Greed and household provision

Meaning

The appendix warns that greed may shelter under the appearance of prudent household provision. Its criticism is not of all care for one’s household: the qualifying phrase concerns a deceptive guise through which acquisitiveness leads the possessor away from God. Pride is named alongside it, and loss of the art is the threatened consequence. The emblem’s closing verses present the contrary example, a figure who allows greed no place despite possessing what delights the world. English “prudent provision” preserves the respectable appearance under which the fault hides. Together these passages distinguish possession of goods from the disposition that misuses them.