replying, Do you desire nothing else ? No, saith he, all things are in BasiXijcuc, in this one word, like a king; so all things are in this one word, ' The Lord is my portion.' He that hath God for his portion, hath all things, because God is all things ; he is a good that contains all good in himself. All the good that is to be found in honours, in riches, in pleasures, in preferments, in husband, in wife, in children, in friends, &c., is to be found only and eminently in God. You have all in that great God that is the saints' great all. Col. iii. 11. But,
(11.) Eleventhly, If God be the saint's portion, and such a portion as I have at large discovered him to be, then certainly God is no injurious poiiion, no mischievous pooiion, no huftful portion, nx) prejudicial portion. Surely there can be no danger, no hazard, no hurt in having God for a man's portion. Oh ! but oftentimes earthly portions do a great deal of hurt, a great deal of mischief ; they ruin men's bodies, they blast and blot men's names, and they lay men open to such sins, and snares, and temptations, that for ever undoes their immortal souls. Oh what a trappan^ are worldly portions to most men ! yea, what fuel are they to corruption ! and how often do they lay persons open to de- struction ! Eccles. V. 13, ' There is a sore evil which I have seen under the sun, namely, riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt.' Though riches in themselves are God's blessings, yet through the cor- ruptions that are in men's hearts, they prove weapons of wickedness and engines to evil * There is a sore evil,' the Septuagint reads it, in- firmitas pessiTna, a sore disease ; Pagnin and Arias Montanus reads it mala injirmitas, an evil disease ; others read it languor 'pessimus, a sore weakness. The Hebrew word, cholah, signifies such a sore evil as sticks close and is not easily removed ; they are kept a thousand thou- sand ways for their hurt. Latimer, in a sermon before king Edward the Sixth, tells a story of a rich man, that when he lay upon his sick bed, some told him that came to visit him, that by all they were able to discern he was a dead man ; he was no man for this world. As soon as ever he heard these words, saith Latimer, What, must I die ? said the sick man : send for a physician ; wounds, sides, heart, must I die, and leave these riches behind me ? wounds, sides, heart, must I die, and leave these things behind me ? and nothing else could be got from him but wounds, heart, sides, must I die, and leave these riches behind me ? Do you think, sirs, that riches were not kept for this man's hurt? With- out a perad venture in this man's heart was writ ' the god of this pre- sent world.'
And the same father Latimer elsewhere saith, that if he had an enemy to whom it was lawful to wish evil, he would chiefly wish him great store of riches, for then he should never enjoy any quiet. As I have read of one Pheraulas,'^ a poor man, on whom king Cyrus be- stowed so much that he knew not what to do with his riches ; being wearied out with care in keeping of them, he desired to live quietly, though poor, as he had done before, than to possess all those riches with discontent ; therefore he gave away all his wealth, desiring only to en- joy so much as might relieve his necessities, and give him a quiet pos- session of himself
Queen Mary said, when she was dying, that if they should open her • ^repan,' = snare. — G. * Xenophon, Cyrop. ii. 3, sec. 6, 7, and viii. 8.— G.
68 AN ARK FOB ALL GOD's NOAHS. [LAM. III. 24.
when she was dead, they should find Calice ' lying at ihe bottom of her heart, implying that the loss of it broke her heart.
The historian observes that the riches of Cyprus invited the Romans to hazard many dangerous fights for the conquering of it.
When the Indians had taken some of the Spaniards, who made gold their god, they filled their mouths with it, and so choked them ; they melted their gold, and poured it down their throats, resolving that they should have their fill of gold, who preferred gold before the lives and souls of men.^ How many millions of bodies and souls have the Spaniards destroyed, to possess themselves of the riches of the WevSt Indies ! But let me a little further shew you how hurtful, how danger- ous and pernicious earthly riches, earthly portions, are oftentimes to their owners ; and this I shall do by a brief induction of these par- ticulars.
[1.] First, RieJies encourage and advantage persons to make the strongest and the stoutest opposition agaitist anything that is good} Rich persons usually are the greatest opposers both of religion and of religious persons : James ii. 6, 7, ' But ye have despised the poor. Do not rich men oppress you, and draw you before the judgment-seats ? Do not they blaspheme that worthy name by which ye are called V And this you may see also in the rich citizens of Jerusalem, and in king Herod ; and the very same spirit you may run and read in the scribes and pharisees, who were the rich and the great men of the times, and the very same opposing spirit lives and works strongly in the hearts of many great ones this day. But,
[2.] Secondly, Earthly portions do estrange the heart from God ; as you see in the prodigal, Luke i. 5, and in those wealthy monsters that say unto God, ' Depart from us, for we desire not the knowledge of thy ways ; what is the Almighty, that we should serve him 1 and what profit should we have, if we pray unto him ?' Job xxi. 13-15. But,
[3.] Thirdly, As earthly portions do estrange the soul from God; so they do often swell the soul, and puff up the soul, Ps. x. 1-7, &c. Salvian counts pride the rich man's inheritance. Men's minds ebb and flow with their means, their blood commonly rises with their outward good. Pride, saith Bernard, is the rich man's cousin, it blows him up like a bladder with a quill, it makes him grow secure, and so prepares him for sudden i-uin : so that he may well sing his part with those sad souls, 'What hath pride profited us ? or what profit hath the pomp of riches broijght us ? All those things are passed away like as a shadow, and as a post that passeth by,' Wisd. v. 8, 9. But,
[4.] Fourthly, Eartldy ricftes commonly cast men into a deep sleep of security.* Thus they served David in that Ps. xxx. 6, 7, and thus they served the fool in the Gospel, Luke xii. 16-22, and thus they served the old world ; and so they did Sodom and Gomorrah afterwards, and so they did the two kings of Midian, Zebah and Zalmunna, and their hosts, Judges viii. 11, 12, and so did the people of Laish, in that
' 'Calaia.' — G. 2 Done to Crassus. See Index, «/i nowitne. — G.
• Not only the history of the ten persecutions, but also all other histories do very strongly evince this.
* Amos i. 12-14 ; ponder the words.
Lam. III. 24.] an ark for all god's noahs, 69