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AND he says that this is a command of the Lord: "For He Himself,"
namely the Lord Jesus, said he, "said it is more blessed to give than to
receive." That is, the bounty of the giver is more blessed than the need of
the receiver, where the gift is not supplied from money that has been kept
back through unbelief or faithlessness, nor from the stored- up treasures
of avarice, but is produced from the fruits of our own labour and honest
toil. And so "it is more blessed to give than to receive," because while
the giver shares the poverty of the receiver, yet still he is diligent in
providing with pious care by his own toil, not merely enough for his own
needs, but also what he can give to one in want; and so he is adorned with
a double grace, since by giving away all his goods he secures the perfect
abnegation of Christ, and yet by his labour and thought displays the
generosity of the rich; thus honouring God by his honest labours, and
plucking for him the fruits of his righteousness, while another, enervated
by sloth and indolent laziness, proves himself by the saying of the Apostle
unworthy of food, as in defiance of his command he takes it in idleness,
not without the guilt of sin and of obstinacy.
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