cursing. My brethren, these things ought not so to be "."

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Compare the members of this household with those of another, where they live together in unity. How happy and cheerful the last! how wretched the first! more wretched than they would acknowledge, even to themselves. For is it not wretched to have one's angry feelings continually excited? It is impossible to feel at peace with ourselves, whilst we are living at variance with others. Peace is the greatest blessing we can enjoy upon earth; the announcement of the birth of our Saviour was coupled with that of peace on earth, and His last legacy to His disciples was peace. "Peace I leave with you, My peace I give unto you';" but where love is not, there can be no peace. But, if there were one Christian soul in that household, who would set himself to restore good feeling amongst its members, and pour oil upon the troubled waters, discord might soon cease, and harmony and love be restored. Very often a little explanation, a little concession on one side and on the other, is all that is needed, but some hand is wanted to bind up the broken threads. "Blessed are the peace makers: for they shall be called the children of God?'

James iii. 5, 6. 9, 10.

1 John xiv. 27.

We are all a great deal too apt to think and speak evil of our neighbours. We take hasty dislikes, we impute bad motives to people, we see their faults much more quickly than we see their merits. Then, too, we proclaim their faults and wrong-doing to others, and, though we would hardly admit this even to ourselves, are perhaps pleased to have some evil to tell of them. We think our own conduct stands out in pleasing contrast to theirs, and are anxious to have it understood how far we are from acting as they have done. "Charity," which is love, "thinketh no evil," says St. Paul; there are many amongst us who, on the contrary, think no good. "Judge not," says our Lord. We know nothing of each other's inner life; to our own Master we must each stand or fall. There are many who have little faults or weaknesses, some, indeed, who fall into serious errors, who yet are highly esteemed of God. The Pharisee, who went into the Temple to pray, no doubt was looked upon by his neighbours as a man of pure and blameless life, the Publican was despised as a sinner, yet the Publican was the nearer to the kingdom of God. King David committed a sin of deadly dye, yet he was the beloved of God, the man after God's own heart. How often do we find when we have disliked and despised people, that, on a

closer acquaintance, they have shown virtues of which we had not suspected the existence, and in the brightness of which we have lost sight of the little faults which we had at first noticed. But even if people are really bad, we should act a more loving and Christian part if we were to hide their faults. "Charity covereth a multitude of sins," that is, not our own sins, but the sins of others, which we are to throw a veil over, and turn away our eyes from beholding. What misunderstandings, what heart-burnings arise from evil-speaking and tale-bearing! "He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; but he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends." If we were perfect in love, the transgressions of our neighbours would be a cause, not of satisfaction to us, but of shame-shame such as a wife may feel at the sin of her husband, or a brother at that of his brother. There are scarcely any so lost that some good may not be found in them, and it should be our endeavour to seek this out and draw it forth.

The old commandment requires that we should love our neighbours as ourselves, and if we consider how well we love ourselves, we shall see that this is no easy task. How indulgent we are to ourselves! How hard it is to deny

4

ourselves any pleasure that is within our grasp ! What good reasons we find for not doing that which our consciences tell us we should do; what excellent excuses we invent for our wrongdoing! But, should a neighbour do wrong, the case is pressed against him, we will hear of no excuse, it seems almost as if we should be partakers in his fault, if we admitted any thing in his favour. But the law of Christ goes even further. "A new commandment," says He, "I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another "." What sort of love was His? Love which drew Him who was the brightness of His Father's glory," the "express image of His person," down from Heaven to visit us in great humility, to be born of a poor peasant woman in the stable of an inn, to live amongst His own people as the despised and rejected of men. Love which led Him to go about doing good, healing the sick and those that were oppressed of the devil, rejecting no appeal, but ready always to save. Love which made Him treat the sinner with infinite compassion and mercy; and love which induced Him to die at last a shameful and cruel death, a death from which even His flesh shrank, that we "might live eternally." "Greater

John xiii. 34.

love hath no man than this, that a man lay

down his life for his friends "."

"For scarcely

die; ... but

for a righteous man will one God commendeth His love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us." We are to humble ourselves, to be kind, and to neglect no opportunity of doing good. We are to be merciful, and, whilst hating sin, to be charitable to the sinner, and to be ready at all times to sacrifice ourselves, yea, even to give up our own lives, if our neighbour's good requires such a sacrifice from us.

It is but few who are called upon to lay down their lives, but circumstances may arise in any one's experience in which they must take their lives in their hands, and do their duty without fear of consequences. Not only the soldier who lays down his life on the field of battle for his country's sake, but any one may be called upon at a moment's notice to risk his life to save the life of another, from fire or other accident, or perhaps to watch by the bedside of a fever patient. Only a few weeks since, a woman was crossing the railway, near a station, not perceiving that a train was rapidly approaching. The station-master saw her danger, and rushed forward to save her.

5 John xv. 13.

• Rom. v. 7,

8.

He