1. It is very natural to all men, yea, impossible almost to be free from it. Consider man as degenerate, and in that corrupted estate in which he is, as fallen from God as his chief good and last end, and so he is an idolater, and makes the creature his god, or sticketh too much to it, more especially to wealth. Wealth is the great instrument of commerce ; it cannot be denied to have a power and influence upon human affairs : Eccles. x. 19, ' Money answereth all things.' It can do much in this lower world, and saveth us out of many dangers : Prov. xiii. 8, ' The ransom of a man's life are his riches.' It hath its use in this world as a means in God's hands to sustain and preserve life. But what more common than for a man to look to the subordinate means, and neglect altogether the first cause. As children will thank the tailor, and think they owe their new clothes to his provision rather than to their parents' bounty, so we look to the next hand, and set up that instead of God. Eich and poor cannot be exempted from this sin. (1.) The poor, and those that have not wealth ; they idolise it in fancy and conceit, that if they had estates this would make them happy and glorious ; and because they have not, they trust in those which have, which is idolatry upon idolatry. See Ps. Ixii. 9, ' Surely men of low degree are vanity, and men of high degree are a lie.' To appearance men of low degree are nothing and can do nothing towards our relief, and so are vanity ; but men of high degree, they are a lie, because they disappoint those that trust in them, to the wrong of God. Alas ! they have neither power to help nor hurt, if the Lord will not : 2 Kings vi. 27, ' If the Lord do not help thee, whence shall I help thee ? ' And there- fore we need not fear the hazard of their frowns nor of their displeasure ; we need not with such restlessness court their favour and trust in them that have wealth. (2.) But chiefly this is incident to worldly great men, to trust in what they have ; their minds are secretl}^ enchanted by their estates when they are increased to them. Still the distemper grows with the increase of worldly accommodations : Ps. Ixii. 10, ' Trust not in
VeR. 24.] SERMONS UPON MARK X. 17-27. 39
oppression, and become not vain in robbery : if riclies increase, set not your heart npon them.' As soon as we begin to have anything about us, from thence forward we date our happiness and security. Many that in want despise wealth, and live in an actual dependence upon God's providence, as soon as they have somewhat in the creature, they begin to value themselves at a higher rate, as if they could live alone without God, and their hearts are altogether for increasing their store, or keeping and retaining what they have already gotten.
2. It is a very secret sin, and found in those that are least sensible of it. We seldom or never mistrust ourselves of this confidence, which is so natural and so common ; and why ? Because we have too gross a notion of this sin of trusting in riches. A man doth not think he makes money his idol if he do not pray to it, or otfer sacrifice to it, or adore it with outward ceremonies, as the heathens did their idols of gold and silver ; whereas this sin is to be determined no)i exhihitione. ceremoniarum, sed ohlatione concupiscentiarum, not by the formal rights of worship, but by the secret workings of the heart towards it. Though we do not actually say to the fine gold, Thou art my confi- dence, or use such gross language to riches as, Ye shall deliver me, or I will put my trust in you, yet secretly we idolise it, and set it up in the place of God. It would have been a sorry vindication of Job's innocency to deny that ; few hypocrites say so in open language, but our hearts say so though we perceive it not. There is nothing so close and secret in the bosom of man as his trust. But the heart hath a tongue as well as the mouth, and thoughts are called the sayings of the heart. Yea, divines usually observe that there are two sorts of thoughts, implicit as well as explicit. The scripture calls them inward thoughts : Ps. xlix. 11, ' Their inward thouirht is that their house shall continue for ever.' This is the interpretation of our actions when we do not make God our portion^ but trust in the abundance of our riches; this is our inward thought, the saying of our heart, Ye are my God ; we do in effect say. Thou art my confidence, my hope, and my joy, and will stand by me when all things cease and tali, and wilt not suffer me to want or to be wronged as long as thou lastest ; these are the secret speeches of our hearts. Christians, many may, orator-like, declaim against the vanity of the creature, and speak as basely of money as others do, and say, We know it is but a little refined earth, but their hearts close with it, they are loath to part with it for God's sake or upon God's declared will. As he that speaketh good words of God is not said to trust in God, so speaking bad words of worldly riches doth not exempt us from trusting in them. There is a difference between declaiming as an orator, and acting like a christian ; well, then, it is a common but secret sin.