The dishonesty of unjustly taking a neighbour’s property.
The principal ways of doing this seem to be these four, by negligence, by fraud, by violence, or by stealing strictly so called.
1. The first way of unjustly depriving our neighbour of that which is his, is by negligence, by carelessly neglecting that which is expected by neighbours, one of another, and is necessary to prevent our neighbour’s suffering in his estate by us, or by anything that is ours: and in order that neighbours may live one by another, without suffering in their lawful interests, rights, and possessions, one by another.
For instance, when proper care is not taken by men to prevent their neighbour’s suffering in the produce of his fields or enclosures, from their cattle, or other brute creatures; which may be either through negligence with regard to their creatures themselves, in keeping those that are unruly, and giving them their liberty, though they know that they are not fit to have their liberty, and are commonly wont to break into their neighbour’s enclosures greatly to his damage; or through a neglect of that which is justly expected of them, to defend others’ fields from suffering by the neighbourhood of their own. In such cases men are guilty of unjustly taking from their neighbour what is his property.
It is said in the law of Moses, Exod. xxii. 5. “If a man shall cause a field or vineyard to be eaten, and shall put in his beast, and shall feed in another man’s field; of the best of his own field, and of the best of his vineyard, shall he make restitution.” Now a man may be unjustly the cause of his neighbour’s field or vineyard being eaten, either by putting in his beast, and so doing what he should not do; or by neglecting to do what he should do, to prevent his beast from getting into his field. What is said in the 144th Psalm, and two last verses, supposes that a people who carry themselves as becomes a people whose God is the Lord, will take thorough care that beasts do not break into their neighbour’s enclosures: “That our oxen may be strong to labour; that there be no breaking in, nor going out; that there be no complaining in our streets. Happy is that people that is in such a case; yea, happy is that people whose God is the Lord. 1 ”
2. Taking away that which is our neighbour’s by fraud, or by deceiving him, is another mode of usurping our neighbour’s property. This is the case when men in their dealings take advantage of their neighbour’s ignorance, or oversight, or mistake, to get something from him; or when they make their gains, by concealing the defects of what they sell, putting off bad for good, though this be not done by speaking falsely, but only by keeping silence: or when they take a higher price than what they sell is really worth, and more than they could get for it if the concealed defects were known: or when they sell that for good, which indeed is not merchantable, which is condemned in Amos viii. 6. “Yea, and sell the refuse of the wheat.”
If a man puts off something to another with defects that are concealed, knowing that the other receives it as good, and pays such a price for it, under a notion of its having no remarkable defect but what he sees, and takes the price which the buyer under that notion offers; the seller knows that he takes a price of the buyer for that which the buyer had not of him; for the buyer is deceived, and pays for those things which he finds wanting in what he buys. It is just the same thing, as if a man should take a payment that another offers him, through a mistake, for that which he never had of him, thinking that he had it of him, when lie had it not.
So a man fraudulently takes away that which is his neighbour’s, when he gets his money from him by falsely commending what he hath to sell, above what he knows to be the true quality of it; and attributes those good qualities to it which he knows it has not: or if he does not that, yet sets forth the good qualities in a degree beyond what he knows to be the true degree; or speaks of the defects and ill qualities of what he has to sell, as if they were much less than he knows they are: or on the contrary, when the buyer will cry down what he is about to buy, contrary to his real opinion of the value of it.—These things, however common they be in men’s dealings one with another, are nothing short of iniquity, and fraud, and a great breach of this commandment, upon which we are discoursing. Prov. xx. 14. “It is nought, it is nought, saith the buyer;” but when he is gone his way then he boasteth.”—Many other ways there are whereby men deceive one another in their trading, and whereby they fraudulently and unjustly take away that which is their neighbour’s.
3. Another mode of unjustly invading and taking away our neighbour’s property, is by violence. This violence may be done in different degrees.—Men may take away their neighbour’s goods either by mere open violence, either making use of superior strength, forcibly taking away anything that is his; or by express or implicit threatenings forcing him to yield up what he has into their hands; as is done in open robbery and piracy. Or, by making use of some advantages which they have over their neighbour, in their dealings with him, constrain him to yield to their gaining unreasonably of him; as when they take advantage of their neighbour’s poverty to extort unreasonably from him for those things that he is under a necessity of procuring for himself or family. This is an oppression against which God hath shown a great displeasure in his word. Levit. xxv. 14. “And if thou sell ought unto thy neighbour, or buyest ought of thy neighbour, ye shall not oppress one another.” Prov. xxii. 22, 23. “Rob not the poor, because he is poor, neither oppress the afflicted in the gate; for the Lord will plead their cause, and spoil the soul of those that spoiled them.” And, Amos iv. 1, 2. “Hear this word, ye kin of Bashan, that are in the mount of Samaria, which oppress the poor, which crush the needy, the Lord hath sworn in his holiness, that he will take you away with hooks, and your posterity with fish-hooks.”