Mammon or Covetousness the Sin of the Christian Chruch. By Rev. John Harris; Anti-Mammon, or an Exposure of the Unscriptural Statements of Mammon [pp. 222-239]

Mammon, and dnti-Mammnon.
others. The fourth chapter of the work is styled "The
Witnesses." Charnock, Owen, Luthur, Calvin, Henry, Sanderson, and others, being brought forward to testify against
the errors in question. Then follows "The Decision." and
"The Improvement." This work, of which we have given
an outline, had reached a second edition in 1837, but a short
time after its publication.
It is manifest that there is a wide-spread conviction in
the church, that the sin of covetousness is fatally prevalent
within it, as well as in the world; and that to resist and overcome this evil, there should be put into requisition all her resources. It is also manifest, on the other hand, that with
this growing zeal and this spirit of enlarging benevolence,
there is also awakened in the church, by that promised Spirit whose office it is to guide into all truth, an increasing attention to the doctrines of God's word, as the true pillar and
ground of all piety and of all permanent success. Of this
there is sufficient proof in the great demand for works bearing on the subject of benevolence-in the fact that " Mammon" was only one out of a hundred and forty-three Essays
offered for the prize to which it was declared entitled-and
in the great and continued sale of this book. When these
facts are viewed in connexion with the appearance of such a
work as Anti-Mammon, and the excitement produced by
doctrinal discussions among almost every denomination of
Christians at the present time, there is much to encourage us
to hope that the Lord will arise and shine upon Zion, making her a praise in the whole earth. In this returning attention to "the doctrines that be of God," and this sifting of
them as wheat from the chaff of philosophy and human speculations with which they have been commingled, "we rejoice, yea, and will rejoice," believing, with these anonymous writers, that "a wide-spread and increasing indifference
to sound doctrine, is the present great sin of the Christian
Church."
It is in this view of the subject, as being one of permanent
interest and essential importance, we have thought it advisable, even at this late hour, to call attention to this work.
Error is not merely a speculation, which may be treasured
up among the abstractions of the understanding, far removed
from any practical influence over the heart and life. It is,
on the contrary, necessarily connected with the life and actions of him who holds it, for, in his active powers, man
must conduct himself in subordination to the dictates of his
1839.]
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