CHAPTER XIV. THE PROFESSOR IN PROSPERITY. "I KNOW how to abound."-Phil. iv. 12. The Apostle claims for himself in these words, one of the most rare and difficult attainments ever made in this world of imperfection and probation; I mean the right use of prosperity. How few are his imitators! Prosperity is a comparative term, and signifies an improved or an improving state of our temporal affairs; in its most emphatic sense it imports a considerable improvement, a great elevation in our affairs, or a rapid accumulation of wealth: some employ the term as denoting any advancement, whether it be in the humbler or more exalted stations of life. A workman or servant is in prosperity whose wages are doubled; a female is in prosperity who is raised by marriage, from a lower to a higher grade of society; the small tradesman is in prosperity who is delivered from the difficulties he once experienced, and is enabled to provide, though it be only a competency, for his family. Still it is usually expressive of a somewhat higher state of things than this, and as indicating a thriving trade, or the possession of considerable property. This of A professor is to let his light shine before men. course extends to every situation in which he is placed. It is to be an ever shining light; a radiance that is every where to attend him; it must illumine the gloom of his poverty, and add even to the splendour of his prosperity. Like the sun, his own appropriated emblem, he should shine the brighter the higher he rises. Prosperity is a gift granted him, that he may glorify God; a golden talent, to be carried with deep humility and gratitude to the foot of the cross, and consecrated to Him who bought him with his precious blood. It widens the sphere of his opportunity to honour God, a sphere which he should be anxious to fill with a hallowed influence to the very circumference. There are four virtues especially necessary in a state of prosperity. Of these, the first is gratitude. A thankless prosperity is an unnatural and an unholy state. Such a man's heart is hard as the rock, and barren as the sand; continually receiving the rays of the sun, and the riches of the clouds, but returning nothing. A Christian must not only be remote in his own feelings from that atheistic state of mind, which traces up all to lucky accidents and fortunate turns, but he must take care to acknowledge God before men, as the sole author of his success. His whole frame and deportment, must be a devout confession of God. It must be seen that he ascribes all he has, not to his own skill, sagacity, or industry, but to the blessing of the Most High. "By the grace of God I am what I am," must be his declaration. On every favour he should inscribe the name of God as the giver, just as we write the name of our friends on their gifts. God should not only be acknowledged, but praised for prosperity. It is a blessing, unless by our abuse of it we turn it into a curse; and is spoken of as such throughout the word of God. God has not confounded the distinction between plenty and want, nor required us to do so. It is indeed a mercy, and should be received as such, to be released from privation, and care, and necessity. The man who talks of poverty as a good in itself, speaks alike against reason and against revelation; it may be over-ruled for good, and often is, but in itself it is an evil. A cause of thankfulness it certainly is, to have the comforts of this life; and prosperity, both as a means of enjoyment and usefulness, demands our gratitude. Were all our temporal mercies employed as they ought to be, as means of proving to us the enormity of our sins, as fuel to feed the flame of our love, as mirrors in which to see the goodness of Jehovah, as ties to bind our hearts to his service, and as instruments to promote his cause in the world, prosperity would indeed be felt to be a blessing, and would send us to God with the language of the Psalmist, and with his emotions too, "Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me, bless his holy name. Bless the Lord, O the pros my soul, and forget not all his benefits." WATCHFULNESS is the next duty incumbent upon perous professor, for prosperity is a state of danger. This has been confessed by all, and experienced by multitudes. It is the most trite and hackneyed of all themes, on which moralists as well as divines have equally descanted. In what vivid colours does ASAPH pourtray this subject in the 73d Psalm. How often are we in effect told that the prosperity of fools shall slay them. How affectingly is this expressed in the prayer of AGUR.-Prov. xxx. 4--6. In what alarming terms is it thundered forth in the words of Christ; "How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God. Verily, verily, I say unto you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God:" and the fearful sentiment is echoed by the Apostle, "They that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition; for the love of money is the root of all evil, which, while some have coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows."-1 Tim. vi. 9, 10, I seem in reading such language almost to question the truth of what I have before written, and to doubt whether prosperity is really good; at any rate it must be allowed to be a dangerous good, and we have seen numerous and melancholy instances and proofs of the danger. How rarely does it happen that persons are not injured by it; how still more rarely that they are the better for it; so rarely indeed that an individual who passes through the trial unhurt, is admired as a striking proof of the riches of divine grace; while he that is really improved by it, is wondered at and talked of as a religious marvel. But, oh! the myriads of the martyrs of an improved condition! What multitudes as they ascended from the humble vale of poverty, and emerged from the thorny and sequestered glens which it contained, into the sunny spots and higher grounds of wealth or easy competence, have lost their religion as they gradually rose, till by the time they had reached the summit, it was all gone; and they who in the valley looked habitually up to heaven, as soon as they were upon the flowery mount, looked exclusively at the earthly prospect below them. Some have become heretical in opinion, others have sunk into confirmed and unrestrained worldly-mindedness, while not a few have plunged into actual and notorious immorality. In the far greater number of instances, however, it has not gone to this length, but only produced a lukewarmness, which, without impairing the moral character, has destroyed the spiritual one, by leaving nothing of godliness but the form. The danger of prosperity arises from two causes. 1. Its tendency to repress some of the dispositions in which real religion consists. There is little room in such a state for sub⚫ mission to the will of God, for faith, and trust, and hope, in reference to providential arrangements and temporal affairs. Not that prosperity excludes all room for these virtues, but still it must be admitted there is not the same opportunity or call for them as in a state of adversity. And these, be it recollected, are some of the higher elements and more vigorous exercises of true piety. It is true that as regards spiritual things, there is as much opportunity, necessity, and call for faith and hope in the one state as in the other; but as for that daily exercise of patient submission to present privations; that equally constant trust in Providence for future supplies; and that steadfast faith in the promise of ultimate good from seeming evil, which the afflicted and necessitous are called to attempt, the prosperous know little of these things. Their religion is apt to become not only enfeebled, but diseased for want of these more athletic and healthy exertions; just as the sons of affluence, who feed on luxury, who are clad in purple and fine linen, and sleep on down, are puny and effeminate compared with the weather-beaten mariner, or the hardy mountaineer. Great caution, much watchfulness, and earnest prayer are necessary, to guard against this danger. It requires much grace indeed to rise upon the wings of faith, and soar above the enchanting scene of things temporal into the region of things eternal, when the former spread out their variegated beauties, amidst the glowing sunshine of prosperity; and with all that is gratifying in present possessions, to yield our hearts to the impulses of hope, and travel onward to the unseen and comparatively unknown future. 2. But the danger of prosperity arises from its tendency to generate and foster some of the evils to which Christianity is directly opposed. Numerous are the weeds, which, though apparently killed by the frosts, and buried under the snows of winter, obtain a resurrection and a vigorous life by the summer's sun; numerous the noxious and disgusting reptiles and vermin that come forth from their holes when the season of storm is over, to breed and bask in the warmth of the solar beams. Prosperity is that to the imperfections and corrup |