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commandment to any great extent through- will, and never can be brought within the out the mass of society, but the principle of cognizance of any of our courts of adminisgodliness. Nothing will secure the general tration, will still continue to derange the observation of justice amongst us, in its business of human life, and to stir up all the punctuality and in its preciseness, but such heartburnings of suspicion and resentment a precise Christianity as many affirm to be among the members of human society. And puritanical. In other words, the virtues of it is, indeed, a triumphant reversion awaitsociety, to be kept in a healthful and pros-ing the Christianity of the New Testament, perous condition, must be upheld by the virtues of the sanctuary. Human law may restrain many of the grosser violations. But without religion among the people, justice will never be in extensive operation as a moral principle. A vast proportion of the species will be as unjust as the vigilance and the severities of law allow them to be. A thousand petty dishonesties, which never

when it shall become manifest as day, that it is her doctrine alone, which, by its searching and sanctifying influence, can so moralize our world-as that each may sleep secure in the lap of his neighbour's integrity, and charm of confidence, between man and man, will at length be felt in the business of every town, and in the bosom of every family.

DISCOURSE V.

On the great Christian Law of Reciprocity between Man and Man.

"Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets."-Matthew vii. 12.

THERE are two great classes in human | in nearer accommodation to the feelings and society, between whom there lie certain the conveniences of men. mutual claims and obligations, which are And Christianity, on the very first blush felt by some to be of very difficult adjust- of it, appears to be precisely such a religion. ment. There are those who have requests It seems to take away all lawfulness of reof some kind or other to make; and there sistance from the possessor, and to invest are those to whom the requests are made, the demander with such an extent of priviand with whom there is lodged the power lege, as would make the two classes of soeither to grant or to refuse them. Now, at ciety, to which we have just now adverted, first sight, it would appear, that the firm speedily change places. And this is the true exercise of this power of refusal is the only secret of the many laborious deviations that barrier by which the latter class can be se- have been attempted in this branch of mocured against the indefinite encroachments rality, on the obvious meaning of the New of the former; and that, if this were remov-Testament. This is the secret of those many ed, all the safeguards of right and property qualifying clauses, by which its most luminwould be removed along with it. The power ous announcements have been beset, to the of refusal, on the part of those who have utter darkening of them. This it is which the right of refusal, may be abolished by an explains the many sad invasions that have act of violence, on the part of those who been made on the most manifest and unhave it not; and then, when this happens deniable literalities of the law and of the in individual cases, we have the crimes of testimony. And our present text, among assault and robbery; and when it happens others, has received its full share of mutilaon a more extended scale, we have anarchy tion, and of what may be called "dressing and insurrection in the land. Or the power up," from the hands of commentators-it of refusal may be taken away by an au- having wakened the very alarms of which thoritative precept of religion; and then we have just spoken, and called forth the might it still be matter of apprehension, lest very attempts to quiet and to subdue them. our only defence against the inroads of Surely, it has been said, we can never be selfishness and injustice were as good as required to do unto others what they have given up, and lest the peace and interest of no right, and no reason, to expect from us. families should be laid open to a most fearful The demand must not be an extravagant exposure, by the enactments of a romantic one. It must lie within the limits of moderaand impracticable system. Whenever this tion. It must be such as, in the estimation is apprehended, the temptation is strongly of every justly thinking person, is counted felt, either to rid ourselves of the enactments fair in the circumstances of the case. The altogether, or at least to bring them down principle on which our Saviour, in the text,

such fearful anticipation as this which causes casuistry to ply its wily expedients, and busily to devise its many limits, and its many exceptions, to the morality of the New Testament. And yet, we think it possible to demonstrate of our text, that no such modifying is requisite; and that, though admitted strictly and rigorously as the rule of our daily conduct, it would lead to no practical conclusions which are at all formidable.

rests the obligation of doing any particular | legality would be overthrown. It is some thing to others, is, that we wish others to do that thing unto us. But this is too much for an affrighted selfishness; and, for her own protection, she would put forth a defensive sophistry upon the subject; and in place of that distinctly announced principle, on which the Bible both directs and specifies what the things are which we should do unto others, does she substitute another principle entirely-which is, merely to do unto others such things as are fair, and right, and reasonable.

