Part 49
III. If we consider Christ as a glorious benefactor, who has taken care to provide for us the necessaries of this life, and hath purchased for us, at the hands of God, the eternal treasures of heaven and glory. Has not this blessed consideration force enough to guard us against all temptations to injustice? Shall a christian break the rules of equity, and steal, or cheat, or plunder his neighbour to gain money or merchandise, who has the promises of God for his support in a way of diligence and humble faith? Shall we sully our consciences, and defile our souls with knavery and injustice for a little of the pelf of this world, when we have the unsearchable riches of Christ made over to us in the gospel, and the inheritance of heaven in reversion?
IV. Let us consider the very nature and design of the gospel of Christ, it is to make sinners holy, to make the unjust righteous: The new man of christianity must be created in righteousness and true holiness. Therefore are we _purchased with the blood of Christ, that we might be a peculiar peeple, zealous of good works_; Tit. ii. 14.
It is a shame and scandal to the christian name, when one who wears it is unrighteous or dishonest. An unjust christian, what a contradiction is it in itself, and how it disgraces the profession of the gospel! Hear how the great apostle treats his Corinthian disciples when such sort of sins were found amongst them; 1 Cor. vi. 1-8. _Dare any of you, having a matter against another, go to law before the unjust man and the infidel? Dare any of you injure your neighbour, your fellow-christian? I speak this to your shame. Brother goes to law with brother, and ye injure one another. Why do not you rather suffer wrong? nay, you do wrong, and defraud, and that your own brethren._ But what is the consequence? Such wretches as these are, _shall never inherit the kingdom of God_.
_The grace of God that bringeth salvation_; Tit. ii. 9, 10. _teacheth us to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, and to live soberly and righteously_, and religiously, _in this present evil world_. It teacheth us righteousness towards men, as well as sobriety among ourselves, and godliness towards the King of heaven. But how hath this divine religion been scandalized for want of justice in the professors of it! Scandalized among heathen kingdoms, among Turks and unbelievers! and christianity in our own land, how hath it been dishonoured by the practices of those that pretend to that holy name! How hath the conversion of wild heathens in the Indian nations been hindered by the injustice and fraud of christian merchants and traders there, or by merchants who call themselves christians. I have heard it said by persons whom I could fully credit, that a Turk when he is suspected of fraud and cheating, will reply, “What, do you think I am a christian?” O how hath the gospel of the lovely Jesus been rendered odious by the abominable practices of those that pretend to honour him! What falsehood, what lying, what perjury, and cheating, and deceit, and violence have been practised by our traders in foreign lands! Thus there has been an ill savour of our holy christianity carried beyond the seas, by those, perhaps, who have pretended to convert the infidels. And many in our own nation, who have begun to set their faces towards heaven, have been sorely disgusted at the knavish practices of professors, and been tempted to think that all religion is a jest, and to abandon the ordinances of the gospel. But when souls stumble, and fall, and perish by such discouragements, woe to him that gave the offence, and laid this stumbling-block of iniquity in their way. How heavy must the blood of souls lay upon such sinners!
Surely there has been enough said on this head to discourage oppression, deceit, and injustice in the professors of christianity, if argument, and shame, and terror can have power and prevalence over sin and temptation. O may almighty grace attend this discourse of justice, and work the sacred love of it in the hearts of men!
Now if ye are made willing to walk by the rules of equity and justice, instead of proposing particular directions for this end, I shall proceed,
In the fifth and last place, to point out the various springs of injustice, that ye may avoid them.
The great and general spring of injustice to our neighbour is a criminal and excessive love to ourselves. For since the comprehensive notion of justice lies in this, to give to every one that which is due, it follows, that the general notion of injustice consists in taking to ourselves more than is due, or in giving less than is due to our neighbour.
There are a thousand instances of this unrighteousness among men, in reference to their bodies, their souls, their good name, or their possessions in the world. This general term of injustice is so extensive, that it includes a great part of the sins forbidden in the second table. Disobedience to parents and governors, rebellion, treason, murder, adultery, theft, violence and plunder, cheating, and deceit, and slander, with all sinful desires to possess what belongs to our neighbour, may be justly ranked under the head of unrighteousness: And they spring from this one fountain, namely, an excessive regard to self. It is to this natural and exalted idol that we sacrifice the peace and the property, the good name, and even the life of our fellow-creatures. Nor will any method be effectual to secure us from the practice of injustice, till we learn to degrade self a little in our own esteem, and to judge of our neighbour, and of the things that are his due, by the same rule and measure by which we take an estimate, of ourselves, and of what is due to us. Let us put our neighbour in the place of self, and judge how he ought to be treated.
