world is unanimously trying to do. Having made a
pile, he proposed to make a bigger pile. Meanwhile he slapped his soul on
the back and smacked his lips in anticipation. To Jesus the fat farmer was
a tragic comedy. In the first place, an unseen hand was waiting to snuff
out his candle. To plan life as if it consisted in an abundance of
material wealth is something of a miscalculation in a world where death is
part of the scheme of things. In the second place, Jesus saw no higher
purpose in the man's aim and outlook to redeem his acquisitiveness. The
man was a sublimated chipmunk, gloating over bushels of pignuts. If wealth
is saved to raise and educate children, or achieve some social good, it
deserves moral respect or admiration. But if the acquisitive instinct is
without social feeling or vision, and centered on self, it gets no
respect, at least from Jesus.

Unlimited acquisition used to be considered immoral and dishonorable. How
and when did public opinion change on this?

Third Day: Quit Grafting

And the multitudes asked him, saying, What then must we do? And he
answered and said unto them, He that hath two coats, let him
impart to him that hath none; and he that hath food, let him do
likewise. And there came also publicans to be baptized, and they
said unto him, Teacher, what must we do? And he said unto them,
Extort no more than that which is appointed you. And soldiers also
asked him, saying, And we, what must we do? And he said unto them,
Extort from no man by violence, neither accuse any one wrongfully;
and be content with your wages.--Luke 3:10-14.

The social teachings of John the Baptist were so close to those of Jesus
that we can safely draw on them in this passage.

John told the people that a new era was coming and they would have to get
a new mind and manner of life as an outfit for it. The people asked for
specifications. John's suggestions ran along two lines. He encouraged the
plain working people to be neighborly and friendly, and share with a man
who was hard up. With powerful individuals, like hired soldiers and Roman
tax-farmers, he insisted that they must quit using their physical force
and legal power as a cinch to extort money. In other words, they must quit
grafting. In the Kingdom of God the "big, black book of graft" will be
closed, and men will no longer eat their protesting fellow-men. The more
we realize that some form of graft is at the