II. 1. Having gained all you can, by honest wisdom, and unwearied diligence, the second rule of Christian prudence is, Save all you can. Do not throw the precious talent into the sea: leave that folly to Heathen philosophers. Do not throw it away in idle expences, which is just the same as throwing it into the sea. Expend no part of it merely to gratify the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eye, or the pride of life.
2. Do not waste any part of so precious a talent, merely in gratifying the desires of the flesh; in procuring the pleasures of sense of whatever kind; particularly, in enlarging the pleasure of tasting. I do not mean, avoid gluttony and drunkenness only: an honest Heathen would condemn these. But there is a regular, reputable, kind of sensuality, an elegant epicurism, which does not immediately disorder the stomach, nor (sensibly at least) impair the understanding. And yet (to mention no other effects of it now) it cannot be maintained without considerable expence. Cut off all this expence: despise delicacy and variety, and be content with what plain nature requires.
3. Do not waste any part of so precious a talent, merely in gratifying the desire of the eye, by superfluous or expensive apparel, or by needless ornaments. Waste no part of it in curiously adorning your houses, in superfluous or expensive furniture: in costly pictures, painting, gilding, books: in elegant (rather than useful) gardens. Let your neighbours, who know nothing better, do this: Let the dead bury their dead. But what is that to thee, says our Lord? Follow thou me. Are you willing? Then you are able so to do.
4. Lay out nothing to gratify the pride of life, to gain the admiration or praise of men. This motive of expence is frequently interwoven with one or both of the former. Men are expensive in diet, or apparel or furniture, not barely to please their appetite, or to gratify their eye, their imagination, but their vanity too. So long as thou dost well unto thyself, men will speak good of thee. So long as thou art cloathed in purple and fine linen, and farest sumptuously every day, no doubt many will applaud thy elegance of taste, thy generosity and hospitality. But do not buy their applause so dear. Rather be content with the honour that cometh from God.
5. Who would expend any thing in gratifying these desires, if he considered, that to gratify them is to increase them? Nothing can be more certain than this: daily experience shews, the more they are indulged, they increase the more. Whenever therefore you expend any thing to please your taste or other senses, you pay so much for sensuality. When you lay out money to please your eye, you give so much for an increase of curiosity, for a stronger attachment to these pleasures, which perish in the using. While you are purchasing any thing which men use to applaud, you are purchasing more vanity. Had you not then enough of vanity, sensuality, curiosity before? Was there need of any addition? And would you pay for it too? What manner of wisdom is this? Would not the literally throwing your money into the sea, be a less mischievous folly?
6. *And why should you throw away money upon your children, any more than upon yourself, in delicate food, in gay or costly apparel, in superfluities of any kind? Why should you purchase for them, more pride or lust, more vanity, or foolish and hurtful desires? They do not want any more: they have enough already: nature has made ample provision for them. Why should you be at farther expence, to increase their temptations and snares, and to pierce them thro’ with more sorrows?
7. *Do not leave it to them, to throw away. If you have good reason to believe, they would waste what is now in your possession, in gratifying and thereby increasing, the desire of the flesh, the desire of the eye, or the pride of life; at the peril of theirs and your own soul, do not set these traps in their way. Do not offer your sons or your daughters unto Belial, any more than unto Moloch. Have pity upon them and remove out of their way, what you may easily foresee, would increase their sins, and consequently plunge them deeper into everlasting perdition. How amazing then is the infatuation of those parents, who think they can never leave their children enough? What! cannot you leave them enough of arrows, fire-brands, and death? Not enough of foolish and hurtful desires? Not enough of pride, lust, ambition, vanity? Not enough of everlasting burnings! Poor wretch! Thou fearest [♦]where no fear is. Surely both thou and they, when ye are lifting up your eyes in hell, will have enough both of the worm that never dieth, and of the fire that never shall be quenched.
[♦] ‘were’ replaced with ‘where’
8. *“What then would you do, if you was in my case? If you had a considerable fortune to leave?” Whether I would do it, or no, I know what I ought to do: this will admit of no reasonable question. If I had one child, elder or younger, who knew the value of money, one who I believed would put it to the true use, I should think it my absolute, indispensable duty, to leave that child the bulk of my fortune; and to the rest just so much as would enable them to live in the manner they had been accustomed to do. “But what if all your children were equally ignorant of the true use of money?” I ought then (hard saying, who can hear it?) to give each what would keep him above want: and to bestow all the rest in such a manner as I judged would be most for the glory of God.
III. 1. But let not any man imagine, that he has done any thing, barely by going thus far, by gaining and saving all he can, if he were to stop here. All this is nothing, if a man go not forward, if he does not point all this at a farther end. Nor indeed can a man properly be said, to save any thing, if he only lays it up. You may as well throw your money into the sea, as bury it in the earth. And you may as well bury it in the earth, as in your chest, or in the Bank of England. Not to use, is effectually to throw it away. If therefore you would indeed make yourselves friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, add the third rule to the two preceding. Having first gained all you can, and secondly saved all you can, then give all you can.