-considered virtue. 
 ^ A sparing, a bountiful, and a grudging giver may 
 all be met with in your every day life. You call on 
 a wealthy gentleman, Mr. Close, for a benevolent 
 object. "Yes; it is a good cause, every one 
 ought to do his share ; but really one has so much 
 
SPARING, GRUDGING, AND BOUNTIFUL. 23 
 
 to do, one is always giving. However, I have great 
 pleasure in giving my mite ; you are perfectly wel- 
 come. Gentlemen, to this trifle :" and he gives you 
 five dollars. You modestly hesitate, tell him that 
 much will depend on his example, and that, from his 
 position, you had hoped for something considerable, 
 say five hundred dollars. " O dear no ! I could 
 never afibrd that. That is a subscription for a rich 
 man. I am very happy to give my mite ; but I 
 never thought of any sum like that." 
 
 From this sparing, but cheerful giver you pass to 
 another, Mr. Goode. He just hears you, and, puts 
 down his name for a thousand dollars. This is 
 neither sparing nor grudging. 
 
 From him you go to Mr. Sliarpe. He hears your 
 statement. " O yes ! all the principal people are 
 giving to it. One must do something respectable. 
 "Will you let me see your book, gentlemen ? — What ! 
 Goode down for a thousand dollars ! I know why 
 he did that. It was to be ahead of me, or rather 
 to spite me ; for he knew" I would never be behind 
 him. It is not the first time he has served me so ; 
 but I'm not going to let him stand before me for 
 the sake of five hundred dollars." And so he puts 
 down a thousand. 
 
 Now, while this gift professes to be an act done 
 out of consideration for others, it is really done 
 out of consideration for himself; and, while his 
 hand was giving, his heart was grudging. 
 
 The greedy man who would grudge a large gift, 
 but makes a merit of a small one ; and the vain man 
 who must stand high, even in giving, and grudges 
 
24: PROPORTIONATE GIVING. 
 
 the price he pays for his importance, are equally far 
 from Christianity. A bounty that reaches the point 
 of sacrifice, and a heart-charity that rejoices in such 
 sacrifice, can alone meet the call of the Gospel. 
 
 It is ordained hy Christianity^ that our hountiful 
 and cheerfid giving shall he in jyroportion to our 
 means. '^ Upon the first day of the week let every 
 one of you lay by him in store, as God hath pros- 
 pered himP Here the scale which regulates giving 
 is decisively taken from the hand of impulse, fashion, 
 or personal disposition. Whether our giving is or 
 is not to be in proportion to the bounties of God to 
 us, is no matter of debate. The principle of propor- 
 tion is enjoined in the I^ew Testament. But the 
 passage decides nothing as to what application of 
 the law of proportion is to be made. One who gives 
 a hundredth part of his increase, observes a propor- 
 tion as much as one who gives a fifth ; and might 
 plead that he was giving as God had prospered him, 
 if he could find ground in Scripture for the belief 
 that one hundredth would be acceptable. 
 
 This scripture, "As God hath prospered him," 
 forces us to ask, What is giving in proportion to 
 God's gifts to us? If we seek an answer in the 
 E'ew Testament, everything seems to push up the 
 scale to a proportion from which we nearly all shrink 
 away. We find liberality in a rich man sanctioned 
 up to "half his goods," as in the case of Zaccheus; 
 and in a poor widow up to " all her living," as with 
 the two mites. We find a whole church selling 
 their property, and giving away without limit ; and 
 though that example is never enforced on others, it 
 
NEW-TESTAMENT PROPORTION. 2$ 
 
 is never reproved. "We find the cliurcli of Mace- 
 donia, in " depths of poverty," and also in " a great 
 trial of afilictions," abounding in " riches of liberal- 
 ity ;" and their record is written for the gratitude of 
 all ages, that they gave "be^^ond their power." 
 These early Christians, who thus rejoiced to bestow, 
 are melted to yet greater sacrifices by words so 
 winning and so mighty as, "Ye know the grace 
 of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though He was rich, 
 yet for your sakes He became poor^ that ye through 
 His poverty might be rich." 
 
 Turn where you will in the New Testament in 
 search of an answer to the question, *' What is giving 
 as God has prospered me ?" you are surrounded by 
 an atmosphere of fervid joy and love ; solicited 
 by a feeling of which the words are, "Glory to 
 God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will 
 to men ;" and the deeds are every good work, distri- 
 buting, communicating, making sacrifices with which 
 God is well pleased : you are stimulated by examples 
 of Apostles forsaking all, individuals selling all, 
 churches bestowing all, the deeply poor giving to 
 the poorer, and, to crown the whole, the Master 
 giving always, and storing never ; and in the end 
 giving Himself a ransom for all. You feel that 
 if you are to take your answer to the question by 
 honest, logical inference from that Book, any thought 
 of a tenth is out of sight, and you must contemplate 
 a style of giving which no one I know — perhaps I 
 do know some of the poor who would — but which no 
 one of the comfortable classes, in our day, would 
 think of following. 
 
 2 
 
88 OLD-TESTAMENT PROPORTION. 
 
 If, fearful to press ISTew-Testament precept and 
 example, we go to the Old to learn what the Lord 
 counted acceptable in ancient times, we lind that 
 each head of a family among the Jews was bound 
 by direct enactment to give a tenth of all his 
 yearly increase to the support of the ministering 
 tribe of Levi. Lie had to pay a second tenth for 
 the support of the feasts; a third tenth for the 
 poor once in three years ; and in addition were the 
 trespass offerings, long and costly journeys to the 
 temple, and sundry other religious charges, all im- 
 posed by Divine sanction ; besides free-will offerings. 
 Taking all these items, it is undoubted that among 
 the Jews every head of a family was under religious 
 obligation to give away at least a fifth, perhajps a 
 third, of his yearly income. 
 
 Passing on to the Patriarchs, you find Jacob, 
 when houseless, awaking from his sleep by the road- 
 side, solemnly vowing to the God of his fathers, that 
 if only " bread to eat and raiment to put on " were 
 granted to him in his exile, a tenth of all should 
 be rendered back in honour of his God. And fur- 
 ther up, where you see Abraham, the father and 
 representative of all believers, standing before Mel- 
 chizedek, the type, not of Ihe Levitical priesthood, 
 but of our Great High Priest, he gives him a tenth 
 of all. The goods were the property of others, 
 of which he would not, for his private benefit, take 
 " from a thread to a shoe-latchet ;" but yet he 
 asserted the claims of the Lord upon all. 
 
 Thus, in the patriarchal dispensation, a tenth 
 seems to be the portion which the Lord accepts. 
 
