a word used always in the plural number, means wealth, money, possession, or a splendid sumptuous appearance. When used to express the fortune of private persons, whether patrimonial or acquired, it signifies opulence; a term which expresses not the enjoyment, but the possession, of numerous superfluities.—The riches of a state or kingdom expresses the produce of industry, of commerce, of different incorporated bodies, of the internal and external administration of the principal members of which the society is composed, &c.

Our Saviour says, that it is more easy for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven; and we find, in fact, that riches frequently bring along with them a degree of inattention, lukewarmness, and irreligion, such as sufficiently confirms the divine assertion; which is merely a general truth, and which by no means asserts the absolute impossibility of being virtuous and rich at the same time. For as the ancient philosophers wisely taught, riches, considered in themselves, and abstractedly from the bad purposes to which they may be applied, are not necessarily incompatible with virtue and wisdom. They are indeed absolutely indifferent; in good hands they will be useful, and promote the cause of truth, virtue, and humanity; and in bad hands they are the source of much mischief; on the one hand they confer the power of doing much good, and on the other they are equally powerful in doing ill.

To men, however, whose principles of virtue are not sufficiently founded, riches are unquestionably a dangerous and seducing bait; and as the ancients rightly taught, they are to the greatest number of men, in an infinite variety of circumstances, a powerful obstacle to the practice of moral virtues, to the progress of truth, and a weight which prevents them from rising to that degree of knowledge and perfection of which human nature is capable. They multiply without ceasing the occasions of vice, by the facility which they give to satisfy tify a multitude of irregular passions, and to turn at length those who are attached to them from the road of virtue, and from the desire of inquiring after truth.

It is this which Seneca means to express, when he says, "that riches in a vast number of cases have been a great obstacle to philosophy; and that, to enjoy freedom of mind necessary for study, a man must live in poverty, or as if he were poor. Every man (adds he) who wishes to live a pleasant, tranquil, and secure life, must avoid, as much as possible, the deceitfulness of riches, which are a bait with which we allow ourselves to be taken as in a snare, without afterwards having the power to extricate ourselves, being so much the more unhappy, that we believe we possess them, while on the contrary, they tyrannize over us." Senec. Epist. 17. and Epist. 8.

"The wise man (says the same author in another place) does not love riches to excess; but he would not choose wholly to divest himself of them; he does not receive them into his soul, but into his house; he is careful of them, and employs them for the purpose of opening a wide field for virtue, and of making it appear in all its splendour. Who can doubt that a wise man has not more occasions of displaying the elevation and greatness of his mind when he is possessed of riches than when he labours under indigence, since, in the last condition, he can exercise only one virtue, namely, resignation; whereas, riches give him an opportunity of displaying, in their greatest lustre, the virtues of temperance, liberality, diligence, regularity, and magnificence. There is no occasion, then, to prohibit philosophers from the use of wealth, or to condemn wisdom to poverty. The philosopher may possess the greatest riches, provided he has not employed force or shed blood in acquiring them; provided he has not gained them by unjust or illegal means; in a word, provided the use which he makes of them be as pure as the source from which they were derived, and no person (the envious excepted) regretting his possession; he will not refuse the kindness of fortune, and will enjoy, without shame or pride, the wealth acquired by honest means; he will have more reason to glory, if, after exposing his riches to the view of the whole world, he can desire any person to carry away the reward of treachery or the fruits of oppression. If, after these words, his riches continue undiminished, this man is truly great, and worthy to be rich." Senec. de Vila Beata, cap. 21, 22, & 23.