Luke 12:15 And he said to them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness… It is a vice that increases in those who harbour it, making them miserable and utterly mean. A very wealthy French banker, worth many hundred thousand francs, would not purchase for himself a little meat when he was almost dying for want of the nourishment. A Russian miser used to go about his house at night barking like a dog, to prevent robbers coming to get any of his great wealth, and because he would not be at the expense of keeping a dog. Are not covetous people punished as the dog in the fable was, which, in snatching at the shadow in the water, lost the meat he had in his mouth? or as Tantalus was, of whom the ancients said he was up to the neck and surrounded with all good things, but he could never get or enjoy one of them? Covetous persons are also like the old man of whom Bunyan tells, who spent his life in raking together dirt, straw, and worthless things; whilst he never heeded the immortal crown an angel offered him. Rowland Hill said, "Covetous persons should be hung up by their heels, that all their money might fall from their pockets, for it would do them good to lose it, and others good to get it." (Henry R. Burton.) Parallel Verses KJV: And he said unto them, Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth. |
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