OLD-TESTAMENT PKOPOKTION. 2T 
 
 In the Mosaic dispensation, that proportion is 
 raised to at least a fifth by express ordinances; 
 and when we come into the Gospel dispensation, 
 we are sensible at once of a notable rise in the tem- 
 perature of benevolence. Here the idea of a 
 religion less generous, less self-denying, less superior 
 to sordid hoards or personal comforts, is not only 
 inadmissible, but atrocious. "Whatever of heaven- 
 liness and large heart was in the religion of 
 Prophets, receives an expansion and not a chill, and 
 selfish man is placed at last in his highest school of 
 unselfishness. 
 
 Whether, then, we take the Old Testament or 
 the IN'ew, the lowest proportion of giving for which 
 we can find any pretext, or foot-hold whatever, in 
 command or in precedent, is one tenth. He who 
 fixes on this, deliberately fixes on far less than was 
 required of a Jew. He who fixes on less than this, 
 deliberately excludes all Scripture instruction, and 
 chooses a standard for which no part of God's word 
 offers a justification. 
 
 But several objections are taken against our con- 
 clusion ; some of which we ought to notice. 
 
 " In urging ujpon us to give away a tenth, you are 
 reviving the Levitical law, and that is alolishedP 
 The difference between those who hold that it stands, 
 and those who hold that it is abolished, lies perhaps 
 more in word than reality. Those who hold that 
 it stands, would hardly contend that the letter is 
 in force ; for that was, that the tenth should be given 
 to the tribe of Levi, which, to the letter, we cannot 
 fulfil. And those who hold that it is abolished, 
 
28 THE LAW IS LOVE. 
 
 surelj do not mean that its spirit is abolished. The 
 spirit of that law is, " Of Thine own have we given 
 unto Thee." This is not abolished ; and, blessed 
 be God, never will be ! And snrely you do not 
 mean that this spirit, a spirit so right and good, 
 in passing from Judaism to Christianity, forsook a 
 more sensitive body, for one grosser and heavier 
 with earth I We need not pause to show that, 
 quite independently of the Levitical tenth, the other 
 requirements of the Mosaic law demand more than 
 a second tenth ; and that the Patriarchs gave their 
 tenth before ever Levi was. 
 
 " But we are not now to he hr ought under rule; for 
 the law is loveP I know that some who thus 
 speak, do so upon the best grounds. A good man 
 has a small income and a large family ; he has 
 also a warm heart, and his neighbours know it. 
 Though he never adopted any specific proportion, 
 he is conscious,, and so is his wife, by daily expe- 
 rience, that he gives away " to his power, yea, and 
 beyond bis power." When he hears of fixing a 
 rule, and walking by it, he feels that for him it is 
 unnecessary ; and he pleads, " The law is loveP 
 Were all like him, most gladly should we leave it 
 here. But many whose heart has never led them 
 into the troubles of over-giving, gladly catch up his 
 words, and, as a simple defence against giving some- 
 thing definite, cry, " The law is love.''^ 
 
 To you who use this objection we have only one 
 thing to say : If the law is love, will you keep the 
 law? Then all we contend for, and more than all, is 
 secured. Among laws, none is near so exacting as 
 
SAVING MONEY BY LOVE. 
 
 love. It has never felt, never done, never given 
 enough. It is " never ending, still beginning." Its 
 great things of yesterday, are little things to-day; 
 and its great things to-day, will be little things 
 to-morrow. The law of love! It is, "Thou shalt 
 love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and thy 
 neighbour as thyself ^'^ And you invoke the law of 
 love to save jour money ! 
 
 As a matter for personal guidance, the definite 
 meaning of this expression is something like this : 
 " The heart that is right is full of love. Love fulfils 
 all law, and secures the rights of God and man. 
 Therefore the heart that is right is a law to itself, 
 and needs no other rule. But my heart is right, 
 and is sure to fulfil the law without special rules." 
 Is that safe reasoning? If your heart be so right 
 to-day, may it not wax cold some other day ? and 
 would it not be well to have a test by which to try 
 its warmth \ Or may there not be some like me, 
 who cannot trust so surely to their heart ; but feel 
 that it is a wholesome thing, to have clear rules 
 whereby its dispositions may be often measured ? 
 
 Love may be a good reason for going above rules; 
 but it is the worst in the world for staying below 
 them, or without them. It is a law of love which 
 binds a man to provide for the comfort of his family ; 
 but surely that is no reason why he should refuse to 
 give his wife a regular allowance for the expenses of 
 housekeeping. 
 
 " But yoit speak of giving a tenth : — that is an 
 arithmetical law j and you will never hring the 
 hearts of Christians wfider a cold arithmetical lawP 
 
•30 AN ARITHMETICAL LAW. 
 
 This is a very tremendous objection. Half the sym- 
 pathies of an audience are in danger of being lost 
 the moment they hear that our rule is a cold arith- 
 metical law. Arithmetic sounds of school-books, 
 and counting-houses, and markets, and hard prob- 
 lems, and dry statistics, and other ungenerous things. 
 Well, it is so, and we cannot deny it ; to say you 
 are bound to give away at the very least a tenth of 
 your all, is to speak the language of arithmetic. 
 But is the principle the less sacred for that? 
 "Kemember the seventh day to keep it holy." 
 That is an arithmetical ex23ression! And is there 
 any thing unhallowed in the Sabbath because a 
 square seventh is cut oif from our time, and is just 
 in that arithmetical proportion to be consecrated to 
 God ? Again : it is ordained that a Bishop shall be 
 the husband of but one wife, which is an arithmeti- 
 cal law. 
 
 But if our spacious friends who object to narrow 
 arithmetical laws will observe their own givings, it 
 will prove that somehow arithmetic follows them 
 wherever they go. For if you do not give a tenth, 
 but a ninetieth, even that is an arithmetical propor- 
 tion ; and if, instead of giving a tenth all the year 
 through, you only give a tenth of one day's income 
 for the whole year, still that is an arithmetical pro- 
 portion, — though it might be hard to ascertain it: 
 and, in fact, go down however low you may, if you 
 give any thing whatever, at any time whatever, it 
 still bears an arithmetical proportion to the whole. 
 Did we name a tenth as the high standard of Chris- 
 tian benevolence, and confine ourselves to it, we 
 
CONTENT WITH TOO LOW A PROPORTION. 31 
 
 might be taunted with arithmetic ; but when we 
 name it only as the lowest point at which any foot- 
 ing can be found, and leave all above free, that 
 arrow flies below us. 
 
 *' But if you teach men to give a tenths they will 
 give that and he content, though they ought to he 
 giving much moreP This is an objection of real 
 gravity. Doubtless, did we succeed in producing 
 generally in the churches the state of feeling, that 
 all were bound to give at least a tenth, many would 
 think themselves generous in giving that, when per- 
 haps a third or a half would be only their just 
 proportion. But how do matters stand at present? 
 Multitudes of sincere Christians are royally content, 
 though they give nothing like a tenth ; and could we 
 succeed in bringing up the church generally to that 
 proportion, (though far below what we hold to be 
 the due of many,) the state of things then would 
 present a wonderful improvement on that existing 
 now. 
 