For, what is the precise circumstance which lays the obligation of this precept upon you? There may be other places in the Bible where you are required to do things for the benefit of your neighbour, whether you would wish your neighbour to do these things for your benefit or not. But this is not the requirement here. There is none other thing laid upon you in this place, than that you should do that good action in behalf of another, which you would like that other to do in behalf of

Now, there is one clause of this verse which would appear to lay a positive interdict on all these qualifications. How shall we dispose of a phrase, so sweeping and universal in its import, as that of "all things whatsoever?" We cannot think that such an expression as this was inserted for nothing, by him who has told us, that "cursed is every one who taketh away from the words of this book." There is no distinction laid down between things fair, and things un-yourself. If you would not like him to do fair-between things reasonable, and things unreasonable. Both are comprehended in the "all things whatsoever." The signification is plain and absolute, that, let the thing be what it may, if you wish others to do that thing for you, it lies imperatively upon you to do the very same thing for them also. But, at this rate, you may think that the whole system of human intercourse would go into unhingement. You may wish your next-door neighbour to present you with half his fortune. In this case, we know not how you are to escape from the conclusion, that you are bound to present him with the half of yours. Or you may wish a relative to burden himself with the expenses of all your family. It is then impossible to save you from the positive obligation, if you are equally able for it, of doing the same service to the family of another. Or you may wish to engross the whole time of an acquaintance in personal attendance upon yourself. Then, it is just your part to do the same extent of civility to another who may desire it. These are only a few specifications, out of the manifold varieties, whether of service or of donation, which are conceivable between one man and another; nor are we aware of any artifice of explanation by which they can possibly be detached from the "all things whatsoever" of the verse before us. These are the literalitics which we are not at liberty to compromise -but are bound to urge, and that simply, according to the terms in which they have been conveyed to us by the great Teacher of righteousness. This may raise a sensitive | dread in many a bosom. It may look like the opening of a floodgate, through which a torrent of human rapacity would be made to set in on the fair and measured domains of property, and by which all the fences of

it for you, then there is nothing in the compass of this sentence now before you, that at all obligates you to do it for him. If you would not like your neighbour to make so romantic a surrender to your interest, as to offer you to the extent of half his fortune, then there is nothing in that part of the gospel code which now engages us, that renders it imperative upon you to make the same offer to your neighbour. If you would positively recoil, in all the reluctance of ingenuous delicacy, from the selfishness of laying on a relation the burden of the expenses of all your family, then this is not the good office that you would have him to do unto you; and this, therefore, is not the good office which the text prescribes you to do unto him. If you have such consideration for another's ease, and another's convenience, that you could not take the ungenerous advantage of so much of his time for your accommodation, there may be other verses in the Bible which point to a greater sacrifice, on your part, for the good of others, than you would like these others to make for yours; but, most assuredly, this is not the verse which imposes that sacrifice. If you would not that others should do these things on your account, then these things form no part of the "all things whatsoever" you would that men should do unto you; and, therefore, they form no part of the "all things whatsoever" that you are required, by this verse, to do unto them. The bare circumstance of your positively not wishing that any such services should be rendered unto you, exempts you, as far as the single authority of this precept is concerned, from the obligation of rendering these services to others. This is the limitation to the extent of those services which are called for in the text; and it is

surely better, that every limitation to a commandment of God's, should be defined by God himself, than that it should be drawn from the assumptions of human fancy, or from the fears and the feelings of human convenience.

rule rise, in the scale of duty, with its demands upon him; and thus there is rendering to him double for every unfair and ungenerous imposition that he would make on the kindness of those who are around him.

