SIXTEEN CHARACTERISTICS OF LOVE (ΑΓΑΠΗ).
| 1. | It is long-suffering. |
| 2. | is kind. |
| 3. | envieth not. |
| 4. | vaunteth not itself. |
| 5. | is not puffed up. |
| 6. | doth not behave itself unseemly. |
| 7. | seeketh not its own. |
| 8. | is not easily provoked. |
| 9. | thinketh no evil. |
| 10. | rejoiceth not in iniquity. |
| 11. | rejoiceth in the truth. |
| 12. | beareth all things. |
| 13. | believeth all things. |
| 14. | hopeth all things. |
| 15. | endureth all things. |
| 16. | never faileth. |
St. Paul (1 Cor. xiii.)
Ἀγάπη, brotherly love, “Though I have all knowledge and all faith, though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not ἀγάπη, it profiteth me nothing.” (1 Cor. xiii, 2).
In the Eighth Century B.C., in the heart of a world of idolatrous polytheists, the Hebrew prophets put forth a conception of religion which appears to be as wonderful an inspiration of genius as the art of Pheidias or the science of Aristotle. “And what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?”[20]
T. H. Huxley (Essays, IV, 161).
The best of all we do and are,