Begin therefore ‘to-day,’—(which you may, in passing, note to be your present leader’s signal-word or watch-word),—to do good work for Him—whether you live or die,—(see first promise asked of you, Letter II., page 21, explained in Letter VII., page 19, etc.,)—and see that every stroke of this work—be it weak or strong, shall therefore be done in love of God and your neighbour, and in hatred of covetousness. Which that you may hate accurately, wisely, and well, it is needful that you should thoroughly know, when you see it, or feel it. What covetousness is, therefore, let me beg you at once clearly to understand, by meditating on these following definitions.
Avarice means the desire to collect money, not goods. A ‘miser’ or ‘miserable person’ desires to collect goods only for the sake of turning them into money. If you can read French or German, read Molière’s l’Avare, and then get Gotthelf’s ‘Bernese Stories,’ and read ‘Schnitzfritz,’ with great care.
Avarice is a quite natural passion, and, within due limits, healthy. The addition of coin to coin, and of cipher to cipher, is a quite proper pleasure of human life, under due rule; the two stories I ask you to read [[50]]are examples of its disease; which arises mainly in strong and stupid minds, when by evil fortune they have never been led to think or feel.
Frugality. The disposition to save or spare what we have got, without any desire to gain more. It is constantly, of course, associated with avarice; but quite as frequently with generosity, and is often merely an extreme degree of housewifely habit. Study the character of Alison Wilson in ‘Old Mortality.’
Covetousness. The desire of possessing more than we have, of any good thing whatsoever of which we have already enough for our uses, (adding house to house, and field to field). It is much connected with pride; but more with restlessness of mind and desire of novelty; much seen in children who tire of their toys and want new ones. The pleasure in having things ‘for one’s very own’ is a very subtle element in it. When I gave away my Loire series of Turner drawings to Oxford, I thought I was rational enough to enjoy them as much in the University gallery as in my own study. But not at all! I find I can’t bear to look at them in the gallery, because they are ‘mine’ no more.
Now, you observe, that your creed of St. George says you believe in the nobleness of human nature—that is to say, that all our natural instincts are honourable. Only it is not always easy to say which of them are natural and which not. [[51]]
For instance, Adam Smith says that it is ‘natural’ for every person to covet his neighbour’s goods, and want to change his own for them; wherein is the origin of Trade, and Universal Salvation.
But God says, ‘Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s goods;’ and God, who made you, does in that written law express to you His knowledge of your inner heart, and instruct you in the medicine for it. Therefore on due consideration, you will find assuredly it is quite unnatural in you to covet your neighbour’s goods.
Consider, first, of the most precious, the wife. It is natural for you to think your own the best and prettiest of women; not at all to want to change her for somebody else’s wife. If you like somebody else’s better than yours, and this somebody else likes yours better than his, and you both want to change, you are both in a non-natural condition, and entirely out of the sphere of happy human love.
Again. It is natural for you to think your own house and garden the nicest house and garden that ever were. If, as should always be, they were your father’s before you, and he and you have both taken proper care of them, they are a treasure to you which no money could buy,—the leaving them is always pain,—the return to them, a new thrill and wakening to life. They are a home and place of root to you, as if you were founded on the ground like its walls, or grew into it like its flowers. You would no more [[52]]willingly transplant yourself elsewhere than the espalier pear-tree of your own graffing would pull itself out by the roots to climb another trellis. That is the natural mind of a man. “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house.” You are in an entirely non-natural state if you do, and, properly speaking, never had a house in your life.