Let a man, in fact, give himself up to a strict and literal observance of the precept in this verse, and it will impress a two-fold direction upon him. It will not only guide him to certain performances of good in behalf of others, but it will guide him to the regulation of his own desires of good from them. For his desires of good from others are here set up as the measure of his per-perty of another. Have the high-mindedformances of good to others. The more selfish and unbounded his desires are, the larger are those performances with the obligation of which he is burdened. Whatsoever he would that others should do unto him, he is bound to do unto them; and, therefore, the more he gives way to ungenerous and extravagant wishes of service from those who are around him, the heavier and more insupportable is the load of duty which he brings upon himself.-The commandment is quite imperative, and there is no escaping from it; and if he, by the excess of his selfishness, should render it impracticable, then the whole punishment due to the guilt of casting aside the authority of this commandment, follows in that train of punishment which is annexed to selfishness. There is one way of being relieved from such a burden. There is one way of reducing this verse to a moderate and practicable requirement; and that is, just to give up selfishness-just to stifle all ungenerous desires-just to moderate every wish of service or liberality from others, down to the standard of what is right and equitable; and then there may be other verses in the Bible by which we are called to be kind even to the evil and the unthankful. But, most assuredly, this verse lays upon us none other thing, than that we should do such services for others as are right and equitable.

Now, there is one way, and a very effectual one, of getting these two ends to meet. Moderate your own desires of service from others, and you will moderate, in the same degree, all those duties of service to others which are measured by these desires. Have the delicacy to abstain from any wish of encroachment on the convenience or pro

ness to be indebted for your own support to the exertions of your own honourable industry, rather than the dastardly habit of preying on the simplicity of those around you. Have such a keen sense of equity, and such a fine tone of independent feeling, that you could not bear to be the cause of hardship or distress to a single human creature, if you could help it. Let the same spirit be in you, which the Apostle wanted to exemplify before the eye of his disciples, when he coveted no man's gold, or silver, or apparel; when he laboured not to be chargeable to any of them; but wrought with his own hands, rather than be burdensome. Let this mind be in you, which was also in the Apostle of the Gentiles; and, then, the text before us will not come near you with a single oppressive or impracticable requirement. There may be other passages, where you are called to go beyond the strict line of justice, or common humanity, in behalf of your suffering brethren. But this passage does not touch you with any such preceptive imposition: and you, by moderating your wishes from others down to what is fair and equitable, do, in fact, reduce the rule which binds you to act according to the measure of these wishes, down to a rule of precise and undeviating equity.

The operation is somewhat like that of a governor or fly, in mechanism. This is a The more extravagant, then, a man's very happy contrivance, by which all that wishes of accommodation from others are, is defective or excessive in the motion, is the wider is the distance between him and confined within the limits of equability; the bidden performances of our text. The and every tendency, in particular, to any separation of him from his duty, increases mischievous acceleration, is restrained. at the rate of two bodies receding from each The impulse given by this verse to the conother by equal and contrary movements.duct of man among his fellows, would seem, The more selfish his desires of service are to a superficial observer, to carry him to alí from others, the more feeble, on that very the excesses of a most ruinous and quixotic account, will be his desires of making any surrender of himself to them, and yet the greater is the amount of that surrender which is due. The poor man, in fact, is moving himself away from the rule; and the rule is just moving as fast away from the man. As he sinks, in the scale of selfishness, beneath the point of a fair and moderate expectation from others, does the

benevolence. But let him only look to the skilful adaptation of the fly. Just suppose the control of moderation and equity to be laid upon his own wishes, and there is not a single impulse given to his conduct be yond the rate of moderation and equity. You are not required here to do all things whatsoever in behalf of others, but to do all things whatsoever for them, that you would

