THIRTY-SECOND INSTRUCTION. The Seventh Commandment. What it forbids — First, the unjust taking away of what belongs to another; Secondly, the unjust keeping of our neighbour's goods -Obligation of restitution. The Tenth Commandment. What it forbids-What these two Command ments command. Q. What is the Seventh Commandment? A. The Seventh Commandment is, "Thou shalt not steal." A The Tenth Commandment is, "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's goods." The seventh and tenth commandments, my dear children, may be explained together for the same reason as the sixth and ninth-namely, because they both treat of the same subject. The one forbids us to steal, the other to covet, the goods of our neighbour; in other words, the one forbids all acts and the other all thoughts and desires which tend to deprive our fellow-man of his lawful possessions. God has given us these two commandments to secure to us the use and peaceful possession of the temporal goods which he has bestowed upon us. For whatever man has, is from God, though it may appear to us the fruit of his own labour and industry, or the result of chance, as people sometimes foolishly say, forgetting that there is no such thing as chance in the world, but that everything is ruled and directed by the all-seeing Providence of God. He it is who gives to man the health, the strength, the ability, the opportunity to earn, and it is His Providence which ordains that one should be born of poor and another of wealthy parents. Therefore whatever man has is the gift of God, who bestows on one more, on another less, according to his own wise designs. The goods of this world are so many talents entrusted to us by God to be employed for His honour and the good of our fellow-men, and every one will have to give a strict account of the manner in which he has employed them. From this you see the particular hatefulness of the sin of theft, which is a rebellion against God's Providence, and an effort to over turn the order which he has established. The thief declares, not in words but by his deeds, that it shall not be as God has ordained; he usurps to himself what God has given to his neighbour. By so doing he not only inflicts a grievous wrong on his fellow-man whom he deprives of what is justly his, but also offers an extreme outrage to God in resisting his appointments, and violating the first principles of justice, which is one of the most admirable perfections of the Almighty. Hence the Apostle declares that both theft and covetousness are most grievous sins, and such as will exclude us for ever from the kingdom of heaven. "Do not err," says he to us, "neither idolaters, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor extortioners, shall possess the kingdom of God" (1 Cor. vi. 9, 10). Q. What does the Seventh Commandment forbid? A. The Seventh Commandment forbids all unjust taking away, or keeping what belongs to another. Q. What else is forbidden by the Seventh Commandment? A. All manner of cheating in buying and selling, or any other way of wronging our neighbour, is forbidden by the Seventh Commandment. Q. Is it dishonest for servants to waste their master's time or property? A. Yes; it is dishonest for servants to waste their master's time or property, because it is wasting what is not their own. We come now to speak of the sins which are forbidden by these two commandments. And first, as regards the seventh, the catechism says that it forbids all unjust taking away or keeping what belongs to another. Under these two general headings are comprised all the various sins of dishonesty which are here forbidden. Notice, however, that the catechism only speaks of the unjust taking away or keeping of our neighbour's goods, for it may happen that a person may justly be deprived or kept out of the use and enjoyment of what belongs to him. Take for example the case of a person who has broken some public law, for which he is liable to pay a fine to the State. refuses, the money may be taken from him by the public officers in the manner which the law prescribes. Take, again, the case of a madman who demands from his friends possession of some deadly weapon which belongs to him, If he but which he would probably use for his own destruction. Not only may it lawfully be kept from him, but it would even be a sin to place it in his hands. In these and such like instances no sin is committed in taking or detaining what belongs to another; but in all other cases we are strictly forbidden by the seventh commandment to deprive our neighbour of what God has given him, or to keep him from the possession of it. Let us now see what are the principal ways in which we may commit this injustice. First of all, those are guilty in the highest degree of unjustly taking away what belongs to another, who are guilty of theft accompanied by violence; for example, those who knock down people and rob them, who break into and plunder houses, who by threats of personal violence extort money from the timid and feeble. This kind of robbery is more grievous than ordinary sins of theft, on account of the violence employed, and the terror, anxiety, or personal injury caused to the person who is plundered. Hence the punishment inflicted by the law on those who commit these crimes is usually far more severe than that which is enjoined in cases of simple dishonesty. Another species of theft which carries with it a