f idolatry as if he so
believed."

Idolatry is the act of ascribing to things or persons properties that
are peculiar to God. The principal objects of worship are those things
which bring to men the greatest good.

The sun has been the most general object of idolatrous worship in all
the ages. It is the most conspicuous object, and is the source of
light and heat, and rules the seasons. Its worship was so general that
the Hebrew people, when they lapsed from the worship of God, turned to
the worship of the sun or Baal. No natural object is more worthy of
worship. Job declaring his integrity and freedom from idolatry, said
that he had not kissed his hand in salute of the sun in his rising.

The river Nile was an object of idolatrous worship for ages. Its
source was a mystery, and its annual rise in its rainless valley was
so beneficent, that it was given the worship which belonged to the
Divine alone. All the hope of the harvest depended on its annual
overflow. It moistened and fertilized and prepared the ground, and
then receded until the harvest was grown and gathered. Moses showed
the Egyptians the impotence of their idols by making this chief idol,
and the things that came out of it, a curse. The cow was worshiped
because it was the most useful and necessary of their animals. A real
or supposed power to give or withhold favors has been from the
beginning the source and spring of idolatry.

Riches, property, as the means of supplying our needs, is an object
more coveted than any other. The principle of usury greatly aggravates
this tendency. The principle of usury makes it imperishable; it can be
perpetuated, unimpaired from year to year and from age to age; it is a
constant source of benefit; it is productive of all that is necessary
to supply human needs.

It supplies, too, without effort on the part of the recipient. The
sun, with his light and heat, makes the labor of the farmer
successful. The rising Nile moistening and fertilizing the land,
prepares the way for the sower. The cow draws the plow and the harrow,
and threshes the grain, but usury makes property bring all needed
material good without effort on the part of the owner. It brings him
the matured fruits of the farm, though he neither plows or sows nor
reaps. No labor on his part is needed. His property clothes and feeds
him, and yet does not grow less, but is endowed with perpetual youth,
ever giving yet never exhausted or diminished. He may die, b