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This rule of our Saviour's, then, prescribes moderation to our desires of good from others, as well as generosity to our doings in behalf of others; and makes the first the measure of obligation to the second. It may thus be seen how easily, in a Christian society, the whole work of benevolence could be adjusted, so as to render it possible for the givers not only to meet, but also to overpass, the wishes and expectations of the receivers. The rich man may have a heavier obligation laid_upon him by other precepts of the New-Testament; but, by this precept, he is not bound to do more for the poor man, than what he himself would wish, in like circumstances, to be done for him. And let the poor man, on the other hand, wish for no more than what a Christian ought to wish for; let him work and endure to the extent of nature's sufferance, rather than beg-and only beg, rather than that he should starve; and in such a state of principle among men, a tide of beneficence would so go forth upon all the vacant places in society, as that there should be no room to receive it. The duty of the rich, as connected with this administration, is of so direct and positive a character, as to obtrude itself at once on the notice of the Christian moralist. But the poor also have a duty in it-to which we feel ourselves directed by the train of argument which we have now been prosecuting-and a duty, too, we think, of far greater importance even than the other, to the best interests of mankind.

For, let us first contrast the rich man who is ungenerous in his doings, with the poor man who is ungenerous in his desires; and see from which of the two it is, that the cause of charity receives the deadlier infliction. There is, it must be admitted, an individual to be met with occasionally, who represents the former of these two characters; with every affection gravitating to itself, and to its sordid gratifications and interests; bent on his own pleasure, or his own avarice and so engrossed with these, as to have no spare feeling at all for the brethren of his common nature; with a heart obstinately shut against that most powerful of applications, the look of genuine and imploring distress-and whose very countenance speaks a surly and determined

exclusion on every call that proceeds from it; who in a tumult of perpetual alarm about new cases, and new tales of suffering, and new plans of philanthropy, has at length learned to resist and to resent every one of them; and, spurning the whole of this disturbance impatiently away, to maintain a firm defensive over the close system of his own selfish luxuries, and his own snug accommodations. Such a man keeps back, it must be allowed, from the cause of charity, what he ought to have rendered it in his own person. There is a diminution of the philanthropic fund up to the extent of what benevolence would have awarded out of his individual means, and individual opportunities. The good cause is a sufferer, not by any positive blow it has sustained, but the simple negation of one friendly and fostering hand, that else might have been stretched forth to aid and patronise it. There is only so much less of direct countenance and support than would otherwise have been; for, in this our age, we have no conception whatever of such an example being at all infectious. For a man to wallow in prosperity himself and be unmindful of the wretchedness that is around him, is an exhibition of altogether so ungainly a character, that it will far oftener provoke an observer to affront it by the contrast of his own generosity, than to render it the approving testimony of his imitation. So that all we have lost by the man who is ungenerous in his doings, is his own contribution to the cause of philanthropy. And it is a loss that can be borne. The cause of this world's beneficence can do abundantly without him. There is a ground that is yet unbroken, and there are resources which are still unexplored, that will yield a far more substantial produce to the good of humanity, than he, and thousands as wealthy as he, could render to it out of all their capabilities.

But there is a far wider mischief inflicted on the cause of charity, by the poor man who is ungenerous in his desires; by him, whom every act of kindness is sure to call out to the reaction of some new demand, or new expectation; by him, on whom the hand of a giver has the effect, not of appeasing his wants, but of inflaming his rapacity; by him who, trading among the sympathies of the credulous, can dexterously appropriate for himself a portion tenfold greater than what would have blest and brightened the aspect of many a deserving family. Him we denounce as the worst enemy of the poor. It is he whose ravenous gripe wrests from them a far more abundant benefaction, than is done by the most lordly and unfeeling proprietor in the land. He is the arch-oppressor of his brethren; and the amount of the robbery which he has practised upon them, is not to be esti

