p. 75 | BURIED IN WEALTH

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, Cal. · Feb 17, 1881

BURIED IN WEALTH.

A MAN employed in a Spanish bank once stole the key to the strong room, and visited it at night intending to carry off a large sum of money. But while intent on his booty he forgot the great door, which swung together by its own weight. There was a spring lock to the door which fastened him beyond all chance of escape. And now the poor prisoner could only sit down in his despair, and wait and listen for help to come. It might be days before any one came. Meanwhile he should die of thirst and hunger. The hours sped on, and the gloom grew deeper. A raging thirst consumed him. He would have given all the gold about him for one draught of water. What would the riches of the world be compared with his freedom? How anxiously he listened for some sound without! But those deep walls shut out alike all sound from without or within. It was of no avail that he beat the massive door, and cried and shrieked for help. As well might those buried deep in the sea call upon those above to rescue them. How vaguely he sought in his despair for some weak point through which he might, with superhuman effort, dig out a passage-way to the outer world. So near to him it seemed, and yet so far away! He would have welcomed detection and exposure, yea, and punishment, if he could only have been delivered from that living tomb. His covetousness had been his ruin. He had pressed his way into the treasure-house, only to find how vain is gold and treasure if a man has nothing else.

There are other unsatisfied and discontented men who are preparing for a terrible doom. After years of toil, and sin, and folly, the hour of retribution comes. The miser who has gained money, finds how little it is worth, and dies amid his rusting hoards. The business man having amassed wealth, with broken constitution, drags out his weary existence, envying the sturdy beggar at his door, and leaving his wealth to be squandered by those who count his death a favor to them, and a blessing to the world.

The lover of sinful pleasure glories in his shame, and runs to all excess of riot, till at last, with broken health and shattered nerves, he lies lonely and accursed, and finds that his pleasures were his pain, and the things he longed for have proved his ruin.

O child of Adam, learn the lesson of content. Sin brings sorrow. Nothing which God forbids can give permanent peace or pleasure. Push on if you will, but you will find yourself at last in a prison from which there is no escape. Your possessions, appetites, associations, and sins, will wall you in on every hand, and there will be no way to flee. For "what shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?"—The Safeguard.