436 / 514
428
CHRISTIAN MORALITY,
VIZ.
JUSTICE,
&C.
[SERM. XXYJ,
and luxurious
expences
of
a
twelve
-
month, devour
and
swallow
up seven years
income, or the gain
of half
their
lives.
What
remains
then, when
their
own
substance
is
not
sufficient to
supply
their
vanity,
but
that
they
make
an
inroad upon
the
property
of
their neighbour
?
They,
run deep into debt,
with
the artificer and trader,
and
they
never concern
themselves
how
to
make payment.
The
workman has built them palaces, instead
of 'such
common
dwellings as
their character
requires,
and the
artificers of various kinds have furnished
out their bravery
of
apparel
or equipage
:
But the
unhappy creditors
are
ready
to
starve
in
tattered
raiment,
through
the oppres -,
sion
and injustice
of their
luxurious neighbour. And
when they make
a
modest demand
of
what
is
due
to
them, they
meet
with
nothing but a
frown or a
jest, and
the reproachful
names
of
saucy and
impertinent.
BOY,
"
woe
to
him
that
covets
an
evil
covetousness
to
his
house,
that
he may set
his
nest
on
high
;for
the stone
shall
cry out of
the
wall
against the oppressor
:
The
beam
out
of
the
timber
shall
answer
it,
and
shall
bear
witness
against
unrighteousness,
Hab.
ii..
9,
11.
This
is
the crying
guilt
of
many,
and very commonly
practised
in this city,
in
greater or
in
less
degrees; but
perhaps the 'profuse
wretch
pursues
a bolder
course
of
injustice, and betakes himself
to
robbery and
plunder;
He'
lies
at
watch
on
the
high-ways, he seizes
and
as,
saults
the
innocent
traveller, and deprives
him
of
his
wealth and
'every
thing valuable,
in
order
to
support
his
own wild
and extravagant
expences.
Luxury must
be
fed,
though
justice
be starved
;
and luxury must
be
clothed, though
justice
go
naked.
My hearers
perhaps-will
think
themselves
unconcerned
in
all,
this
story, and
take
no
share
of
the conviction
to
themselves, nor
do
I
know any
of
them
-to
whom
half
this charge belongs.
But let
it.be considered,
that
men
do
not
usually rise
W
this
degree
of
madness
all
at
once.
Uririghteousness has
several
steps
and
stages
in its
race
;
if
we-
indulge
our
.appetites, and spread our
tables,
or
form our
apparel. or our furniture but
a little
beyond
our
income,
if
we
once begin
to
admit
such
a
manner
of
life
and expence
as
exceeds
our
estate, in
order
to please
Our
own sensual
or
vein
inclinations, or
to
.onie