Eighteenth Argument.
the last,—for discontent and wrong desires are still indulged in his selfish and worldly heart. How unfortunate, therefore, is his appeal to the commandments, by which his secret enmity to the law, government, and nature of God, is brought to the clearest light!
EIGHTEENTH ARGUMENT.
But as the heartfelt love of God is supposed to be downright enthusiasm by some moralists, who, dashing in pieces the first table of the law against the second, pretend that our duty to God consists in the love of our neighbour, let us examine the unconverted man’s charity, and see whether he bears more love to his fellow creatures than to his Creator.
Nothing can be more erroneous than his notions of charity. He confounds it with the bare “giving of alms;” not considering that it is possible to do this kind of good from the most selfish and uncharitable motives. Therefore when the fear of being accounted covetous, the desire of passing for generous, the vanity of seeing his name in a list of noble subscribers, the shame of being outdone by his equals, the teazing importunity of an obstinate beggar, the moving address of a solicitor whom he would blush to deny, or the Pharisaic notion of making amends for his sins, and purchasing heaven by his alms;—when any, I say, of these sinister motives sets him upon assisting industrious poverty, relieving friendless old age, or supporting infirm and mutilated indigence, he fancies that he gives an indubitable proof of his charity.
Sometimes, too, he affixes to that word the idea of a fond hope that every body is going to heaven. For if you intimate that the rich voluptuary is not with Lazarus in Abraham’s bosom, and that the foolish virgins are not promiscuously admitted to glory with the wise, he wonders at “your uncharitableness, and thanks God he never entertained such unchristian thoughts of his neighbours.”
He considers not that charity is the fair offspring of the “love of God,” to which he is yet an utter stranger; and that it consists in a universal, disinterested benevolence to all mankind, our worst enemies not excepted; a benevolence that sweetly evidences itself by bearing with patience the evil which they do to us, and kindly doing them all the good we possibly can, both with respect to their soul and body, their property and reputation. If this is a just definition of charity, the unrenewed man has not even the outside of it. To prove it, I might appeal to his impatience and ill humour: his unkind words and cutting railleries, (for I suppose him too moral ever to slander or curse any one.) I might mention his supercilious behaviour to some, who are entitled to his affability as men, countrymen, and neighbours: I might expatiate on his readiness to exculpate, enrich, or aggrandize himself at the expense of others, whenever he can do it without exposing himself.
But, waiving all these particulars, I ask, Whom does he truly love? You answer, “Doubtless the person to whom he makes daily protestations of the warmest regard.” But how does he prove this regard? Why, perhaps by the most artful insinuations and dangerous attempts to rob her of her virtue. Perhaps he has already gained his end. Unhappy Magdalene! How much better would it have been for thee to have fallen into the hands of a highwayman! Thou wouldst only have lost thy money, but now thou art despoiled of the honour of thy sex, and the peace of thy mind; thou art robbed at once of virgin innocence, a fair reputation, and possibly a healthy constitution. If this is a specimen of the unconverted man’s love, what must be his hatred?
But I happily mistake: “he is no libertine, he has a virtuous wife and amiable children, and he loves them,” say you, “with the tenderest affection.” I reply, that these relations, being immortal spirits, confined for a few years in a tenement of clay, and continually on the remove for eternity; his laudable regard for their frail bodies, and proper care of their temporal prosperity, are not a sufficient proof that he loves them in a right manner; for even according to wise heathens,f33 our soul is our better part, our true self. And what tender concern does the unrenewed man feel for the soul of his bosom friend? Does he regard it more than the body of his groom, or the life of his horse? Does he, with any degree of importunity, carry it daily in the arms of love and prayer, to the throne of grace for life and salvation? Does he, by good instructions and a virtuous example, excite his children to secure an eternal inheritance? And is he at least as desirous to see them wise and pious, as well bred, rich, handsome, and great? Alas! I fear it is just the reverse. He is probably the first to poison their tender minds with some of the dangerous maxims that vanity and ambition have invented; and, supposing he has a favourite dog, it is well if he is not more anxious for the preservation of that one domestic animal, than for the salvation of all their souls.