Love, A Mother’s—See [Mother-love].

LOVE, A PROOF OF

We can not permanently benefit men until we are willing to get near to them. The Christian method of charity is illustrated in this incident in the career of a notable promoter of London city missions:

Love is not fastidious; her hands are as busy as her heart is full. He (Frank Crossley) found five dirty youngsters (their father a sot, their mother in the sick ward), and he burned their old clothes and clad them in clean ones, and then sent them to play with his own boy! Is it any wonder if both their father and mother were won?—Pierson, “The Miracles of Missions.”

(1902)

LOVE AND LAW

As to which was the first and greatest command, the rabbis were in grave doubt. Most agreed that the smallest and least command was the one concerning the bird’s nest, recorded in Deut. 22:6, 7; but when it came to the first and greatest, they were in doubt, whether it was the one respecting the observance of the Sabbath, or the law concerning circumcision, or the one concerning fringes and phylacteries, while still others contended that the omission of ceremonial ablutions was as bad as homicide. With these distinctions and differences and absurd hair-splittings in mind the young lawyer addrest the master with the question, “Which is the first commandment of all?” What a majestic answer was that which he received! Nothing in it about fringes and phylacteries, nothing about ceremonial washings, nothing about attitudes and genuflections; but the grand answer which will abide for all time to come: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind, and with all thy strength, this is the first commandment.” This answer goes to the heart of the matter. Eighteen hundred years have not suggested any improvement or addition to the great answer, nor will eighteen hundred years to come, because it embraces all other answers and is the sum total of morality.—The Golden Rule.

(1903)

LOVE AND TIME

Love that lasts is the power that binds heart to heart with the indissoluble bonds. Such love knows no limit of time. Dr. Van Dyke says: