them which are due only to their Creator, yet may we fhew a proper deference and fubmiffion to their more extenfive faculties, and enlightened understandings.

Laftly, We are affured that the joy of these immortal beings, their pleasure and happiness, is in giving glory to God, in hymning his praifes, recording his mercies, and celebrating his perfections; can there be a more pleasing, a more delightful employment? why then fhould we not join them in it? Let us all then, with one accord, join to blefs and praise God for the creation of thefe immortal minifters of good; together with those spirits, with angels and archangels, and with all the company of heaven, let us laud and magnify his holy name, evermore praising him and faying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of hofts; heaven and earth are full of thy glory. Glory be thee, O Lord most high.

ON RICHES.

SERMON

XXXIII.

MATTHEW XIX. 24.

It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

UR bleffed Saviour, who at all times and in all places endeavoured to convince mankind that his kingdom was not of this

world,

world, and to fet them right in their mistaken notions of happiness, in the verses juft preceding my text, had commanded the young man who required of him the means of eternal life, to leave all his treafures and follow him but when he heard that faying, (fays the Apoftle) he went away forrowful; for he had great poffeffions: whereupon Jefus immediately makes the following reflection, naturally refulting from the event: Verily I fay unto it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

you,

Some learned commentators on this paffage have affected to give a different interpretation of it, and having difcovered that the word in the original, which is here conftrued camel, will admit alfo of another fignification, have changed the image, and fuppofed that our Saviour faid, it is easier for a cable to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

The propriety of the metaphor they contend is here better preferved, the fense equally clear, and the moral equally perfuafive.

But it may be faid in favour of the received verfion, that our Saviour here addreffes himfelf to the Jews, and makes use of the oriental manner in proof of which it may be observed, that this very fentence is to be met with in the Koran of Mahomet; and has been a common proverbial expreffion among the eastern nations, and is used as fuch even unto this day. This however muft, after all, be no more than a matter

a matter of merc curiofity, as the inference from the paffage in either fenfe must be the fame; namely, the improbability of the rich man's entering into a fiate of future happiness: it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. An expreffion, no doubt, very ftrong and poignant, but which is by no means to be understood in the ftrict and literal sense, as if the good things of this world fhould totally exclude us from the hopes of a better in another, or that we could not be happy here, without forfeiting all our claims to the bleffings of an hereafter. The fole meaning, scope, and intention of it was, to warn mankind against the great and imminent dangers arifing to them from that affluence and profperity which they feemed fo warmly to defire, and fo eagerly to purfue.

We may reft affured therefore, that what is here afferted is a truth, because it came from him who could have no intereft to deceive us : and it is no lefs evident that he thought it also a truth worthy of our confideration, or he would not certainly have proposed it to us. It will well become us, therefore, to weigh and confider within ourselves the reafons which induced our bleffed Saviour to pass so severe a fentence on this great idol of mankind, that we may be the better enabled to avoid that which will obftruct our entrance into the kingdom of God, and at the fame time turn our fcps into that path which will moft probably conduct us to it. To this end therefore it may

not

not be improper to obferve, among the reafons which induced our Saviour to make the affertion now before us, the following might probably be the moft powerful and convincing; namely, that riches do naturally and of neceffity contribute to render men proud, idle, voluptuous, covetous, and irreligious; and as the gates of heaven were always fhut against fuch, it is impoffible that the rich can ever enter

into them.

Let us then firft examine, if it need an examination, whether the rich are proud. Surely we may venture to pronounce that man little fkilled in the genealogy of vice, who doth not know that affluence is the parent of oppreffion, and pride the daughter of profperity. When men are raised to a certain rank or degree of life, they are generally inclined to look upon their inferiors with contempt, and on their fellow creatures with infenfibility. One would indeed imagine, from the high looks of the proud, that they confidered the rest of mankind as a fpecies of beings infinitely beneath them, of powers and capacities by no means on a level with their own; that they had therefore an indifputable right to treat them accord. ingly. One would fuppofe that the faculties and abilities of the great extended with their fortunes; that beauty, ftature, wit, and wisdom, all the perfections, in fhort, of mind and body, never failed to increase in proportion to their abundance. It muft at the fame time be acknowledged, in extenuation of their insolence, that the opinion which the rich man entertains

of

of himself receives no fmall encouragement from a venal fawning world, who have meannefs enough to ftoop to the burthen, whilft they lament the weight of it. It is not that men judge partially of themselves, but that others alfo are apt to weigh them in this falfe fcale, and compliment them on this merely ideal fuperiority.

Paft difpute it is, that pride is the natural attendant on riches; and it is equally indifputable that nothing can fo effectually exclude us from the kingdom of God, as our frequent in. dulgence in it. He that exalteth himself, we are exprefsly told, fhall be abafed, and he only who humbleth himself fhall be exalted. Pride, we know, was the peculiar fin of fatan, and, all that rebellious crew who were the partakers of his crime, and of his punishment alfo: and it is highly probable that the fame vice which expelled angels out of heaven, should prevent men from entering into it.

But fecondly, That riches tend in a great meafure to render man not only proud, but idle and diffolute alfo, is a point too felf-evident to admit of any doubt or difpute concerning it, as we need but open our eyes to receive immediate conviction. Look round among thofe whom we falfely term the great, among those whom riches and honours have raised to a fuperior rank, how do they for the most part repay the benefits which they have received? how are their hours employed? what traces do they leave behind of their existence? do they contemplate the book of knowledge, open the volume of wisdom or tread in the pat h