 But I question whether adopting the principle of 
 proportion would tend to make men content with 
 the minimum proportion, after they were abundantly 
 prospered. So far as my knowledge of its practical 
 working goes, my impression is the reverse. It is 
 my pleasure to know many men who, at the outset 
 of life, or early in life, adopted Jacob's resolution to 
 give a tenth. These have all been prosperous men. 
 I do not know one of them but shows that the effect 
 of his early adopting the principle of a tenth, has 
 been to prepare him for a higher proportion when 
 years of plenty set in. 
 
dSk IS IT OUR DUTY TO GIVE ALL? 
 
 , And is it not natural that such should be the 
 effect ? There is a great, not to say a tremendous, 
 power over man in that very principle of arith- 
 metical proportion which it is so easy to spurn. 
 When an arbitrary proportion of our time or goods 
 is taken, — a proportion for which reason has no more 
 to say than for any other, — what is the effect upon 
 the mind? It serves as a practical claim of sove- 
 reignty on the part of the Creator. It says, '' This 
 is claimed, because all might be claimed. He who 
 accepts this, owns all, and holds you to account for 
 the rest." It is not probable that year after yearN 
 one will carefully set apart a fixed proportion for the 
 service of his God, without becoming habituated to 
 feel that he is neither author nor owner of any frac- 
 tion of property, but merely steward ; and that He 
 at whose feet he lays the first-fruits is the Lord, the 
 Giver of all. Such stated setting apart is a prac- 
 tical keeping of the precept : " Thou shalt remember 
 the Lord thy God : for it is He that giveth thee 
 power to get wealth." And whoever thus begins 
 life by keeping a law of proportion, is the most 
 likely of all men to advance his proportion, as his 
 Benefactor augments his blessing. 
 
 " But we ought not to sjpeak of a tenths a fifths or 
 any other proportion / our duty as Christians is to 
 give ally That is not correct. Our duty is not to 
 give away all ; but to employ all according to the 
 will of God, and so as to be pleasing in His sight. 
 It is our positive duty not to give away all ; but to 
 spend suitable proportions of our income in supply- 
 ing our own wants, and those of our families, as 
 
GIVING WHAT WE CAN SPAEE. 33 
 
 also in fulfilling any commercial or other calling for 
 which property is needful. Our objector replies, 
 " Of course, what I meant was, all after our reason- 
 able wants are supplied. We ought to give abso- 
 lutely all the surplus, and not save any." 
 
 In the lips of some — and I could name the very 
 man — this means noble and incessant liberality ; but 
 in the lips of most, it would just mean giving as 
 much as was perfectly convenient. If every one, 
 before assigning any portion as a thank-offering to 
 the Giver of all, is to spend what meets his views 
 of providing for his own and his children's wants, 
 present and prospective, in ninety-nine out of every 
 hundred cases it will prove that the surplus for 
 giving away is next to nothing. In many cases, 
 giving liberally will be postponed till family provi- 
 sion is made, till resources are fairly in advance of 
 demands ; and by that time all heart for giving will 
 he gone. In fact, this rule of giving away all you 
 have to spare, is that by which multitudes think 
 they are living ; whereas, could they get an account 
 of all they gave on this system last year, and resolve 
 next year to consecrate the small proportion of a 
 tenth, they would be utterly astonished to find how 
 much the latter exceeds their habitual liberality. 
 
 One strong reason for some definite rule lies in 
 this : That we have far better memories for our vir- 
 tues, than for our obligations — for the dollars we 
 give away, than for those we receive, or spend upon 
 ourselves. Even truly excellent persons, who have 
 not tested their givings, monstrously exaggerate the 
 amount of them to their own mind. The relish of 
 
 2* 
 
34 THE FIKST CLAIM UPON US. 
 
 one act of liberality remains long upon the lips ; and 
 some who believe that " their hand is never out of 
 their pocket," would be confounded if the great 
 account where all items are entered were placed 
 before them, and they saw how miserably little their 
 endless deeds of generosity amount to. The first 
 expenditure of all should be that which sanctifies 
 the rest — that which is not for self, or flesh, or earth, 
 or time, but for the Lord, for gratitude, for the train- 
 ing of the soul, for store in heaven. Our own morsel 
 will be sweeter, and more wholesome too, when the 
 due acknowledgment has been first laid, with a boun- 
 tiful hand and a thankful heart, on the altar of the 
 Saviour. " Ye shall eat neither bread, nor parched 
 corn, nor green ears, until the selfsame day that ye 
 have hrought an offering unto your God." (Lev. 
 xxiii. 14.) This was the spirit of the first-fruits — a 
 spirit of noble preference for the honour of God over 
 selfish care. 
 
 Another advantage of deciding that a consecrated 
 proportion shall take the precedence of all other 
 outlay, instead of counting on giving what we have 
 to spare, is this : It materially affects our scale of 
 personal expenditure. Our ideas of what is neces- 
 sary are ruled by our knowledge of what we have to 
 spend. A gentleman with five thousand a year, who 
 means to give away what he can spare, unless he be 
 a man of extraordinary generosity and decision 
 united (which cases are never the rule), forms his 
 whole scheme of expenditure on the basis of five 
 thousand a year, and finds it hard, now and then, to 
 spare a dollar or two ; not that he is unwilling, but 
 
SHOULD THE POOR GIVE? 35 
 
 all his resources are pre-engaged. Another with the 
 same income has his regular Benevolent Fund, into 
 which the first fifth of his income goes. Tlie efi'ect 
 is, that all his plans of expenditure proceed on the 
 basis of four thousand a year ; and thus while the 
 Benevolent Fund is strong for all legitimate claims, 
 it pays itself — perhaps more than pays itself — by 
 acting as a check upon the Yanity Fund, the Hobby 
 Fund, the Folly Fund, and several other exigent 
 funds on which thousands of our domestic revenues 
 are wasted. We, then, hesitate not for a moment to 
 prefer the rule of giving regular first-fruits, even in 
 the low proportion of a tenth, over the rule of giving 
 all we have to spare. This last, while for a strong 
 and holy man the highest of laws, is for the great 
 majority a law which amounts to no more than is 
 now prevalent. 
 
 ' '^But^ at all events^ surely you would not apply 
 your rule to the poor.^'' Certainly not to the desti- 
 tute. One object of liberality is to relieve and com- 
 fort them. But rising above those who need help,/ 
 upon whom do you fix as poor ? The man who can^ 
 afford to spend money on liquors or segars, is he 
 poor ? The woman who can afford to spend money 
 on fineries, is she poor ? It would be no small bless- 
 ing, if some of those well-meaning but ill-judging 
 persons who are continually telling the poor that 
 they are too poor to do any good, or support any 
 cause, would stand out of the way of the poor. The 
 worst thing you can do for a man, is to pauperize 
 him. If a poor man reads this — and I hope many 
 will — I would say to him, Never count that man 
 
36 PATTPEEIZING A MAN. 
 
 your friend who teaches you to lean on other people. 
 He is your friend, and your children's friend, who 
 teaches you to lean alone on the good providence of 
 God, and on your own right hand. 
 
