See Luke, x. 29-37. "Who is my neighbour?"

This is the message that ye heard from the beginning, that we should love one another... Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer; and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him.—1 John, iii. 11. 15.

This commandment have we from Him, "That he who loveth God love his brother also.-1 John, iv. 21.

Behold! how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! It is like the precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard, that went down to the skirts of his garments: As the dew of Hermon, and as the dew that descended upon the mountains of Zion.-Ps. cxxxiii. I was born of woman, and drew milk,

As sweet as charity. from human breasts.
I think, articulate, I laugh, and weep,
And exercise all functions of a man.

How then should I and any man that lives
Be strangers to each other? Pierce my veins,
Take of the crimson stream meandering there
And catechise it well; apply thy glass,
Search it, and prove now if it be not blood
Congenial with thine own: and, if it be,
What edge of subtlety canst thou suppose
Keen enough (wise and skilful as thou art)
To cut the link of brotherhood, by which
Our common Maker bound me to the kind?
True, I am not proficient, I confess,

In arts like yours: I cannot call the swift
And perilous lightnings from the angry clouds,
And bid them hide themselves in earth beneath;
I cannot analyse the air, nor catch

The parallax of yonder luminous point,

That seems half quenched in the immense abyss:
Such powers I boast not; neither can I rest
A silent witness of the headlong rage,
Or heedless folly, by which thousands die,
Bone of my bone, and kindred souls to mine.

Cowper.

Lands intersected by a narrow frith
Abhor each other. Mountains interposed
Make enemies of nations, who had else,
Like kindred drops, been mingled into one.
Thus man devotes his brother and destroys;
And worse than all, and most to be deplored,
As human nature's broadest, foulest blot,
Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat
With stripes, that Mercy, with a bleeding heart,
Weeps, when she sees inflicted on a brutè:
Then what is man? and what man seeing this,
And having human feelings, does not blush
And hang his head to think himself a man?

Cowper.

Man, like the generous vine, supported lives;
The strength he gains is from the embrace he gives.
On their own axis as the planets run,

Yet make at once their circle round the sun,

So two consistent motions act the soul,

And one regards itself, and one the whole.

Thus God and Nature link the general frame,
And bid self-love and social be the same.-Pope.

Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?-Shakspeare. Seneca says, however mean or wretched a fellow mortal may be, he is still a member of our common species.

St. Ambrose saith, that brethren should be like the coat of Jesus, which had no seam in it.

St. Chrysostom saith, "Charity is the scope of all God's commandments."

Aunque negros, somos gente.

THEME CXVI. Example more powerful than
Precept.

INTRODUCTION.

1ST REASON.-Man is a creature of imitation, both by education and habit: walking, language, writing, handicrafts, etiquette, and all the courtesies of society, are handed down from generation to generation by the agency of example.

2ND REASON.-Imitation is a sympathetic instinct : Thus our countenances involuntarily reflect the passion or emotion expressed in the face we look at; and hence arises the strong resemblance in voice, features, and habits of all members of the same family.

3RD REASON.There is an invisible and insensible constraint in example, almost independent of will. Thus, where one sheep leads, all the flock will follow; when one person gapes, a similar desire constrains those who notice it to the same act; and when one person weeps or laughs, the contagion spreads through a whole theatre of spectators.

4TH REASON.-Example is a practical illustration both of the possibility of doing what is enjoined, and of the manner how the task is to be performed.

5TH REASON.-Example speaks to the eyes, precept to the ears: but we all learn more readily from sight than hearing.

6TH REASON.-Example interests the spectator; and this interest excites attention, rouses the mind, and impresses the memory far more vividly than any description: The one is a living reality, the other a caput

mortuum.

7TH REASON.-A precept is too rapidly communicated to make a solid impression; performance is more slow; the successive parts are kept more distinct, and the mind of the spectator is not harassed with a confused crowd of undigested ideas.

8TH REASON.- Almost all persons have a degree of "mauvais honte," which impels them to follow what they see others do, to escape the banter and ridicule incurred by singularity.

9TH REASON. The love of praise and emulation is a powerful impulse in man: Thus, when any feat of dexterity is performed, an intuitive desire of emulation seizes the spectator, and creates in him a longing to attempt the same thing.

10TH REASON.-As man is in the flesh, corporeal things affect him more powerfully than abstract ideas; hence it is that man walks more by sight than he does by faith."

SIMILES.

HISTORICAL ILLUSTRATIONS.

QUOTATIONS.-Examples has a secret power and influ ence upon those with whom we hold converse, to form them into the same disposition and manners. It is a living rule that teaches without trouble to the learner, and lets him see his faults without open reproof and upbraiding. Besides, it adds great weight to counsel, when he who gives the advice exacts only what he himself does. -Sej. Palmer's aphorisms and maxims.

Example works more than precept; for words without practice are but counsels without effect. But when we do as we say we illustrate and confirm the rule which we prescribe.-Serj. Palmer's aphorisms and maxims.

Nothing is so infectious as example. What is good we imitate from emulation, what is bad we imitate from natural corruption and malignity, which being kept close by shame, is unlocked and let loose by example.-Serj. Palmer's aphorisms and maxims.

There is a happy contagion in goodness, which kindles goodness in others, as wood is kindled by a neighbouring flame.-Serj. Palmer's pahorisms and maxims.

Precepts lead, examples draw.-Maunder's proverbs.

We do not want precepts (says Pliny) but patterns, for example is the softest and least invidious way of commanding.

Every art is best taught by example.-Maunder's proverbs.

One bad example will spoil many precepts.-Maunder's proverbs.

The example of good men is visible philosophy.Fielding's proverbs.

I have given you an example, that ye should do as I have done to you.-John, xiii. 15.

Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should follow his steps.-1 Pet. ii. 21.

General precepts form abstract ideas of virtue; but, in examples, virtues are made visible in all their circumstances.-A. Cruden.

Examples, by a secret and lively incentive, urge to imitation. We are touched in another manner by the visible practice of saints, which reproaches our defects, and obliges us to the same zeal, than by laws though holy and good.-A. Cruden.

Pluris est oculatus testis unus, quam auriti decem.— Plautus.

Segnius irritant animos demissa per aurem,

Quam quæ sunt oculis subjecta fidelibus, et quæ
Ipse sibi tradit spectator.-Horace.

Exemplo plus quam ratione vivimus.-Seneca.

Homines amplius oculis quam auribus credunt.-Seneca.

Longum iter est per præcepta, breve et efficax per exempla.-Seneca.