special guilt is that which is accompanied with a breach of confidence. For example, a master entrusts to one of his servants a sum of money for some particular purpose, or puts certain goods under his charge. Now the servant, seeing the confidence which the master places in him, takes advantage of it to pilfer the money or make away with the goods for his own profit. A shopkeeper sends round one of his men whom he considers trustworthy to collect the accounts due to him. The collector, however, is a rogue, who keeps back part of the money paid, or, like the unjust steward in the Gospel, knocks off a portion of the bills for the sake of a gift, or in hopes of some future advantage. A servant girl is sent by her mistress to purchase some goods. She does not go to the shop where she can make the best bargain, but where she is likely to receive a gift from the dealer in return for her custom- -a bribe which her mistress will have to pay for by the increased charge made in the bill or the inferior 66 value of the goods purchased. Again, a cook happens to have some friends or relations whom she goes to visit, and to whom she takes the dripping or scraps of meat which she can get together without her mistress's permission or knowledge. Perhaps she is misled by a mistaken charity to the poor, and gives half a loaf to one, a little tea or sugar to another, and the remains of a joint of meat to a third, without ever asking her mistress's consent. She says, "Oh, it will never be missed!" or, Surely the mistress can well afford it!" but she forgets that to give alms at another's expense is not charity, but theft. Or perhaps it is the housemaid, who disposes of the cast-off clothes, which she finds lying about, to some travelling pedlar in exchange for a smart ribbon or a few pence. Again, a servant man is hired for a certain sum to work for a fixed time, or to perform certain duties. Instead of setting industriously to his work, he wastes his time and neglects the duties he has undertaken to perform, or does them in an imperfect and slovenly manner. dear children, let us not deceive ourselves, all these are sins of dishonesty; and though they vary in enormity in proportion to the amount of injury inflicted on the employer, yet they have all a special guilt of their own, on account of the abuse of that confidence which is placed by every master or mistress in those who are engaged in their service. Hence sins of theft committed by servants, like those which are accompanied with violence, are usually punished with greater severity by human laws. My The third kind of dishonesty of which we may be guilty is simple theft without violence or abuse of confidence. For example, there are some who get their livelihood by stealing from open shops or by picking pockets; others by robbing gardens, market stalls, or ships' cargoes; others, again, by stripping clothes-lines or taking whatever they find lying about exposed and unprotected. Travelling pedlars and gipsies who, under pretence of selling their wares, plunder back-yards and kitchens, boys who rob orchards, children who pilfer sugar or preserves, or who steal the playthings and sweetmeats of their companions, come under this class of thieves. -are The fourth kind of theft, and this is one which is especially mentioned in your catechism, is cheating in buying or selling. By cheating, we mean overreaching our neighbours by some trick or artifice. Shopkeepers who give short weight and measure, or who adulterate their goods-that is, mix them up with something inferior, for example, sugar with sand, milk with water, &c. guilty of this sin. The same may be said of those who tell lies about their goods to deceive the customers as to their value or quality, who sell them for more than they are really worth, allowing for their own trouble and risk, who keep back part of the change which they are bound to return, who send in bills already paid, or charge for more than they have sold, &c. On the other hand, buyers commit the same sin when they take advantage of a shopkeeper's mistake as to the quality or price of the goods purchased, when they pass bad money, or when they seek in any way to defraud those with whom they deal. These sins of cheating, whether on the part of buyer or seller, are of course nothing less than downright robbery. Hence, Almighty God said to the Jews in the Old Law, "Thou shalt not have divers weights in thy bag, a greater and a less. Neither shall there be in thy house a greater bushel and a less. Thou shalt have a just and a true weight, and thy bushel shall be equal and true. For the Lord thy God abhorreth him that does these things, and he hateth all injustice" (Deut. xxv. 13-16. See also Lev. xix. 35, 36, and Prov. xx. 23). The fifth way of wronging our neighbour is by imposition, which is a kind of cheating, though not necessarily in the way of buying and selling. Those who beg without necessity, or tell lies to excite compassion, are guilty of this sin. They wrong those from whom they obtain an alms, for the latter would not give if they knew the truth; and they wrong the deserving poor, who often have to go without relief on account of the great number of impostors. Those who order goods without the means of paying, who forge the names of others, or pretend to be acting for them in order to obtain money, goods, or credit; in a word, all those who try to get anything under false |