 On the very same grounds that it is a serious 
 injury to a man to pauperize him, it is a great 
 service to teach him to save something, and give it 
 away. The one induces feebleness, the other power : 
 the one inclines him to be listless in earning, and 
 thriftless in spending; the other to be alert in earn- 
 ing, and careful in spending. The moment a man 
 begins to save sometliing and give it away, he rises 
 in the social scale, and takes his place in the family 
 circle of benefactors. As to the godly poor, I will 
 test this whole question of proportionate giving by 
 their verdict, sooner than by that of any other class. 
 Let some of those who would bid us not ask them to 
 give, learn what they do, and, perhaps, they will 
 look anew to their own proportions. And when one 
 sees how the poor tax themselves by waste, by hurt- 
 ful luxuries, by ill-spent time, how often their spare 
 money, not pre-engaged for good ends, is the cause 
 of their ruin, one feels indignant at those self-consti- 
 tuted friends of theirs who would protect them from 
 the calls of generosity — the very calls which would 
 raise and make men of them ; and we say, Stand out 
 of the way of the poor ! 
 
 There was One who was no amateur in poverty, 
 but had known it from the manger, in His own lot 
 and that of His friends. Did He think it a pity 
 that the widow should give away her two mites ? or 
 did He tell Maiy that the exceedingly costly box 
 
ST. Paul's reformed thief. 37 
 
 of ointment was too much for one of her means ? 
 And when the Prophet heard from the widow of 
 whom he had begged a little bread, that she was so 
 poor as to say, "• I have not a cake," did he think it 
 would be a loss to her to give, for the Lord's sake, a 
 little of her meal 1 He who delights in mercy has 
 never yet denied to the poor the joy of giving. St. 
 Paul plainly contemplates giving as the immediate 
 result of labour in the case of one recovered from 
 the class of thieves. " Let him that stole steal no 
 more : but rather let him labour, working with his 
 own hands the thing that is good, that he Tuay have 
 to give to him that needeth.^'^ (Eph. iv. 28.) If, then, 
 a reformed thief, just beginning to earn his own 
 bread, is at once to set before him the joy of giving 
 away a share of his earnings, who dare degrade the 
 working men of Christendom, by telling them they 
 are to look on themselves as meant only to feed their 
 own wants ? O what a blessing had it been to many 
 a poor working man, what a saving to his means, 
 what a comfort to his home, had his father trained 
 him to honour the Lord with the first-fruits of all his 
 increase ! 
 
 ^^But there are those whom we do not call the poor, 
 who yet are in more straits than they — -jpersons of 
 small means and respectable position^ I should be 
 the last man on earth to press hard on that class. 
 There are no sorrows I would hold more sacred than 
 theirs, who unite in themselves the feelings of the 
 rich and the fortunes of the poor. Poverty is a cold 
 wind ; and the higher your situation, the colder it 
 blows. But this is to be said : However sacred may 
 
9^ PLEA FOR PRACTICE. 
 
 be the claims of respectability, of tbe desire to 
 honour your family, and maintain your appearances, 
 more sacred still are the claims of gratitude, piety, 
 and goodness. Nor will it ever prove that what you 
 painfully spare from your own respectability for the 
 purpose of honouring your God, will fail to bring 
 back its reward. "Them that honour Me, I will 
 honour." 
 
 These are the chief objections to our argument; 
 and having thus noticed them, I now proceed to — 
 
 Plead for practical attention to the duty. 
 
 By " practical attention to " it, I do not mean that 
 "we should be much interested in the subject, feel 
 ourselves in a very generous frame, and intend to be 
 much more liberal than we have been ; then com- 
 fortably come round, in the course of a week or two, 
 to our old habits. By " practical attention to " it, I 
 mean something different from all this, — something 
 decided, something instant, something permanent 
 and life-long. I mean that every one, in solemn 
 gratitude to God, and under an humble sense that 
 He is owner and they are stewards, should now, 
 and irrevocably resolve that by the help of Divine 
 grace, henceforth to the day when money ceases to 
 be treasure, " Of all that Thou shalt give me, I 
 
 WILL surely give THE TENTH TO ThEE." 
 
 This resolve once come to, it only remains that, at 
 stated times, the consecrated portion of what the 
 Lord gives you be set apart for His service; and 
 that it be cheerfully given away. Tliose stated 
 times may be either weekly, quarterly, half-yearly, 
 
ARE EELIGIOUS MEN SINCERE? 89 
 
 or yearly, according as you can ascertain your in- 
 come. Those are points of detail of the utmost 
 importance, which any one who is really resolved 
 will soon adjust for himself. But my point is to 
 obtain the firm resolution of steady and habitual 
 liberality for all that remains of life. I do not want 
 a temporary surface glow, but a permanent quick- 
 ening of the circulation, by greater strength at the 
 heart. Life is ebbing, time is flying, opportunities 
 of doing good are daily growing fewer, and the 
 moment is come for something practical. I plead, 
 then, most importunately plead, for practical atten- 
 tion to this duty now, I plead for man's sake, for 
 the Gospel's sake, for the Lord's sake^ for your own 
 sake. 
 
 I PLEAD FOR man's SAKE, that men may learn that 
 Christians are sincere. Thousands dwell in the 
 midst of us who never thought of formally disbe- 
 lieving the word of God ; yet they have a habitual 
 suspicion, more than a suspicion, that the practical 
 religion of religious men is only a seemly garb 
 which is beautiful on Sunday, serves to go to church 
 in, and is at all times respectable. This suspicion 
 is one of the most serious obstacles to their own 
 conversion. There are in this city hundreds who 
 would be brought nearer to salvation, did they only 
 feel in their conscience that the faith, hope, and love 
 of Christian men are not a profession, but a matter 
 of the heart. ITow all worldly men have one deep 
 instinct : they believe that a 7nan is sincere in what 
 
40 THE SEA OF GLASS. 
 
 lie will pay for. If tliey, then, see religious men 
 cheerfully and largely paying for their religion, the 
 habit of doubting their sincerity will gradually be 
 worn away. And surely those principles are worth 
 little which are not worth paying for. A religion 
 that did not check our selfishness could not come 
 from a God of love. He who is not willing to pay 
 for his religion has no right to have a religion. 
 Creatures there are, and creatures, too, calling them- 
 selves Christians above all names, who would fain 
 take the benefit of Jesus' religion of love, without it 
 costing them any thing ! O, could we lift one such 
 soul up and up into yonder celestial light, and there 
 set it upon the Sea of Glass: — as it saw its own 
 image reflected in that sea, with so much of greed, 
 of earthiness, of self, of meanness, shown in the 
 blaze of that day, would it not shriek out in terror, 
 that heaven was the most horrible exposing place 
 whereinto a poor wretch was ever driven ? 
 
