Character and Conduct Part 18

"Enveloped in a common mist, we seem to walk in clearness ourselves, and behold only the mist that enshrouds others."

GEORGE ELIOT.

Unbalanced Memory

APRIL 21

"Strange endurance of human vanity! a million of much more important conversations have escaped one since then, most likely--but the memory of this little mortification (for such it is, after all) remains quite fresh in the mind, and unforgotten, though it is a trifle, and more than half a score of years old. We forgive injuries, we survive even our remorse for great wrongs that we ourselves commit; but I doubt if we ever forgive slights of this nature put upon us, or forget circ.u.mstances in which our self-love has been made to suffer."

W. M. THACKERAY.

"A past error may urge a grand retrieval."

GEORGE ELIOT.

"Memory is not a pocket, but a living instructor, with a prophetic sense of the values which he guards; a guardian angel set there within you to record your life, and by recording it to animate you to uplift it."

EMERSON.

"Silence a great Peacemaker"

APRIL 22

"Hard speech between those who have loved is hideous in the memory, like the sight of greatness and beauty sunk into vice and rags."

GEORGE ELIOT.

"I don't want to say anything nasty, because nasty words always leave a scar behind."

_Isabel Carnaby_, ELLEN THORNEYCROFT FOWLER.

"Silence is a great peacemaker."

LONGFELLOW.

"If bitterness has crept into the heart in the friction of the busy day's unguarded moments, be sure it steals away with the setting sun.

Twilight is G.o.d's interval for peace-making."

Reconciliation

APRIL 23

"It is exceedingly noteworthy that in the rule laid down here by our Lord, the responsibility of seeking reconciliation is laid primarily, not upon the man who has done wrong, but upon the man who has received the wrong. It is the injured man who is to take the initiative, to go after the offender, to seek him out, and to exhaust all proper means of bringing him to a right state of mind, and of getting him reconciled to the man whom he has wronged. It is only after all these proper means have been exhausted, after the man who has been injured has done everything in his power--a great deal more than the law prescribed--it is then only that he is to regard the offender as 'a heathen man and a publican.' Is not this the exact opposite to the world's code of morality upon that subject? Is it not the rule among men of the world--I do not use the word in a bad sense--is it not the rule among Christian men of the world, who live what we should call on the whole good honest lives, to wait until the offender has come to them with a confession and an apology? And if they then accept the apology and forgive the offence, they probably think they have done something very magnanimous; nor would they consider they had done anything very much amiss if they refused to accept the apology, especially if the offence had been a gross one. If the offender did not apologise, even an otherwise good Christian would probably think that he might treat the matter with indifference, take no notice of it, and say to himself, 'He has offended me, I will take no notice, I will leave him to himself.' Would not men of the world--Christian men--consider that they had upon the whole discharged the Christian duty of forgiveness if they treated the offender in that way? But the law which our Lord laid down in His answer to Peter, which governed His own conduct, the law which rules the dealing of Almighty G.o.d with sinful man, is that the man who has been injured, to whom the wrong has been done, is to make the first move, is to take the first step, is to go after the man who has done the wrong, and use his utmost means of persuasion to convince him of his guilt, and to bring him back from the error of his ways."

_Life Here and Hereafter_, Canon MACCOLL.

Reconciliation and Forgiveness

APRIL 24

"Never forget, when you have been injured, that your duty is not only to refrain from retaliating, not simply to retire upon your dignity and self-respect, not to leave the offender severely alone; but to seek him out, to reason with him, to pray for him, to exhaust all your powers of persuasion, all the resources of gentleness and love. It is only when all this has been done that your responsibility is ended, and you are justified in leaving him to be dealt with by Almighty G.o.d."

_Life Here and Hereafter_, Canon MACCOLL.

"'Remember,' he said, ... 'that if you forgive him, you become changed yourself. You no longer see what he has done as you see it now. That is the beauty of forgiveness: it enables us better to understand those whom we have forgiven. Perhaps it will enable you to put yourself in his place.'"

_The Mettle of the Pasture_, JAMES LANE ALLEN.

"Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look through each other's eyes for an instant?"

Th.o.r.eAU.

Forgiveness

APRIL 25

"The little hearts that know not how to forgive!"

TENNYSON.

"Oh, make my anger pure--let no worst wrong Rouse in me the old n.i.g.g.ard selfishness.

Give me Thine indignation--which is love Turned on the evil that would part love's throng; Thy anger scathes because it needs must bless, Gathering into union calm and strong All things on earth, and under, and above.

"Make my forgiveness downright--such as I Should perish if I did not have from Thee; I let the wrong go, withered up and dry, Cursed with divine forgetfulness in me.

'Tis but self-pity, pleasant, mean and sly, Low whispering bids the paltry memory live:-- What am I brother for, but to forgive?

Lord, I forgive--and step in unto Thee."

GEORGE MACDONALD.

Reparation

APRIL 26