The germ of this heaven-born principle has survived the fall; and though its highest development is one of the distinguishing marks of the true Christian, its existence is discernible in all who have not sinned away the last faint outlines of the Divine image.
Some philosophers, indeed, would persuade us that there is no such thing in existence as a principle of pure, unmixed benevolence; that every exercise of charity is simply another mode of self-gratification, and every generous impulse a mere exhibition of selfishness.
Undoubtedly there is a “luxury in doing good,” and the ability to contribute to the happiness of others is one of the purest sources of human gratification; but we question whether an act, resulting from mere self-love, is capable of yielding any solid satisfaction to the agent; and we therefore hold the existence of genuine benevolence, believing that it is a principle innate in the human breast, and requiring only to be developed and consecrated by religious influence to become one of the most powerful levers for the evangelization of the world.
Unhappily there are too many who have schooled themselves to the practice of inhumanity, and closed up the springs of spontaneous sympathy, thus depriving the heart of its rightful heritage, and restricting the sphere of its operations to self. Those who thus sever themselves from all external influences are left at length in undisturbed possession of a little world of their own creation. No longer linked to their fellow-men in the bonds of true fellowship, their orbit of activity becomes narrower, until at length every avenue to the heart is hermetically sealed, except such as minister to self-gratification and indulgence. The man who has thus estranged himself from the rest of creation, and become isolated from all the ties of a common humanity, is indeed an object of unqualified pity, because he has destroyed one of the purest springs of happiness.
He who, on the other hand, is most fully alive to the claims of universal brotherhood, and whose heart is most
“At leisure from itself,
To soothe and sympathize,”
is the highest type of man, and the best representative of his race. This spirit of brotherhood if recognised by the world, would “hush the thunder of battle, and wipe away the tears of nations. It would sweep earth’s wildernesses of moral blight, causing them to blossom as the rose.”
Those persons who accustom themselves to speak of London as a mere seething caldron of crime, or as a very charnel-house of impurity, without any redeeming character or hopeful element, are surely as wide of the mark as they who under-rate its vast resources for crime, or take a superficial view of its predominant vices.
It would, perhaps, be a curious and not unprofitable subject of inquiry how far the metropolis contributes its influence for good or evil upon the provinces, and to what extent the country is capable of reciprocating this influence. Probably, allowance being made for the difference of population, the law of giving and receiving is pretty evenly adjusted. Those forms of vice which seem to be more indigenous to our great cities are steadily imported into the country, while on the other hand, the hamlet and the village transmit to the town those particular vices in which they appear to be constitutionally most prolific.