But that we may more effectually guard ourselves from the temptations of injustice, let us descend to particulars, and we shall find that almost all the unrighteous practices of men spring from some of these six principles; _viz._ covetousness, pride, luxury, sloth, malice against men, or distrust of God.
I. Covetousness is a great spring of injustice. This consists in an immoderate desire of possessing: And we are told by the apostle, that the love of money is the root of all evil, which while some have coveted after, they have not only erred from the faith, but they have ventured upon many sins, as well as pierced themselves through with many sorrows. For _they that will be rich, fall into temptation, and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which draw men in destruction and perdition_; 1 Tim. vi. 9, 10. Solomon is of the same mind; Prov. xxviii. 20, 22. He that maketh haste to be rich, shall not be innocent, for he hath an evil eye upon the possessions of his neighbour.
It is from this cursed root of covetousness that a multitude of bitter fruits proceed. It is by this vicious principle working within us, that we are tempted to take what is not our due, either by craft or by violence. Hence it is that men cheat each other in their daily commerce, they defraud and over-reach their neighbour, if they can, in every bargain they make, and try all the arts of subtle knavery, in order to enrich themselves. They divest their souls of truth and virtue, and put off conscience and shame to load themselves with thick clay.
It is covetousness that teaches the sons of men to practise upon their dealers with a false balance and a deceitful beam. They shorten their measures, and lessen their weights by which they sell their goods: But when the case alters, and they buy any thing for themselves, they will, if possible, take another sort of weight, or use a different measure; all which are an abomination to the Lord.
It is the same evil and unrighteous principle that persuades the seller to put off corrupt and damaged wares for good and sound, and to cozen his neighbour with merchandize that is by no means such as he reasonably expects. It is this principle that persuades the buyer also to cheat his neighbour with corrupt and false money, which he knows to be unlawful coin. For corrupt merchandize and corrupt money, false balances, light weights, and scanty measure, seem all to stand in the same rank of deceit: These are all weapons of craft and knavery to give a secret wound to their neighbour’s estate, they all belong to the armory of fraud, and the magazine of unrighteousness.
It is this covetous humour that tempts the tongues of men to speak flattering falsehoods in their daily dealings, and some of them make an hourly sacrifice of truth to the gain of a penny. It is from this principle that they break their promises of payment; they withhold the money that is due to their neighbour, beyond all reasonable time, and that for no other reason but to gain by the loan of it: They delay the payment of their poor creditors for many months, or perhaps for years, and put the advantage which they make of this delay into their own purse. This is a frequent, but an unrighteous practice in our day: For the profit that accrues by the detaining of money that is due to another beyond the customary or contracted time of payment, should doubtless be given to the person to whom the principal money was due; or at least he should have such a valuable share of it as may compensate the damage or loss he sustains by the delay.
It is a covetous desire of gain that tempts men to practise extortion, and to prey upon the necessities of those they deal with. When the buyer wants any conveniency of life, they force him to give much more than it is worth, because he stands in the utmost need of it; or they constrain the seller perhaps to part with some of his most valuable possessions for a trifle, because he is under special necessity and present distress. This was the extortion which Jacob practised upon his brother Esau, when he made him sell his birth-right for a mess of pottage, while he was faint with hunting. And it is the same iniquity when we impose upon the ignorance or known unskilfulness of the persons we deal with; and especially when we make our advantage of children or servants, or of persons who confess their own ignorance, and leave the choice of the goods, or the determination of the price, to the conscience of him that sells.
