SERMON XXXII. OF A PEACEABLE TEMPER AND CARRIAGE. ROMANS XII. 18. If it be possible, as much as lieth in you, live peaceably with all men. XXXII. HAVE very lately considered what it is to live SRRM peaceably, and what are the duties included therein; and what means conduce thereto. II. I proceed now to consider the object thereof, and why the duty of living peaceably extends to All men, that is, why we are bound to bear good will, and do good offices, and shew civil respects to all men; and to endeavour, that all men reciprocally be well affected toward us. For it might with some colour of reason be objected, and said, Why should I be obliged heartily to love those, that desperately hate me; to treat them kindly, that use me despitefully; to help them, that would hinder me; to relieve them, that would plunge me into utter distress; to comfort them, that delight in my affliction; to be respective to, and tender of, their reputation, who despise, defame, and reproach me; to be indulgent and favourable to them, who are harsh and rigorous in their dealings with me; to spare and pardon them, who with implacable malice persecute me? Why should I seek their friendship, who disdainfully reject mine? why prize their favour, who scorn mine? why strive to please them, 28 B. S. VOL. II. XXXII. SERM. who purposely offend me? Or why should I have any regard to men, void of all faith, goodness, or desert? And most of all, why should I be bound to maintain amicable correspondence with those, who are professed enemies to piety and virtue, who oppugn truth, and disturb peace, and countenance vice, error, and faction? How can any love, consent of mind, or communion of good offices, intercede between persons so contrarily disposed? I answer, they may, and ought, and that because the obligation to these ordinary performances is not grounded upon any peculiar respects, special qualifications, or singular actions of men, (which are contingent and variable,) but upon the indefectible score of common humanity. We owe them, (as the philosopher alleged, when he dispensed his alms to an unworthy person,) Οὐ τῷ ἀνθρώπῳ, ἀλλὰ τῷ ἀνθρω Tiva, not to the men, but to human nature resident in them. There be indeed divers other sorts of love, in nature and object more restrained, built upon narrower foundations, and requiring more extraordinary acts of duty and respect, not competent to all men ; as a love of friendship, founded upon long acquaintance, suitableness of disposition, and frequent exchanges of mutual kindness: a love of gratitude, due to the reception of valuable benefits; a love of esteem, belonging to persons endued with worth and virtue; a love of relation, resulting from kindred, affinity, neighbourhood, and other common engagements. But the love of benevolence, (which is precedent to these, and more deeply rooted in nature, more ancient, more unconfined, and more a [Aristot. apud Stob. Flor. Tit. XXXVII. 32. Tom. II. p. 56. Ed. Gaisford.] XXXII. immutable,) and the duties mentioned, consequent SERM. on it, are grounded upon the natural constitution, necessary properties, and unalterable condition of humanity, and are upon several accounts due thereto. I Upon account of universal cognation, agreement, and similitude of nature. For, Oiketov άπas ἄνθρωπος ἀνθρώπῳ καὶ φίλον; All men naturally are of kin and friends to each other, saith Aristotle'. Fratres autem etiam vestri sumus, jure naturæ matris unius; We are also your brethren in the right of nature, our common mother, saith Tertullian of old, in the name of the Christians to the heathens. We are but several streams issuing from one primitive source; several branches sprouting from the same stock; several stones hewed out of the same quarry: one substance, by miraculous efficacy of the divine benediction diffused and multiplied. One element affords us matter, and one fire actuates it, kindled at first by the breath of God. One blood flows in all our veins; one nour- Acts xvii. ishment repairs our decayed bodies, and one common air refreshes our languishing spirits. We are cohabitants of the same earth, and fellow-citizens of the same great commonwealth; Unam omnium rempublicam agnoscimus, mundum, said the forementioned Apologist for Christianity. We were b Eth. vIII. 1. [3.] c d Apolog. [Cap. xxxix. Opp. p. 31. B.] ὁ Ἀνδράποδον, οὐκ ἀνέξῃ τοῦ ἀδελφοῦ τοῦ σαυτοῦ, ὃς ἔχει τὸν Δία πρόγονον, ὥσπερ υἱὸς ἐκ τῶν αὐτῶν σπερμάτων γέγονε, καὶ τῆς αὐτῆς ǎvwdev kataßoλîs; &c.-Epict. Diss. 1. 13. [3.] Nemo est in genere humano, cui non dilectio, etsi non pro mutua caritate, pro ipsa tamen communis naturæ societate debeatur.-Aug. [Ep. cxxx. ad Probam. Opp. Tom. II. col. 387. c.] e Tert. Apolog. [Cap. xxxvIII. Opp. p. 30. D.] 26. XXXII. SERM. all fashioned according to the same original idea, (resembling God our common Father,) all endowed with the same faculties, inclinations, and affections; all conspire in the essential and more notable ingredients of our constitution; and are only distinguished by some accidental, inconsiderable circumstances of age, place, colour, stature, fortune, and the like; in which we differ as much from ourselves in successions of time. So that what Aristotle said of a friend is applicable to every man; every man is, "AXλos auros, Another ourself": and he that hates another, detests his own most lively pictures; he that harms another, injures his own nature; he that denies relief to another, starves a member of his own body, and withers a Prov. xi. branch of his own tree. The merciful man doeth 17. good to his own soul; but he that is cruel troubleth his own flesh. Neither can any personal demerit of vicious habit, erroneous opinion, enormous practice, or signal discourtesy towards us, dissolve these bands for as no unkindness of a brother can wholly rescind that relation, or disoblige us from the duties annexed thereto; so neither upon the faults or injuries of any man can we ground a total dispensation from the offices of humanity, especially if the injuries be not irreparable, nor the faults incurable. 2 We are indispensably obliged to these duties, because the best of our natural inclinations prompt us to the performance of them; especially those of pity and benignity, which are manifestly discernible in all, but most powerful and vigorous f [Eth. Ix. 4. 5.] Nihil est enim unum uni tam simile, tam par, quam omnes inter nosmetipsos sumus.-Cic. de Leg. 1. [10. 29.] XXXII. in the best natures; and which, questionless, by SERM. the most wise and good Author of our beings were implanted therein both as monitors to direct, and as spurs to incite us to the performance of our duty. For the same bowels, that, in our want of necessary sustenance, do by a lively sense of pain inform us thereof, and instigate us to provide against it, do in like manner grievously resent the distresses of another, and thereby admonish us of our duty, and provoke us to relieve them. Even the stories of calamities, that in ages long since past have happened to persons nowise related to us, yea, the fabulous reports of tragical events, do (even against the bent of our wills, and all resistance of reason) melt our hearts with compassion, and draw tears from our eyes: and thereby evidently signify that general sympathy" which naturally intercedes between all men, since we can neither see, nor hear of, nor imagine another's grief, without being afflicted ourselves. Antipathies may be natural to wild beasts; but to rational creatures they are wholly unnatural. And on the other side, as nature to eating and drinking, and such acts requisite to the preservation of our life, hath adjoined a sensible pleasure and satisfaction, enticing us to, and encouraging us in the performance of them; so, and doubtless to the same end, hath she made relieving the necessities of others, and doing good offices to them, to be accompanied with a very contentful and delicious relish to the mind of the |