Proverbs 19:4 Wealth makes many friends; but the poor is separated from his neighbor. In Dr. Guthrie's "Autobiography" there is a good illustration of the unhappy state of cynicism into which the rich are prone to fall. There he relates how, in a winter of extraordinary severity, he made an appeal to a lady who had succeeded to a prodigious fortune, on behalf of the starving poor of his parish. In doing so he had no very sanguine hope of success. On being ushered into her room, she turned round, and showing her thin, spare figure, and a face that looked as if it had been cut out of mahogany, grinned and said, "I am sorry to see ye. What do you want? I suppose you are here seeking siller." "The very thing I am here for," was the Doctor's frank reply. Her next remark demonstrated how little power her riches had of conferring happiness; and with all her wealth of flatterers, what a poor, lonely, desolate, miserable creature this possessor of more than a million sterling was. "Ah," she said, "there is nobody comes to see me or seek me; but it's the money, the money they are after." We are glad to be able to relate that this rich old lady gave to Dr. Guthrie fifty pounds for the poor — an act which we hope shed a gleam of sunshine into her dark life. Parallel Verses KJV: Wealth maketh many friends; but the poor is separated from his neighbour.WEB: Wealth adds many friends, but the poor is separated from his friend. |
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