We may indeed set a just value upon our own goods; but we must not set a price upon any man’s pressing necessity, nor raise a tax upon his ignorance. It can never be certainly determined how much it is lawful for a trader to get by his merchandize: Doubtless he may sometimes make a greater gain of the same things than at another: And this is often necessary, in order to compensate the losses, the risks or dangers that he passes through. He may lawfully make those advantages which the change of things, and the divine providence often puts into his hands: Nor is it unlawful for him to take more of some persons than he does of others for the same merchandize; for he may treat some of his customers favourably, though he must deal righteously and justly with them all. But let him see to it that he use ingenuity towards the poor, the necessitous, and the unskilful, as well as moderation toward all men. The circumstances of things are so various, that much of the practice of justice must be left to the court of equity in every man’s breast, under the sacred influence of this rule, _Do that to others which you think reasonable that others should do to you_. It is best in all doubtful and difficult cases to practise what is fair and honourable in the sight of men, and what is safe and innocent in the sight of God: for a good conscience is better than the largest gain: But where the sacred principles of virtue are over-borne by corrupt inclinations, the moral powers of the soul are stretched at first to the lengths of moderate iniquity, and conscience is strained to the indulgence of some smaller unrighteousness: but virtue will die by degrees, and conscience will learn in time to allow bolder injustice. And then, though it may be stupified and senseless for a season, yet let the sinner know, that it will have its feeling return again, and the guilt of knavery and falsehood will torture the soul with unknown agonies here or hereafter.
But the wretched influence of this vice of covetousness is not confined only to traffic and merchandize: It spreads its unrighteousness much farther and wider: It tempts the sons and daughters of men to withhold due honour and necessary supplies from their aged parents, and exposes to great hardships in the latter end of life, those to whom we owe our life itself, and the comforts of it in our younger years. It withholds wages from the servant, and salary from him that has earned it. It forbids those who have received benefits to make a grateful return to their benefactors. It will teach a man to stop his ears at the cry of his neighbour in distress, lest it should cost some money for his relief. It refuses an alms to the starving poor, and finds an excuse for the churl, lest he stretch out his hand of bounty to a perishing family. It is so wrapped up in self, that it never considers what is due to another; and ventures to break all the rules of righteousness rather than diminish its own estate, or part with any thing it can call mine. It would suffer a church or a kingdom to sink and perish, and let the public peace be broken, and the nation dissolved, if it might but secure itself and its own possessions in the midst of those ruins. An accursed vice. An iniquity big with misery and desolation! yet it hides itself too often from conviction and reproof; it runs like a river under ground, and attempts to conceal itself under the specious disguises of frugality and virtue, while it practises all the mischiefs we have been describing.
II. Pride is another spring of injustice. But having broken up the fountain of covetousness as of a great deep, and traced it in its various streams, the labour of drying them up has employed so much time, that the pursuit of the other springs of unrighteousness must be delayed till a further season.
HYMN FOR SERMON XXV. _Christian Morality_, _viz._ _Justice and Truth_.
Great God, thy holy law requires, To curb our covetous desires, Forbids to plunder, steal, or cheat, To practise falsehood or deceit.
Thy Son hath set a pattern too, He paid to God and men their due: A dreadful debt he paid to God, And bought our pardon with his blood.
Amazing justice! boundless love! Do we not feel our passions move? Do we not grieve that we have been Faithless to God, or false to men?
Have we no righteous debt denied, Through wanton luxury or pride? Nor vex’d the poor with long delay, And made them groan for want of pay?
Have we ne’er thrown a needless shame, Or scandal on our neighbour’s name? O happy men, whose age and youth Have ever dealt in love and truth;
But if our justice once be gone, And leave our faith and hope alone; If honesty be banish’d hence Religion is a vain pretence.
SERMON XXVI. _Christian Morality_, _viz._ _Justice, &c._ PHILIP. iv. 8.—Whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, think on these things. Οσα δικαια, οσα αγνα.
Justice and truth are two of the chief bands that preserve human society. If truth and justice perish from the earth, the sons of men would become like the savages of the wilderness, where the strong or the crafty animals prey upon _the weak, the simple, and the innocent_. The Lord God, the author of nature, is a God of justice, and he has written something of this law in the consciences of men. But the God of grace has given us much plainer rules for the practice of it, hath allured us to righteousness by sweeter motives, and hath guarded it by more awful and solemn terrors. These things have been the subject of the former discourse; and that we may, as far as possible, assist towards the rooting out injustice from the hearts and lives of christians, I have begun to point out some of the chief principles, or springs of it.
The first which I mentioned is covetousness, a vicious weed that grows in corrupt nature, and is fruitful of a thousand unrighteous actions.
