of our own conscience, no sense of degradation or infamy, can annihilate the concern which adheres to us for our own wellbeing; neither should any baseness of our neighbour be permitted to extinguish our concern for his wellbeing. This should be felt independently of benefits which we may have received at his hands, and in spite of any injury which he may have inflicted upon us-lastingly, inextinguishably as the love of self. Such is that charity which the Apostle has so fully delineated, and so loftily eulogized in an Epistle to the Corinthians.

The disposition to return good for evil is, doubtless, alien from our natural mind, and demands a firm determination of purpose, with the concurrence of a Power superior to our own, to sustain it; but facility of obedience to a precept is, surely, not its most needful or proper recommendation to the Christian. The questions befitting our vocation are these:-Is the conduct in question virtue, moral excellence; and how far is it entitled to that distinction? Confessedly, it is virtue, virtue in its uttermost utility in its undeniable tendency to assuage the irascible passions; to abate most powerful incentives to crime; to drain most copious sources of human

wretchedness. It is virtue in its highest character of self-renunciation, its severest struggle with the passions; virtue in its loftiest mood, its heroism, its sublimity-in a word, it is virtue pre-eminently worthy of our efforts and aspirations; if we would approve ourselves as disciples of Christ, as subjects of Him "who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify to himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works"-a people willing to appreciate, and even studious to discern, the purest forms of rectitude, and to embody them in their lives.

Indeed, to attain such benevolence, it is peculiarly necessary to reflect upon our Christian obligations, and to bear them continually in remembrance. In no instance, perhaps, does virtue so evidently lean upon religion. for support and encouragement: in no instance is our perseverance in well-doing so ill sustained by considerations, however wellfounded and valuable, derived from our experience in the present state. Notwithstanding such benevolence is abundantly commended by its pacific and reforming influence on human society in general; and although it amply compensates to the minds of individuals the *Titus ii. 14.

labour of attaining it, yet are we constantly solicited by opinions which, if true, would disprove its utility; and which evidently tend to its utter discouragement and even extinction. Persons are continually asserting and maintaining that there is some stage in the progress of human differences, where the love of our neighbour should terminate in a total disjunction of interests and feelings; in a settled disgust, and even a perpetual hate; where the tone of remonstrance should give place to recrimination and invective, and the spirit of forbearance to the thirst of vengeance. Persons are everywhere judging that the offices of kindness, the expressions of goodwill towards a fellow-creature, should be dependent on his character and conduct; everywhere arguing as if the love of their neighbour, the practice of benevolence, were grounded on motives and calculations of an exclusively personal nature, and were reducible to a system of reciprocity, or transactions of barter between man and man; expecting an equivalent for every service which they render, every favour which they confer. We hear them alleging the neglect and ingratitude of individuals, or mankind in general, as a reason for withholding from them their sympathy,

and denying them their friendly offices and benefactions. We observe them folding themselves up in a sullen contempt of their fellowcreatures, or in a close, exclusive regard to their own pursuits and advantage; nay, even tutoring their spirits to a hard indifference to their neighbour, and actually resolving upon selfishness as the rule or principle of their conduct. The reason is, that in all such moods, persons look upon themselves and their fellowcreatures, no otherwise than as a number of beings associated for the brief period of a human life, and for no higher purpose than to compass, as they are best able, the circle of its pleasures-benevolence is estimated relatively to this world only-virtue is forsaken by piety, and is consequently unequal to the strife with temptation-unequal to combat the irascible passions with no better weapons than are supplied by human hands, and fabricated out of earthly materials. In this contest, especially, she must be furnished with arms of a celestial temper, and be even clothed with "the panoply of God." To exemplify that benevolence to which the Gospel has called us, we must incessantly recur to the principles of our faith, and our especial vocation as Christians. As such we own an alliance with our fellow

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creatures, not in a community of temporary interests merely, a bond of present expediency, but in the participation of a nature which is immortal, and destinies which are eternal ; and we are pledged, under a debt of gratitude which we cannot measure, to promote the kingdom of our Saviour on the earth, the principles of righteousness and peace. Christians, we are not to exact a claim of desert in the objects of our regard and beneficence; for we are privileged to be "the children of the Highest," and "He is kind to the unthankful and the evil."* Nor are we dependent for the power of forbearance towards the man who has annoyed and troubled us-dependent for the heart to forgive him, on any favourable consequences which may immediately follow such a " ruling of our own spirit." For we are not to lay by our resentment because it is a source of uneasiness and disquietude-a mental incumbrance; or because the offender is distinguished by qualities which invite to reconciliation; but because the Almighty, whom we serve, has cancelled our offences, and has charged us to forgive, in like manner, the offences of our fellow-man— nay, has warned us that he will exact the full

* Luke vi. 35.