 I 
 
 I plead for man's sake, that men may learn that 
 
 Providence is 'benevolent. One most ruinous influ- 
 ence at work in society is the general distrust in the 
 vigilance of a power which befriends the right. Most 
 men believe they can prosper more quickly and 
 more surely by keeping an easy conscience than a 
 pure one, by practising clever evasions of right than 
 by boldly shunning all known wrong. To confront 
 this unbelief, to demonstrate before all men that the 
 Power above us does smile upon uprightness and 
 generosity, is the high calling of every godly man. 
 
IS COMMERCE SELFISH? 4} 
 
 You are not only to obtain your neighbour's admis- 
 sion that the Lord is King of the world to come, — 
 they are ready enough to grant that : another point 
 needful for their salvation is to bring them to feel 
 that He is Lord and King of the world that now is. 
 They easily believe that He is the disposer of crowns 
 and harps hereafter ; but they do not so easily be- 
 lieve that He is the disposer of dollars and cents ! 
 Doubting here, for the sake of the pressing to-day, 
 they risk the infinite but unfelt to-morrow. Satan 
 ever boasts, as he did to our Master, that both the 
 good and the glory of this world are in his power, 
 and that to whomsoever he will he gives them. To 
 deny this claim, to maintain the opposite, to lead 
 men to turn upward a reverent eye, and say loyally 
 to the Lord of all, " Both riches and honour come of ' 
 Thee," nothing is so effectual as that all God's serv- 
 ants shall sacredly honour Him with the first-fruits < 
 of their increase. Doing this, it will soon be seen 
 that they who acknowledge Providence bloom in its 
 sunshine, and that seldom indeed is one of their 
 number struck with a blight. Bands — not here and 
 there an individual, as much an exception in the 
 church as in the world, but — large bands of open- 
 handed men, whose works prosper and whose homes 
 rejoice, will stand before the world living witnesses 
 that we are not given over to the keeping of a demon 
 who pampers wrong and famishes goodness. 
 
 I plead for man's sake — that men may learn that 
 commerce is lenewlent. It is not more hurtful than 
 
42 WEATDER AND COMMERCE. 
 
 wonderful how generally even good men look on 
 commerce merely as an engine for fortune-making, 
 and a field of battle for all the selfish passions. Even 
 grave divines may be found calling commerce " the 
 god of this world," with just the same propriety and 
 truth as they, professing to quote Scripture, call 
 money "the root of all evil." "Well, but is not 
 commerce a hatefully selfish thing?" Is not weather 
 a selfish thing? Both are appointed by Providence 
 for the same end ; both perverted by man to the 
 same abuse. For the threefold purpose of provision- 
 ing, clothing, and adorning this world and its inha- 
 bitants, the Lord has made a great unconscious 
 machinery of sky and sea, soil and air, and appointed 
 intelligent workers to watch its processes, and com- 
 plete the result. K'either weather nor commerce 
 separately will suffice for the provisioning, clothing, 
 and adorning of our world. "Without the mechani- 
 cal agents the intelligent workers are impotent; 
 without the intelligent workers the mechanical 
 agents revolve in vain. 
 
 The covetous imderwriter makes the storms the 
 servants of his creed ; the greedy corn-speculator 
 turns the blessed sunbeams into tools of gain ; the 
 bloodthirsty buccaneer makes the genial breeze 
 serve as charger in his murdering onset. Looking at 
 these disgusting perversions of the Lord's instru- 
 ments, are we to forget that, above evil eyes and 
 unholy hands, One is guiding the weather for the 
 good of all ? And coming into commerce — the pro- 
 vidential play of intelligent agents for our comfort — 
 
BENEVOLENCE PEOMISING HAPPINESS. 43 
 
 are we to look at the lower side, the motives of 
 traders, and forget the higher side, the design and 
 actual result wrought out by Providence ? It is like 
 the web of a cunning weaver : on the lower side you 
 find only tangled threads, on the upper only bloom- 
 ing flowers. Look at commerce as regarded by the 
 hearts of buyer and seller, and selfish indeed is the 
 scene ; look at it as designed, ay, as actually wrought 
 out, by the Ruler above, and you see every man in a 
 city provided by the hands of others with all things 
 which earth can ofier to his convenience, in such 
 proportion as his means will command. Rise up, 
 then, ye Christian men, ye who know a God, and 
 bless a Providence, rise up, and testify that this com- 
 merce, which busies your masses, is not a lawless 
 scramble, but a beneficent appointment whereby 
 every one may become a co-worker with Heaven in 
 plenishing and provisioning the homes of men ! Let 
 all see that, when well-won gains come into your 
 hand, you have a joy in scattering them abroad, to 
 spread temporal and eternal happiness among that 
 race for whom all winds blow, and all markets are 
 opened. 
 
 I plead for man's sake, that practical lenevolence 
 may he increased. Of all sources of happiness in a 
 community, none acts so greatly and pervasively as a 
 spirit of true benevolence. IS'othing would so much 
 assnage private griefs, or so greatly smooth the rela- 
 tions of class with class, as the general spread of 
 that sacred brother-love, that true fellow-feeling, 
 
44 ADORNING THE GOSPEL. 
 
 which breathes so sweetlj in our Christian Scrip- 
 tures. That widows may not weep unconsoled ; that 
 orphans may not roam friendless ; that wayward 
 men may not pass a lifetime within sound of church- 
 bells, without ever hearing inside their own door a 
 word of loving exhortation ; that the poor may not 
 be set against the rich by envy ; that the rich may 
 not be estranged from the poor by contempt ; that 
 real Heathens may not live and die in the heart of 
 Christendom ; that nations of Pagans may not sit on 
 and on in the darkness of their fathers ; — in a word, 
 that this cold world may be warmer, and this trou- 
 bled race have more joy, open your hand and give ; 
 for man's sake, give ! 
 
 I 
 
 I PLEAD FOR THE Gospel's SAKE, that it may 1)6 
 fitly represented. That is not its own word ; but one 
 almost fears to nse its own, it is so strong. " That ye 
 may adorn the doctrine of God yonr Saviour in all 
 things." Adorn that doctrine ! See it so pure, so 
 bright, lovely in the likeness of its Author, and then 
 say where is the life that is to be to it, not a veil to 
 dim its beauties, not a spot to mar its charm, but an 
 ornamerit — what a jewel is to the brow of a fair 
 woman, an attraction for eyes and admiration ! 
 ' "Where is the life that really adorns the Gospel ? 
 Surely it is not that of a man who calls himself a 
 Christian, and yet to whom no one will turn in his 
 need, as to a certain friend, for body or for soul. 
 Alas for that man from whose door a neighbour in 
 distress instinctively turns away ; to whom collectors 
 
RESULTS OF ADOPTING THIS PRINCIPLE. 45 
 
 for any holy work never think of going ! O, who 
 would rest nnder a roof upon which no man's bless- 
 ing comes ? JSTot long ago one rich man was letting 
 a splendid seat to another rich man, and, mistaking 
 the character of his customer, he stated, among the 
 many attractions of the place, this great attraction : 
 ''■And there are 710 charities P^ Ah! lay not your 
 dying head on that man's pillow ! 
 
