| Strength and Beauty |
Chapter 2 |
Page 2 |
The law of love abates nothing of the duty which we owe to each other. It requires us to show to every one all proper honor and regard. We are exhorted to render to all their dues. A noble spirit is always exceedingly careful to respect all personal rights, even in the lowliest. We may not interpret the law of Christian love, therefore, as giving us liberty to withhold from any other attention, service, or courtesy which it is our duty to render. It is not on this side that the lesson of charity touches. We should hold ourselves responsible for the payment in full, to the very last farthing, of all our debt of love or honor to others.
But in the exaction of our own rights we are to be lenient to the last degree. The teaching of our Master on this subject is very clear and emphatic. “Blessed are the meek,” he said. The meek are those who do not contend for their own rights, but submit to be ignored or wronged, taking it quietly, patiently, and sweetly when men fail to do them justice, not fuming and fretting under a sense of wrong.
Meekness is not weakness. There are those who do not assert their rights nor try to enforce them, only because they have no power to contend with the tyrannical oppression which crushes them. There may be no meekness in their quiet submission; perhaps they submit only because they cannot successfully resist. On the other hand, the Master tells us that he himself is meek and lowly in heart. We know, too, that through all his life he never resisted wrong. He complained not even when he was suffering most unjustly and most cruelly. He never demanded his rights, but cheerfully surrendered them. Yet we know that it was not in the powerlessness of weakness that he thus suffered. He had all power and could have crushed his enemies, escaping from their hand. Or he could have summoned legions of angels to his help any moment and have been liberated. But he gave up his rights rather than lift a finger to enforce them.
Page 2