purpose, " not counting our lives dear to us, so that we may but fulfil the will of God, and finish our course with joyd." To every one who would draw us from the path of duty, we must make this reply, " Whether it be right to hearken unto you more than unto God, judge ye: for we cannot but do what we know to be his wille."]
The Apostle, having thus briefly declared our duty in general terms, proceeds to speak of it,
II. In a more specific manner —
Of those which he particularizes we shall be called to notice three ; namely, the duties,
1. Of kindness — [Here again the language is such as God alone could inspire. Such a sentiment as is here expressed, we are well persuaded, never entered into the mind of an uninspired man: nor do we conceive that it can be expressed with equal brevity and elegance in any other language under heaven. Parents instinctively feel a most tender affection for their offspring. Even the brute creation are penetrated with it perhaps as strongly as the human kind. It arises out of the relation in which they stand to the object of their regards. Now such an attachment we should feel towards all the members of Christ's mystical body : yea, we should not mei'ely feel it, as from instinct, but cultivate it from 'principle1. But, inasmuch as this may be only, as it were, an animal feeling, we must have it tempered and refined " with brotherly love." In brotherly love there is an union proceeding from a correspon- dence of mind, and a reciprocation of good offices and kind returns: and this feeling united with the former, knits to- gether the hearts of men in a way that cannot be expressed, nor indeed conceived by any, who are not themselves the sub- jects of it. It exists not in nature : it is produced only by grace : but wherever it does exist, it raises the object so high in our estimation, that we seem to ourselves low in com- parison of him ; and, consequently, it makes us "prefer him in honour before ourselves." This sentiment is always mutual : each party casts a veil over the defects of the other, and views only his excellencies ; whilst, on the other hand, he is slow to admire his own virtues, and intent rather on humbling himself for his faults. This disposition, I say, believers cultivate towards all who are of the household of faith ; and all of them thus meeting together upon the same ground, " each esteems the other better than himself6."
d Acts xx. 24. e Actsiv. 19, 20.
f 0tXoerropyot. 2 Phil. ii. 3.