Religio Medici
, in which he describes his Charity in several Heroick Instances, and with a noble Heat of Sentiments, mentions that Verse in the Proverbs of
Solomon, He that giveth to the Poor, lendeth to the Lord
.
'[There] is more Rhetorick in that one Sentence, says he, than in a Library of Sermons; and indeed if those Sentences were understood by the Reader, with the same Emphasis as they are delivered by the Author, we needed not those Volumes of Instructions, but might be honest by an Epitome[5].'
Passage in Scripture is indeed wonderfully persuasive; but I think the same Thought is carried much further in the New Testament, where our Saviour tells us in a most pathetick manner, that he shall hereafter regard the Cloathing of the Naked, the Feeding of the Hungry, and the Visiting of the Imprisoned, as Offices done to himself, and reward them accordingly
. Pursuant to those Passages in Holy Scripture, I have somewhere met with the