mated by the alms which he has monopo- | life becomes, will it be the more seen of lized, by the food, or the raiment, or the what a high pitch of generosity even the money, which he has diverted to himself, very poorest are capable. They, in truth, from the more modest sufferers around him, though perhaps they are not aware of it, he has done what is infinitely worse than can contribute more to the cause of charity, turning aside the stream of charity. He by the moderation of their desires, than the has closed its floodgates. He has chilled rich can by the generosity of their doings. and alienated the hearts of the wealthy, by They; without, it may be, one penny to bethe gall of bitterness which he has infused stow, might obtain a place in the record of into this whole ministration. heaven, as the most liberal benefactors of A few such harpies would suffice to exile their species. There is nothing in the huma whole neighbourhood from the attentions ble condition of life they occupy, which of the benevolent, by the distrust and the precludes them from all that is great or jealousy wherewith they have poisoned graceful in human charity. There is a way their bosoms, and laid an arrest on all the in which they may equal, and even outsensibilities that else would have flowed peer, the wealthiest of the land, in that very from them. It is he who, ever on the virtue of which wealth alone has been conwatch and on the wing about some enter- ceived to have the exclusive inheritance. prize of imposture, makes it his business to There is a pervading character in humanity work and to prey on the compassionate which the varieties of rank do not obliteprinciples of our nature; it is he who, in rate; and as, in virtue of the common coreffect, grinds the faces of the poor, and that, ruption, the poor man may be as effectually with deadlier severity than even is done by the rapacious despoiler of his brethren, as the great baronial tyrant, the battlements of the man of opulence above him-so, there whose castle seem to frown, in all the pride is a common excellence attainable by both; of aristocracy, on the territory that is be- and through which, the poor man may, to fore it. There is, at all times, a kindliness the full, be as splendid in generosity as the of feeling ready to stream forth, with a ten-rich, and yield a far more important contrifold greater liberality than ever, on the bution to the peace and comfort of society. humble orders of life; and it is he, and such To make this plain-it is in virtue of a as he, who have congealed it. He has generous doing on the part of a rich man, raised a jaundiced medium between the when a sum of money is offered for the rerich and the poor, in virtue of which, the lief of want; and it is in virtue of a geneformer eye the latter with suspicion; and rous desire on the part of a poor man, when there is not a man who wears the garb, and this money is refused; when, with the feelprefers the applications of poverty, that has ing, that his necessities do not just warrant not suffered from the worthless impostor him to be yet a burden upon others, he dewho has gone before him. They are, in clines to touch the offered liberality; when, fact, the deceit, and the indolence, and the with a delicate recoil from the unlooked-for low sordidness of a few who have made proposal, he still resolves to put it for the outcasts of the many, and locked against present away, and to find, if possible, for them the feelings of the wealthy in a kind himself a little longer; when, standing on of iron imprisonment. The rich man who the very margin of dependence, he would is ungenerous in his doings, keeps back one yet like to struggle with the difficulties of labourer from the field of charity. But a his situation, and to maintain this severe poor man who is ungenerous in his desires, but honourable conflict, till hard necessity can expel a thousand labourers in disgust should force him to surrender. Let the moaway from it. He sheds a cruel and ex-ney which he has thus nobly shifted from tended blight over the fair region of philanthropy; and many have abandoned it, who, but for him, would fondly have lingered thereupon; very many, who, but for the way in which their simplicity has been tried and trampled upon, would still have tasted the luxury of doing good unto the poor, and made it their delight, as well as their duty, to expend and expatiate among their habitations.

We say not this to exculpate the rich; for it is their part not to be weary in welldoing, but to prosecute the work and the labour of love under every discouragement. Neither do we say this to the disparagement of the poor; for the picture we have given is of the few out of the many; and the closer the acquaintance with humble

himself take some new direction to another; and who, we ask, is the giver of it? The first and most obvious reply is, that it is he who owned it: but, it is still more emphatically true, that it is he who has declined it. It came originally out of the rich man's abundance: but it was the noble-hearted generosity of the poor man that handed it onwards to its final destination. He did not emanate the gift; but it is just as much that he has not absorbed it, but left it to find its full conveyance to some neighbour poorer than himself, to some family still more friendless and destitute than his own. It was given the first time out of an over flowing fulness. It is given the second time out of stinted and self-denying penury. In the world's eye, it is the proprietor who be

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