I proceed now to the second, that is pride. When a person sets too high a value upon himself, and aggrandizes himself in his own esteem, he is ready to imagine that all things are due to him, and there is very little left to become due to his neighbour. The proud, as well as the covetous man, is full of self, and he forgets the command of love to his neighbour: He treats him as if he was not made of the same clay, and lives as though he were obliged to no duty to his fellow-creatures. This is evident in a variety of instances.
It is pride that forbids us to give due respect to those that are above us in the family, in the church, or in the civil state: And instead of paying the honours that are due to superiors, we are tempted to treat them with insolence and scorn. Many a father in our degenerate age, has found this unhappy effect of raising his children too soon and too high: And the mother has seen her sin, and felt it in her punishment, when she has cockered up her young offspring in pride, and thereby taught them to break the rules of justice, to slight all her authority, and make a scoff of that pre-eminence which God and nature have given her. The proud man is ready to say in his heart, “All that are around me ought to pay me respect, and do me justice,” while he is regardless of the respect due to others. “Let them carry it towards me as they ought, and I will carry it toward them as I please.”
It is pride that inclines us to throw a blot here and there upon the good name of our neighbour, and to blemish his reputation, lest he should outshine us. When some honourable mention is made of another person in our company, especially if it be one of our own sex, our own rank or degree in the world, do we not feel something rising within to lessen their honour, and to stain their character? It is through this vanity and ambition of mind, that we are tempted to defame and reproach our neighbour, and to rob him of his just honour among men, and we endeavour to build our own fame and credit upon the ruin of his. But it is a sandy, or rather an impious foundation; and the fame that is built upon such ground will never stand. Pride inclines us to assume more respect than is due to ourselves, and to take it away from our neighbour, even as covetousness tempts us to take more money to ourselves than is due, and to deprive our neighbour of it. Thus both of them are opposite to the sacred rule of justice; one to that justice which we owe to our neighbour’s estate, and the other to his good name.
But the evil influence of pride spreads farther also; for it teaches us to practise unrighteousness in matters of property: It instructs us in the methods of oppression, and inspires us with a wicked courage to practise it; Ps. lxxiii. 6, 7, 8. _When pride compasses men as a chain, and they wear it as a golden ornament, then violence covers them as a garment; and though their eyes stand out with fatness, and they have more than heart could wish, yet they are corrupt, and speak wickedly concerning oppression._ They gripe those that are poor, because they themselves are mighty. They refuse to pay the just demands of their neighbours, they speak loftily, and stand it out with them against all right and justice, because they are great in the world. It is the rule of justice to change places with our humble neighbour, and ask ourselves, what we should think due to us, if we were in his place. Or at least we should set ourselves and our neighbour upon the level, and consider what is just and right on both sides. But the heart of pride cannot bear such a rule, it exalts itself far above the level of mankind, and practises toward those that are around it with a superior insolence and injustice. Cursed pride, the first-born of hell! It seized our first parents and tempted them to aim at godhead, to practice injury to God himself, and assume a right to the fruit of the forbidden tree! Vile iniquity, that hath tainted all the seed of Adam! It is a haughty poison that was infused into our veins with the first sin; and where shall we find the son or daughter of Eve that is not infected with it? Blessed be the grace of God, wheresoever its dominion is broken, so that it does not break out into all the works of unrighteousness.
The third spring of injustice among men is profuseness and luxury. When persons affect to live in a manner above what their circumstances will afford, they are tempted to intrench upon the property of their neighbour, either by cheating or by violence.
It is the language of luxury, “I must indulge my appetite, my table must be furnished with a costly variety, and I must eat and drink with elegance, as is the modish phrase. I must treat my friends when they visit me, with fashionable entertainments; I must keep fine company, and make a figure in the world; I must appear in such an equipage as my neighbour allows himself, though he be ten times richer than I am. I must have many changes of raiment, for it is a mean and vulgar thing to appear too often in the same dress: My house must be furnished after the mode, and I must shine at home and abroad in silks or in silver; for I cannot bear the thought that such or such a one should out-shine and over-top me.” Then the patrimony is sold or mortgaged to raise present supplies, and the rich food and clothing, and luxurious expences of a twelve-month, devour and swallow up seven years income, or the gain of half their lives.