A51840:414
A fourth volume containing one hundred and fifty sermons on several texts of Scripture…
A fourth volume containing one hundred and fifty sermons on several texts of Scripture in two parts : part the first containing LXXIV sermons : part the second containing LXXVI sermons : with an alphabetical table to the whole / by ... Thomas Manton ...
London: printed by J. D., 1693
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
1. When they waste their Estates. You may not do with your Estates as you please; you are Stewards, and are to be accountable to God at the last Day for every Penny. Why should a Prodigal have a greater Liberty and Dominion over his Estate, than a covetous Man? I will tell you for what reason I speak it; Prodigals that waste their Substance with riotous Living, as he described in Luke 15.13. when they are taxed for this, they say, It is my own, and I may do with my own as I please. We are not content to take such an Answer from a rich and covetous Man, when you press him to Charity; if he should say, It is my own, and I shall give what I please: as Nabal said, 1 Sam. 25.11. Shall I take my Bread, and my Water, and my Flesh that I have killed for my Shearers, and give it unto Men whom I know not? The truth is, it is a mistake on both sides, it is not theirs, but God's, he is the great Owner. Therefore when Recreations are costly, and waste your Estates, you cannot give an account of it to God at the great Day; you rob your Families, at least the Poor. Lust starves Charity, and makes it a Beggar. It is sad when a Lust can command thee to do more than the Love of God can; when you can lavish away thus much upon your Pleasures, and account nothing too dear for them, and every Penny be begrudged that is for a Use truly good: You are guilty of Sacrilege to God, you rob him of his Tribute, and you rob the Poor of their Support, who are God's Receivers.
2. When they engross your Time, which is the most precious Commodity that can be, for it cannot be bought with Gold and Silver, and when once lost, can never be repaired. God hath appointed Pleasures after Labour, and when we are grown dull with Exercise; but then they should be moderate, that as little Time be wasted as may be. But now when Men make a Calling of their Recreation, and their Life is nothing else but a Diversion from one Pleasure to another, and they spend more time than will serve to quicken them to their Work, certainly this is a Sin; for then they alter the nature of them, and make it a Work, and not a Sport. They that spend