_Persons free from the necessities of labour and employments, are to consider themselves as devoted to GOD in a higher degree._
AS it has been proved in the foregoing chapter, that all professors of christianity, do lie under manifold obligations to live a life wholly devoted unto GOD; so those who have no _particular employment_, but have their time and fortune at their own disposal, are under still greater obligations of living wholly unto GOD in all their actions.
They are those, of whom “much will be required, because much is given unto them.”
A _slave_ can only live unto GOD in one particular way; that is, by religious patience and submission in his state of slavery; but all ways of holy living, all instances, and all kinds of virtue lie open to those, who are masters of themselves, of their time, and their fortune.
You are no _labourer_ or _tradesman_; you are neither _merchant_ nor _soldier_; should you not therefore consider yourself, as placed in a state, in some degree like that of good angels, who are sent into the world as ministring spirits, for the general good of mankind, to assist, protect, and minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?
Had you, _Serena_, been obliged by the necessities of life, to wash cloaths for your maintenance, or to wait upon some mistress, that demanded all your labour, it would then be your duty to serve and glorify GOD, by such humility, obedience, and faithfulness, as might adorn that state, and improve that one talent to its greatest height: but as GOD hath given you five talents; as he hath placed you above the necessities of life; as he hath left you in the hands of yourself, in the happy liberty of chusing the most exalted ways of religion; so it is now your duty and privilege to turn your five talents into five more; to set no bounds to your love and gratitude to the bountiful Author of so many blessings; and to consider how your time, leisure, health, and fortune, may be made so many happy means of improving your fellow-creatures in the ways of GOD, and of advancing yourself, through grace, at last to the greatest heights of eternal glory.
This, _Serena_, is indeed your profession: and the reason of this will appear very plain, if you would only consider, that your estate is as much the gift of GOD, as your eyes or hands; and is therefore no more to be buried or thrown away at pleasure, than you are to put out your eyes, or throw away your limbs as you please.
But besides these considerations, there are several other great and important reasons, why all christians in general, and such as I am now speaking of in particular, should be religiously exact in the use of their fortunes for the glory of GOD.
For the manner of using our money, and spending our estate, enters so far into the business of every day, that our common life must necessarily be much of the same nature as our common way of spending our estate. If we waste it, we do not waste a trifle, that signifies little; but we waste that which might be made as eyes to the blind, as a husband to the widow, as a father to the orphan; and which, if given in faith, and out of love to JESUS CHRIST, would greatly increase our reward in a future state. “Make to yourselves friends (says our Saviour) of the mammon of unrighteousness, that when you fail, they may receive you into everlasting habitations.” What still adds weight to these arguments, is this, if we waste our money, and do not improve our fortunes for the glory of GOD, and the good of our fellow-creatures, we are not only guilty of wasting a talent which GOD has given us, and making that useless which might be so powerful a means of doing good, but we turn this useful talent into a powerful means of corrupting ourselves. For so far as it is spent wrong, so far it is spent in the support of some wrong temper, in gratifying some vain and unreasonable desires, in conforming to those fashions, and that pride of the world, which as reasonable men and christians we are obliged to renounce. If therefore, you do not spend your money in doing good to others, you must spend it to the hurt of yourself. And you will act like a man that refuses to give that as a cordial to a sick friend, though he could not drink it himself, without not only inflaming, but corrupting his whole mass of blood.
It may be worth our while to pursue this thought a little further. For as we are now discoursing about people in the polite world, and of good fortunes, who we may suppose do not live in gross sins, but only in the indiscreet and dangerous use of things innocent and lawful in themselves, so it is more difficult to make such people at all sensible of the danger of such a life.