MORAL INVESTMENTS. 225 



must renounce all the pleasures of Satan's world. 

 They must sell their property, and give the proceeds 

 to the poor ; discard all domestic ties ; cultivate self- 

 abasement, and do nothing which could possibly raise 

 them in the esteem of other people. For they could 

 not serve two masters : they could not be rewarded 

 in the kingdom of this world, which was ruled by 

 Satan, and also in the new kingdom, which would be 

 ruled by God. If they gave a dinner, they were not 

 to ask their rich friends, lest they should be asked 

 back to dinner, and thus lose their reward. They 

 must ask only the poor, and for that benevolent 

 action they would be recompensed hereafter. They 

 were not to give alms in public, or to pray in public : 

 and when they fasted, they were to pretend to feast ; 

 for if it was perceived that they were devout men, 

 and were praised for their devotion, they would lose 

 their reward. Robbery and violence they were not to 

 resist. If a man smote them on one cheek, they were 

 to offer him the other also ; if he took their coat, they 

 were to give him their shirt ; if he forced them to 

 go with him one mile, they were to go with him 

 two. They were to love their enemies, to do good 

 to them that did them evil ; and why ? Not 

 because it was good so to do, but that they might 

 be paid for the same with compound interest in a 

 future state. 



It might be supposed that as in the philosophy of 

 Jesus poverty was equivalent to virtue, and misery a 

 passport to eternal bliss, sickness would be also a 

 beatific state. But Jesus, like the other Jews, be- 

 lieved that disease proceeded from sin. In Pales- 

 tine it was always held that a priest or a prophet was 

 the best physician, and prayer, with the laying on of 



