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centre of industry, at some not very skilled form of employment. He is, of course, married, with, say, three children, thus making four persons in all dependent on him for a home, a supply of food, clothing, medical attendance, and holidays. Twenty shillings is the sum out of which his wife—he could not do it—has to provide all these.
A Christian is one who, inter alia, takes no thought for the morrow, and who does not lay up for himself treasures upon earth.
In the early days of Christianity asceticism was held to be a logical outcome of Christian belief. Dives was sent to Hades for apparently no other reason than that he was rich. Lazarus went straight to Abraham’s bosom because of his earthly poverty. James the Epistolian called upon the rich to weep and howl for the miseries awaiting them in the world to come. Christ sent out His disciples with empty purses, and Himself had not where to lay His head. The Sermon on the Mount is a consistent and powerful argument against property in every form. The Great Teacher understood clearly the difference between life and a mere struggle for existence. If men desired life they might have it in abundance, but only on the condition that they
ABANDONED THE WORSHIP OF MAMMON.
God the Father had so ordained that in response to labour the earth would yield freely enough and to spare for the supply of every human need, and if men would but follow the example of the flowers of the field and the birds of the air and hold all nature’s gifts in common, drawing from the great storehouse only what each required for the needs of the day, then life would become free, joyous, and beautiful.
