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My brethren, if the busy stir and activity around us were for a subsistence, it would not be necessary that a preacher should select such a text as this; nor, indeed, would the Saviour have uttered this parable. But, in fact, a very small part of this hum and bustle, this hustling and jostling, is fur a competency. It is the absorbing love of money, it is the insane lust of accumulation, above all — in this country, where everybody is crying out "equality!" and everybody dreading nothing so much as equality — it is the eager strife of social rivalry which is driving on the machinery, and keeping in an eternal whirl all this restless and articulate vitality.

I. "So is HE"; SO INSANE. The conduct marked here is not simply folly; the word translated "fool," means madman. The case is one of real insanity; the man before us is a confirmed moral lunatic; and if he be not in an asylum, it is simply because the people around him are as infatuated and deranged as himself. The insanity in the text is neither the desire to have nor to enjoy wealth, but it is the absorbing possession of the mind by a single engrossing passion which monopolizes every thought, and shuts out other objects, even the most noble and important. Here are some of the symptoms of this man's insanity.

1. He forgets that he is immortal — that he has eternal interests to secure.

2. He does not consider the brevity and uncertainty of human life.

3. A third and still more glaring proof of "madness in the heart" of this rich man, is the material estimate, the purely money value, which he puts upon everything, even upon his soul.

4. So mad upon his idol is this man, that he not only misinterprets his own nature, but entirely forgets that there is a God to whom he is accountable. "So is he that layeth up treasure for himself"; treasure for himself. All the aims and purposes of this owner of broad lands centre in himself, nor need we go far to find the original of this portrait. Select any one of the busy throng you see in the world (I had almost said, I blush to own it, in the church); observe his conduct, penetrate his bosom, what are all his thoughts and wishes but a constant repetition of these words, myself, myself? In losing sight of God and his soul, this monomaniac has lost sight of the purpose and end of life, he has missed entirely the object of his creation. What, indeed, is the happiness he promises himself? It is indolence, feasting, mirth, riotous living. "Take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry" — this is all he proposes, all his wealth can secure. And is this all for which he was created? Is man made in the image of God, that he may "take his ease, eat, drink, and be merry"? Is it for this that he is ennobled with those glorious gifts which place him only a "little lower than the angels"? Is this the happiness for which God has formed such a being? Not only his enjoyment. His work, his employment, his ambition, what are these? "I will pull down my barns and build greater." His hands can find nothing more important to do, his intellect nothing more noble to design, his heart nothing more worthy of its loftiest aspirations.

II. But the folly and madness of this rich man are not the only things which the parable illustrates. His disquietude and trouble are also most strikingly portrayed. So IS HE; SO RESTLESS AND UNHAPPY. This is our next topic. "What shall I do?" cries this rich man, and why? What is the matter? What aileth him? "What shall I do, because I have no room to bestow my fruits? .... What shall I do?" Well, and what will he do? He is rich, he is prosperous, he "has more than heart could wish," and his great concern is to know what it is best for him to do. Let us now see what his determination is. What he ought to do is plain; he ought to be grateful to God; he ought not to "trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God"; he ought to abound in deeds of charity" that they do good, that they be rich in good works, ready to distribute"; he ought to watch and pray lest riches prove a fatal snare, lest, like another rich man, he have "his good things in his lifetime;" he ought to tremble as he thinks "how hardly shall a rich man enter the kingdom of God"; in fine, he ought to be "laying up in store for himself a good foundation against the time to come, that he may lay hold on eternal life" — making to himself "friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, that when he dies they may receive him into everlasting habitations." This is what this man ought to do, this is what the Bible charges the rich to do, but the rich seldom consult the Bible on this or any other duty. The Bible apart, however, ought not common sense to instruct the rich? ought not reason to cure a sane man of this restlessness and anxiety? On a certain day, says the historian, Pyrrhus the king, elated by victory, was detailing to Cineas, his prime minister, all his projected triumphs. "I will next conquer Sicily." "What then?" "Then I will subdue Africa." "What then?" "Then I will make myself master of Spain." "And what then?" "Why then," said the monarch, "we can take our ease and be happy." "And why," replied Cineas, "why cannot we do that now?" So with this rich man; what happiness can wealth purchase, which he may not enjoy now? But the admonitions of reason have as little influence as those of conscience upon a man whose heart is debased by covetousness. Look where we will, we see this truth, that men are more intent on possessing than enjoying; and when the desire to accumulate becomes the ruling passion, rest, contentment, all real happiness, are sacrificed to this monopolizing vice. Everybody tells you, indeed, that he wants only a competency; but by a competency, everybody means a little more than he happens to have at present. A few have too much, many too little, but nobody was ever yet found who had just enough.

III. The last admonition which the Saviour designs to convey in this parable has reference to THE FEARFUL PERILS TO WHICH WEALTH EXPOSES THE SOUL. Danger from the absorbing influence over the heart; "where your treasure is, there will your heart be also"; the prodigal is soon disgusted with sensual pleasures, but the love of money only becomes more deeply rooted and engrossing as other passions are destroyed by age; it is quickened and invigorated by their ashes. Danger from the insuperable obstacles to conversion; "he went away sorrowful, for he had great possessions" — strange cause for sorrow, but never sorrow more reasonable. Danger, because, with the possession of wealth, pride is almost invariably insinuated into the heart; "Charge them that are rich in this world that they be not high-minded"; where can we look without seeing men, once poor and humble, and bidding fair for heaven, but now rich, inflated with self-importance, filled with ambitious thoughts for themselves and their families; an ambition which changes not only their style of living, but their style of worshipping God — changed their Church, changes their preacher, changes their creed; Mammon making a revelation, in the light of which truth is seen to be falsehood, and falsehood truth; and thus Christ, and faith, and salvation are immolated to pamper a contemptible vanity? Danger from that utter selfishness which increasing wealth fosters; "layeth up treasure for himself," is elated with a feeling of independence; cares nothing for others; is occupied only with his own ease, and pleasure, and aggrandizement.

(Richard Fuller, D. D.)

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KJV: And he spake a parable unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully:

WEB: He spoke a parable to them, saying, "The ground of a certain rich man brought forth abundantly.