 The Gospel will be adorned only by men who, not 
 in word and in tongue, but in deed and in truth, 
 love their neighbour, body and soul ; — by men in 
 whom the character of Christ, to some extent, re- 
 appears, that character of love and self-sacrifice to 
 which the glory of God and the salvation of man 
 were the sole objects; wealth, or ease, or pride, 
 nothing. Aim, then, aim at such a standard of 
 beneficence as shall attract to the religion you pro- 
 fess the admiring eye of many, who before had seen 
 in it no loveliness ! 
 
 I plead for the Gospel's sake, that it may he 
 diffused. The Lord's commission is, that we "go 
 into all the world, and preach the Gospel to every 
 creature.''^ " To every creature !" Let us remember 
 that injunction. "While a human being lives to whom 
 the good tidings of great joy have never been told, 
 our commission is not executed. How much has 
 been done already'- toward its execution ? Half the 
 race of man, and more, are this day without 
 Preachers of the Gospel ! And even within Chris- 
 tian lands numbers of holy works, for which the 
 
,,l!i RESULTS OF ADOPTING THIS PRINCIPLE. 
 
 need is reproaclifullj plain, remain undone, because 
 tlie church of God is not sufficiently self-denying to 
 give the means. It is easy to sympathize with mis- 
 sions ; to applaud earnest speeches, and kindle with 
 lively hymns. It is easy to feel a generous glow 
 while we sing, in the words of Heber — 
 
 '' Waft, waft, ye wind, the story, 
 And you, ye waters, roll, 
 Till, like a sea of glory, 
 
 It spreads from pole to pole !" 
 
 But listen! the winds are sweeping, and have 
 been sweeping from the beginning, over the peaks 
 of the Himalaya and on the shores of Lake Tsad. 
 !Now it is the rustle of the breeze, now the shock 
 of the tempest; but listen! Does either sound 
 on the ear of the Heathen the name " Jesus ?" 
 The waves are rolling, and from the beginning have 
 been rolling, on the shores of Fijii and of Japan ; 
 but does either the gentle ripple, or the boom of the 
 mighty wave, sound the word, " Mercy ?" 
 
 No ; if the story is to be told, it must be told by 
 the voice of living men. And whence are the 
 means to come, to send forth messengers to tell the 
 tidings of grace " to every creature V Dr. Morgan 
 has said that some such change as was effected in 
 science by the discovery of gravitation, or in 
 mechanics by that of steam, would be effected in 
 the powers of the church for good, by the general 
 adoption of the observance for which we plead. 
 And whether we look at our wealthy or our poorer 
 
47 
 
 churclies, it is certain that were all their members 
 but brought up even to the practice of giving a 
 tenth, then would their ability to flood the earth 
 with Christian agencies be increased to the astonish- 
 ment of mankind ; while our Societies, though in a 
 lower degree, would put on a new, and hitherto 
 unheard-of, might. 
 
 We are drawing near to the hour when we shall 
 take flight from this shore for another. At whatso- 
 ever moment we depart, many other souls, from all 
 lands, w^ill be departing too. Who would wish that, 
 in the fliglit of souls of which he will be one, the 
 majority should be of those who had never heard of 
 Jesus ? If this is not to be our case, if that name is 
 to sound on all ears, and to be invoked in all tongues, 
 up and be earnest ! Spare not your goods, that the 
 poor in soul may be rich at last. 
 
 I PLEAD — reverently it must be said — for the 
 Lord's sake. It is true that all idea of giving a 
 benefit to Him is for ever excluded. ''Is it any 
 gain to Him that thou makest thy ways perfect ?" 
 The sun He has set in our firmament, has rejoiced 
 our world from Adam until now. On him all its 
 beauty and its life depend, ^ow that he is hidden, 
 the rose has no blush, the lily no whiteness, the 
 meadow no green ; a cheerless gloom reduces them 
 all to sameness. To-morrow when he re appears, all 
 the beauties of the landscape will come forth anew. 
 Suppose that then we were all seized with an impulse 
 of admiration, and desired to show how much we 
 
48 
 
 valued his services to man ; not all the powers of 
 our race could send him up a ray to make him 
 grander. 
 
 He is the emblem of his Maker. In one eternal 
 outflood, benefits stream from Him upon His crea- 
 tures. Life, joy, redemption, — all come from Him. 
 After ages of daily debt, were all our race this 
 moment seized with a passion of gratitude, did every 
 human heart ask, "What shall I render unto the 
 Lord for all His benefits ?" then, though every 
 bosom throbbed, and every hand were strained, we 
 could not add one ray to His glory, one step to the 
 elevation of His throne, one hairbreadth to the 
 extent of His dominions, or one moment to the 
 duration of His reign. Inhabiting eternity. He sits 
 "in the high and holy place," as far above our 
 power to benefit as to injure Him, equally incapable 
 of accession and decay. 
 
 Yet He intrusts to us interests that are dear to 
 Him ; and, therefore, — 
 
 I plead for the Lord's sake, that His image may 
 he worthily reflected. The inanimate works of His 
 hand tell much of His strength and skill ; the lower 
 animals much of His wisdom to contrive and His 
 might to control : but all this they tell not to them- 
 selves, but to their superior, man. They are but 
 works of His, not children, who can show His image, 
 or be " partakers of the Divine nature." From 
 them man can learn nothing as to his Maker's mind 
 on moral questions, on the points whereupon the 
 
49 
 
 deepest anxieties of tlie conscience turn, — right and 
 wrong, justice, pardon, judgment, and the future. 
 It is only through man that his fellow-men can see 
 the image of God, — man, that wonderful creature, 
 whose complex nature unites the lowest to the high- 
 est worlds, bringing matter, animal and spirit, into 
 one being, — a being who, on one extreme, is equal 
 with the clod, and, on the other, by the communing 
 of the Spirit reaches to the throne of the Highest. 
 In him, and in him alone, the image of the holy 
 God may be so reflected, that men here shall learn 
 to " glorify their Father who is in heaven." 
 
 But how does he reflect this image who, profess- 
 ing to be a child of God, is yet known to delight in 
 holding and in storing, but to feel a pain in giving ? 
 ^Nothing can be more strictly opposite to the Divine 
 nature than this. The unceasing action of that 
 nature is to pour out unrequited bounties. Eeturn 
 or gain it knows not; and so does it delight in 
 bounty, that no man gives to another in the Lord's 
 name, but He counts the deed as done to Himself. 
 Blessed is that human being in whose goodness some 
 mind first discerns glimpses of the goodness of 
 God! 
 
