The Wild Vine
THE WILD VINE: OR, AN EXPOSITION ON ISAIAH'S PARABOLICALL Song of the Beloved: Isa. 5.1, 2, 3, &c. By NEHEMIAH ROGERS, Pastor of Messing in Essex. Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed: How then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me? Jer. 2.21.
PUBLISHED FOR Edward Brewster
1632
1. 3. Ingrossers;
whose practise is to compasse sea and land to get a commoditie into their hands; which having once obtained, they set a price upon it as large as their owne consciences: Or else hoard it up only to make a dearth without a scarcitie. I deny not but it is lawfull to buy the overplus of any commoditie, and when mens turnes are served in times of plentie, to take the residue (as Joseph did) that in time of dearth he may have to helpe the Common-wealth, with some good and moderate gaine to himselfe also: But these in stead of laying up to prevent a dearth, doe hoard up to procure one; which time is the Ingrossers day, wherein he doth enrich himselfe with the spoile of the poore. Against these very persons Amos thus prophesieth;Amos 8.4, 5, 6. Heare this oh you that swallow up the poore, that you may make the needie of the land to faile; saying, when will the new moone be gone that we may sell corne? and the Sabbath, that we may set forth wheat, and make the Epha small, and the shekell great, and falsifie the waights by deceit? and buy the poore for silver, and the needie for shooes; yea and sell the refuse of the wheat? They had long (as it may seeme) kept up the corne for this purpose, that it might grow deare; and now they had a time to serve their turne in, and they must set it to sale in all haste, so that they thought the new moone and the Sabbath daies appointed for Gods owne service, too long untill they were a selling: And now they intend to prey upon the poore, for they will sell little for much; lessening the measure, and enhancing the price. The poore shall buy the refuse deare, which is little worth, and sell themselves cheape, even in a manner for old shooes to pay for it. Here God sent corne, and the devill sent garners: Nay, in some sort they were worse than the very [Page 312] Devill himselfe: for he seemed to have some charitie in him, when he would have had Christ,Matth 4. to turne stones into bread, and so make a plentie in time of scarcitie: but these endevoured, what in them lay, to make a scarcitie in the midst of plentie, turning bread into stones, a tricke beyond the Devill. Are not these Oppressors?