the sad, stern, and yet pitying view which He always took concerning
them and their condition.

In the passage on which Jesus based His claims, as given by Luke,
one of the clauses is probably not in this place genuine, for 'the
healing of the brokenhearted' should be struck out of the true text.
There are then four symbols employed: the poor, the captives, the
blind, the bruised. And these four are representations of the result
of one fell cause, and that is--sin.

Sin impoverishes. Our true wealth is God. No man that possesses Him,
by love, and trust, and conformity of will and effort to His
discerned will, is poor, whatever else he has, whatever else he
lacks. And no man who has lost this one durable treasure, the loving
communion with, and possession of, God, in mind and heart and will
and effort, but is a pauper whatever else he possesses. Wherever a
man has sold himself to his own will, and has made himself and his
own inclinations and misread good his centre and his aim, which is
the definition of sin, there bankruptcy and poverty have come.
Thieves sometimes beset travellers from the gold mines, as they are
bringing down their dust or their nuggets to market, and empty the
pockets of the gold, and fill them up with sand. That is what sin
does for us; it takes away our true treasure, and befools us by
giving us what seems to be solid till we come to open the bag; and
then there is no power in it to buy anything for us. 'Why will ye
spend your labour for that which satisfieth not?' The one poverty is
the impoverishment that lays hold of every soul that wrenches
itself, in self-will, apart from God. Sin makes poor.

Sin not only impoverishes, but imprisons 'the captives.' Ah! you