 I plead for the Lord's sake, that His claims may 
 te vindicated. I have already said, that many who 
 are willing to look upon Him as God of the world 
 to come, feel as if this world's property was not so 
 directly His and under His hand. For the Creator's 
 glory and the creature's rest, it is needful that all be ' 
 
 3 
 
60 THANKS TO GOD. 
 
 taught that the gold and silver, the harvest's yield, 
 flocks, herds, and fisheries, are all His property ; 
 that whatsoever man has in his hand, is there only 
 in trust and stewardship, not created nor yet retained 
 by his power; that a Hand unseen can at any 
 moment empty his hand, and a Mind unseen blight 
 the fruit of a life's prudence, by the mistake of a 
 day. 
 
 Go, then, and assert the Lord's claims ; go 
 and teach man's stewardship, not in word, but in 
 deed. Steadily devote the first-fruits of all where- 
 with you may be intrusted to holy uses. Let your 
 daily actions say in your neighbours' ears, " Freely 
 ye have received, freely give !" 
 
 I plead for the Lord's sake, that His dice praise 
 may he rendered. Li speaking of the effect of 
 Christian liberality, St. Paul tells us that it does not 
 stop at those who are benefited, but passes on, in a 
 certain sense, to the Lord Himself, — " abounds by 
 many thanksgivings to God." To abound does not 
 mean to sufiice, but to more than suffice ; not only 
 to fill a vessel, but to wave out, or overflow from it. 
 Thus, when an act of Christian goodness fllls a suf- 
 fering heart with joy, it not only thanks the human 
 hand that comforts it, but overflows in the words, 
 " Thank God." There is an ear, an open ear, which 
 never closes to the cry of want ; but when it listens 
 from heaven to the children of men, to hear if there 
 be any that thank God, often it listens in vain, — • 
 often hears praises for the creature, murmurs and 
 
GIVING AND PROSPERING. 51 
 
 blasphemies for the Creator. O, would yon count it 
 a little thing, if, through your own deeds, that ear, 
 ever and anon, heard a fervent " Thank God ?" Of 
 all the hands that make melody, none raises such 
 music as his whose touch on the heart-keys of the 
 despairing changes a murmur into a thrilling 
 " Thank God !" 
 
 Give, then, freely give, that some poor man 
 who was ready to think that charity was dead on 
 earth, and mercy in heaven, may bless you ; and, 
 feeling that it was God who sent you to his side, 
 may cry, " Thank God !" Give, freely give, that 
 the sons of heathen fathers, of cannibals and demon- 
 worshippers, may make scenes which have echoed 
 only to whoop, or yell, or din of orgies, resound 
 with the Christian " Praise God !" 
 
 I PLEAD FOR YOUR OWN SAKE, that yOU may JpTOS- 
 
 jper. The habit of statedly giving lirst-fruits of all 
 you receive, tends to prosperity, by the double force 
 of a natural means and a Divine blessing. As a 
 natural means, it works by promoting order and 
 economy. One reason why many tradesmen fail is, 
 that they do not in due time, and with sufficient fre- 
 quency, ascertain precisely where they are. He who 
 is determined that all his increase shall pay its first- 
 fruits to the glory of his Saviour, must ascertain 
 what that increase is. Again: one reason why 
 many persons of fixed income are miserably before 
 their means is, because they have never carefully 
 apportioned to each branch of their expenditure its 
 
 r 
 
§3 KELIGTOIJS MEN FAILING. 
 
 due share of their income. "Were one portion held 
 sacred, on which no claim whatever sliould touch, 
 an efficient check would be set up against random, 
 living. 
 
 The habits of order and economy thus acquired 
 would work together with the blessing which is 
 assured to him who honours the Lord with the lirst- 
 fruits of all his increase. That a man living steadily 
 up to this principle will prosper, I have no manner 
 of doubt. I once asked a valued friend of mine 
 who had adopted the principle of giving awa}^ a 
 tenth in early life, and whom the prospering hand 
 of God had raised from humble beginnings to a 
 position of great and valuable influence, if he ever 
 knew a case in which a man had set out on that 
 principle, and persevered in it^ and then failed in 
 life. He answered, " Not one." 
 
 Worldly men are often led to doubt whether a 
 blessing does attend the labour of a pious man ; for 
 they see men who profess religion suddenly brought 
 down. But they must ask whether these men have 
 been faithful to their religion. It often happens that 
 one who begins life well, and is liberal while he has 
 little, yields to that fatal tendency which is strong 
 in all to love money in proportion as it increases. 
 As they become richer in hand, they become poorer 
 in heart. As they acquire more, they give less. I 
 have heard of one who had, when poorer, been in 
 the habit of giving five dollars to a certain good 
 work ; now that he is wealthy, he gives half a dol- 
 lar. And only the other day I heard of a miserable 
 
A EICH MAN. ^ 6S 
 
 creature, who is what we call a 'cery rich man^ who, 
 when applied to in a very urgent case by two Minis- 
 ters, for a family in need, did at last promise a dol- 
 lar. But meeting one of the Ministers afterwards, 
 he told him he found he could not give it ; for he 
 had so many houses, and had now to pay an 
 increased tax, that he could not spare so much. 
 Ah ! how such copper souls are to be pitied ! Eut, 
 these cases only represent a large class. And is it 
 to be wondered at, that if religious men thus allow 
 gold to choke up the springs of feeling, the Lord 
 should smite them ? You worldly men, do not 
 judge by such cases ! These men were false to their 
 religion, and it is fitting that a blight should over- 
 take them : — indeed, that blight may be their 
 salvation. But he who steadfastly sets apart for the 
 Lord the first portion of all his gains, checks his 
 love of money on the threshold ; and by increasing 
 the proportion as his gains increase, he checks the 
 terrible bent to a progressive love of it ; so that it is 
 safe for himself, and good for the church, that he 
 should prosper. But how can he prosper who gives 
 a tenth of little, but, when Providence makes it 
 much, thinks his tenth too much to give ? Even to 
 that depth of baseness can our poor nature go. 
 Such men, not only in substance, but in very form, 
 " rob God," and may be met by Him with that stark 
 and frightful charge. And if it may be said of 
 other wrongful modes of getting wealth, surely it 
 may of this : "As a partridge sittetli on eggs and 
 hatcheth them not, so he that getteth riches, and 
 
5i A CARNAL MIND. 
 
 not bj I'iglit, shall leave them in the midst of his 
 dajs, and at his end shall be a fool." 
 
