Proverbs 20:14 It is naught, it is naught, said the buyer: but when he is gone his way, then he boasts. The inconsiderate thirst for cheapness is one of the social curses of our age. Here is a concise description of a bargain-driver. Say anything to depreciate the article, and get it at a lower price than is asked; then boast of your success. This may be sharp, but if it is not always sin, it is constantly on the very margin of vice. In buying cheap we may avail ourselves only of lawful advantages, and may not compass unrighteous or unfair gains. To get what a man wants, and to give as little as possible for it, need not be sinful. Lying is a sin in trade just as much as in common conversation. The inconsiderate craving for cheapness has a bad effect on the mind. It makes it grasping and selfish, greedy of its own gain, but careless of others' well-doing. It produces, if long indulged in, a spirit of low and unworthy cunning. Observe how the influence of this thirst for cheapness spreads. I have no words to express my contempt and abhorrence for the meanness which goes into a shop with the deliberate resolve to get the articles wanted for less than the price asked. Such questions are the very essence of religion. A religion that does not touch our every-day life, our money matters, our actions in and on society, is a religion that is on the surface merely. It is the undue severance of things secular from things sacred which makes so much of men's religion unreal, and so much of their business unrighteous, i.e., not carried out with a full sense of what is right from man to man. (J. E. Clarke, M. A.) Parallel Verses KJV: It is naught, it is naught, saith the buyer: but when he is gone his way, then he boasteth.WEB: "It's no good, it's no good," says the buyer; but when he is gone his way, then he boasts. |
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