Proverbs 30:8,9 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

Give me neither poverty, &c.— These words are introduced in the form of an address to God, in answer, perhaps, to some question which the disciples had proposed to Agur about the duty of prayer. What Agur prays for is, such a proportion of the good things of this world, as may best answer the end of living. It must be observed, that the terms poverty and riches are relative, and not absolute. They are relative to the particular state and circumstances in which each person is placed; so that what is riches to one will be poverty to another of higher station; on the contrary, what is poverty to one, will be riches to another in a meaner condition. This prayer, therefore, is not a prayer for a middle state of life, absolutely; as it has been often understood to be; but it is a prayer for a sufficiency, for a due measure, a fit and just proportion of things necessary and convenient for us, in whatever station we are; without want, without excess. And in this view the prayer is an universal prayer, and may with equal propriety be used by the high and the low; just as both high and low and all men universally pray, "Give us this day our daily bread." If we consider the prayer in the other light, as a request for a middle station of life absolutely, then it is evidently impossible that it should be universal; it being not possible to suppose that the middle station can be the lot and condition of all. The danger which attends a state of great riches and superfluity is expressed thus, Lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, Who is the Lord? To deny God, is to act and live as if there were no righteous Governor and Judge of mankind to whom we are accountable, as well as directly to disown his being and providence; or, in a more confined sense, it implies irreligion and prophaneness, a disregard and contempt of Providence, and other crimes which are committed more directly and more immediately against God himself. As truth may be denied by actions, as well as by words, this is declared atheism. He who lives as if there were no governing Providence, however he may admit in theory the existence of a First Cause, yet in practice he denies that Being to be God: for the notion of God, in the moral and religious sense, is always relative to servants or subjects, and signifies not barely the absolute perfection of nature, but dominion and sovereignty, and the moral government of the world. The temptations to which poverty is exposed are, stealing, and taking the name of God in vain. The latter clause certainly means more than common swearing, because there does not seem to be a greater connection between that vice and poverty, than riches; it therefore probably signifies perjury, to which poverty and distress are great temptations. See Foster's Sermons, as above, and Harvest's 5th Sermon.