6. “Nay, I do not buy any at all myself: I only send my child or servant for it.” You receive it of them: Do you not? And the receiver is as bad as the thief.
7. “Why I would not meddle with it, but I am forced, by my parent, husband, or master.” If you are forced by your father or mother to rob, you will be hanged nevertheless. This may lessen, but does not take away the fault: for you ought to suffer rather than sin.
8. “But I do not know, that it was run.” No! Did not he that sold it, tell you it was? If he sold it under the common price, he did. The naming the price, was telling you, “This is run.”
9. “But I don’t know where to get tea which is not run.” I will tell you where to get it. You may have it from those whose tea is duly entered, and who make a conscience of it. But were it otherwise, if I could get no wine, but what I knew to be stolen, I would drink water: yea, though not only my health, but my life depended upon it: for it is better to die, than to live by thieving.
10. “But if I could get what has paid duty, I am not able to pay the price of it. And I can’t live without it.” I answer, 1. You can live without it, as well as your grandmother did. But 2. If you could not live without it, you ought to die, rather than steal. For death is a less evil than sin.
11. “But my husband will buy it, whether I do or no. And I must use what he provides, or have none.” Undoubtedly to have none is a less evil, than to be partaker with a thief.
IV. Upon the whole then, I exhort all of you that fear God, and desire to save your souls, without regarding what others do, resolve at all hazards, to keep yourselves pure. Let your eye be fixed on the word of God, not the examples of men. Our Lord says to every one of you, What is that to thee? Follow thou me! Let no convenience, no gain, no pleasure, no friend, draw you from following him. In spite of all the persuasions, all the reasonings of men, keep to the word of God. If all on the right-hand and the left will be knaves, be you an honest man. Probably God will repay you (he certainly will, if this be best for you) even with temporal blessings: there have not been wanting remarkable instances of this. But if not, he will repay you with what is far better: with the testimony of a good conscience towards God; with joy in the Holy Ghost; with an hope full of immortality; with the love of God shed abroad in your hearts. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus!
London,
January 30, 1767.