 I plead for your own sake, that you may escape 
 the curse of a carnal mind. It is possible for a man 
 so to drown his spiritual powers in sordid passion, 
 that the soul within him ceases to have any action 
 but for concerns of the market. Of its high facul- 
 ties he cannot rob it : it is, and it will be, a soul, 
 with the inherent lights and forces of a soul. But 
 all these he presses into the ignoble service of pelf- 
 gathering. It still has its judgment, capable of 
 deep and holy themes ; but this is kept ever poring 
 upon problems lying within the two columns, — dol- 
 lars and cents. It has its imagination ; but this, 
 instead of taking flights to a better country, only 
 dwells on more gold, more houses, more land, more 
 state. It has its fear ; but this, forgetting all things 
 really fearful, shudders at nothing except losses. 
 And even its hope, though unquenchable, aspiring 
 only after property, does not wing the soul for 
 heaven, but earths it deeper in pelf. Thus the poor 
 soul is totally shut out from its native air, and the 
 whole man sinks into a machine, — a most wonderful 
 and elaborate machine, worked by spirit-power, for 
 the single use of scraping, scraping, scraping 
 gold! 
 
 There are hundreds of souls in this city just like 
 that ; and if you would not have your soul degraded 
 into mere spirit-power for working a gold-rake, 
 spring up, and, appealing for help to the Spirit who 
 
BAGS WHICH WAX NOT GOLD. 55 
 
 is over all, go and teach your hands to do works of 
 generosity, instead of teaching your soul to do works 
 of pelf. 
 
 I plead for your own sake, that you may increase 
 in purity and heavenliness of mind. It was our 
 Redeemer who first showed the way to make money 
 a means of inclining our affections toward the 
 inheritance of the saints in light. He said: "Sell 
 that ye have, and give alms; provide yourselves 
 bags which wax not old," (is not this what you 
 would covet ? " hags which wax not old?") " a trea- 
 sure in the heavens, where no thief approacheth, nor 
 moth corrupteth." ITow, mark the philosophy of 
 this : " For where your treasure is, there will your 
 heart he alsoP So that, by gradually laying up 
 your treasure in heaven, your heart will gradually 
 follow it there ; and thus money, which some treat 
 as capable only of being a bond and a burden, may 
 become to you a connecting wire with the Throne 
 of retributions, and a stimulant to hope for "the 
 resurrection of the just." A farmer who loves to 
 see a full barn, and also to receive in market the 
 price of his crops, yet foregoes the market, and 
 reduces the store in his barn, casts away his precious 
 grain out of his hand, out of his sight, and leaves it 
 buried, lost as to immediate return, trusting it 
 wholly to the bosom of earth, and the eye of Hea- 
 ven. "What effect does this portion of his treasure 
 produce upon him? It turns his thoughts away 
 from the barn, from the market, from the pride of 
 
S6 TEEASURE FOR THE LAST DAYS. 
 
 the one and the gold of the other. It leads his eye 
 often up to the heavens, and his thoughts forward 
 to the coming harvest-day. 
 
 Go, then, and sow, not sparingly, but bountifully. 
 Foregoing the proud store, foregoing the present 
 recompense, cast your treasure out of your grasp, 
 out of your sight, cast it with a broad hand and a 
 glad heart ; leave it there unseen in the soil of eter- 
 nity, and under the suns of heaven. Even here the 
 fruit will be, that by degrees, your mind will set 
 itself more strongly on the joys that never wane: 
 and when the harvest-days set in, how many will be 
 fain that they had sowed as you ! 
 
 I plead for your own sake, that you may have 
 some good of your money ^ even to eternity. In the 
 passage just referred to, our Kedeemer shows how 
 we may, by a heavenly use of earthly goods, lay up 
 treasure in heaven. An Apostle tells us of another 
 treasure which, by means of money, we may " heap 
 together for the last days." But this is a treasure of 
 " miseries that shall come upon you." He who, to 
 amass wealth, keeps back the labourer's hire, or falls 
 into other " fraud," — surely not excepting the fraud 
 which deprives the Lord of the beneficent use of 
 His own gifts, — is, in heaping up money for this 
 world, heaping up " treasure for the last days." 
 "While the gold and silver distributed for the Lord's 
 sake, to benefit the souls and the bodies of men, will 
 all be found turned into incorruptible treasure " at 
 the resurrection of the just;" this gold and silver 
 
67 
 
 whicli no thank-offerings hallowed, and no poor man 
 blessed, on which the eye of the needy looked wist- 
 fully, and for which the works of God's church 
 appealed in vain — this, too, will re-appear; its "rust 
 shall he a witness against you^ and shall eat your 
 flesh as it were fireP This, O money-lover ! is the 
 way in which you have heaped treasure " together 
 for the last days !" 
 
 " O, I have not been selfish ! It is not for myself 
 I have got something together. I know I must leave 
 it. It is for my children I have saved." Well, per- 
 haps it would have been a blessing to your children, 
 had they been left just with the means of honourably 
 starting in life, the rest depending, under God, on 
 their own conduct. Perhaps the stores you have 
 painfully gathered will breed contentions over your 
 grave, and then hurry your children to folly and to 
 sin — ay, perhaps to poverty. 
 
 You have saved for your children ! "W"e are ready 
 to admit that, in this, if moderately done, you are a 
 public benefactor ; for he who finds a family com- 
 peting with the poor in the labour market, and 
 leaves it in a condition to employ them instead of 
 competing with them, does a general service. But 
 while you have been saving for your children, what 
 have you saved for yourself? In a week your will 
 may be read ; and is it possible that all the savings 
 of your life are invested where they will then be in 
 the hands of others, and nothing invested where it 
 will come to account for you ? As with our life, so 
 with our money : he that saveth his money shall lose 
 
 3* 
 
58 DYING POOR. 
 
 it ; and he who, for the Lord's sake and the Gospel's 
 sake, loses his wealth shall find it. The only money 
 we save for ourselves is what we give to the 
 Lord. 
 
 The same sentiment is quaintly expressed on an 
 old monument in the parish church of Leek, Staf- 
 fordshire : — 
 
 "As I was, so be ye; 
 As I am, ye shall be ; 
 That I gave, that I have ; 
 What I spent, that I had. 
 Thus I end all my cost : 
 What I left, that I lost." 
 
 From the moment you depart hence (and how long 
 is that moment away ?), not one cent of all you ever 
 handled will remain to you, except that which you 
 freely gave away. When all the rest is in the hands 
 of others, this will abide for you, and at the great 
 day will be apportioned to you, in new forms, and 
 with wondrous increase, before all eyes that ever 
 counted gold, or ever melted with benevolence. 
 Then, if you would save anything for yourself, if you 
 would have any enjoyment from your possessions 
 beyond this uncertain life, go and " put on Christ :" 
 let your own character disappear under His ; your 
 own modes of judging and acting give place to His. 
 Give yourself first to Him, and then to the church 
 and the good works the church has to do ; and then 
 shall you " lay up in store against the time to 
 
DYING POOR. 59 
 
 "All, but I should not like to die poor!" Not 
 like to die poor ! For my part I should wish to die 
 rich. Who dies kich ? He who, whether he leaves 
 much, or little, or nothing behind him, has treasure 
 laid up in heaven. He dies rich. Who dies poor ? 
 He who, whatever he leaves behind him, has nothing 
 laid up before him. He dies jpoor* 
 
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