[b]A double hell[/b]

(John Angell James, "Life and Letters")

You who are poor--with this 'pearl of great price'
to enrich you, with a title to a priceless inheritance,
reserved in heaven for you, pure and undefiled,
beyond the reach of change and decay--to animate
and comfort you; all the privations of your earthly
poverty can be borne--not only with patience, but
with cheerfulness.

The grace of God in the heart, the promise of God
in the hand, and the glory of God in the eye--are
enough to reconcile us to the longest life of the
most dire poverty.

But poverty, without true piety--is to be poor indeed!
To be both poor and wicked, is to have a double hell
--a hell here, and a worse hell hereafter!

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SI Moderator - Greg Gordon