Fifty Godly and Learned Sermons (The Decades)

For the proper owning and possessing ¹of goods is not by this precept prohibited, but we are forbidden to get them unjustly, to possess them unlawfully, and to spend them wickedly: yea by this commandment the proper owning of peculiar substance is lawfully ordained, & firmly established.

For the proper owning and possessing ¹of goods is not by this precept prohibited, but wée are forbidden to gett them vniustly, to possesse them vnlawfully, and to spend them wickedly: yea by this commaundement the proper owning of peculiar substance is lawfully ordeined, & firmely established.

1. 1Of the proper owning of substance.Of the proper ownning of substance.

The Lord forbiddeth theft, therefore he ordaineth & confirmeth the proper owning of worldly riches. For what canst thou steal, if all things be common to all men? For thou hast stolen thine own, and not another mans, if thou takest from an other that which he hath. But God forbiddeth theft, and therefore by the making of this law, he confirmeth the proper possession of peculiar goods. But because there is no small number of that furious sect of Anabaptists, which deny this propriety of several possessions, I will by some evident testimonies of Scripture, declare that it is both allowed and ratified of old. Of Abraham, who in the Scripture is called the father of faith, Eliezer his servant saith: God hath blessed my master marvellously, that he is become great, & hath given him sheep and Oxen, silver and gold, men servants and maid servants, camels and asses: and to his son hath he given all that he hath. Lo then Abraham was wealthy, & did possess by the right of propriety all those things which God had given him: and he left them all by the title of inheritance, as peculiar and proper goods unto his son Isaac. Isaac therefore and Jacob possessed their own and proper goods. Moreover God by the hand of Moses brought the Israelites his people into the land of promise, the grounds whereof he did by lot divide unto the tribes of Joshua his servant, appointing to every one a particular portion to possess: and did by laws provide that those inheritances should not be mingled and confounded together. In Solomon and the Prophets there are very many precepts and sentences tending to this purpose. But I know very well that these troublesome wranglers do make this objection and say: That Christian men are not bound to these proofs, that are fetched out of the old Testament. And although I could confute that objection, and prove that those places of the old Testament, do in this case bind us to mark and follow them, yet will I rather for shortness sake allege some proofs out of the Scriptures of the new testament to stop their mouths withal. Our Lord Jesus Christ doth greatly commend in his disciples the works of mercy, which do consist in feeding the hungry, in giving drink to the thirsty, in clothing the naked, in visiting prisoners, and those that be sick, and in harbouring strangers and banished men.