> r l l i

PRUDENCE 1”

any; and the peace of society is often kept, because, as children say, one is afraid, and the other dares not. Far off, men swell, bully, and threaten; bring them hand to hand, and they are a feeble folk.

It is a proverb that “courtesy costs nothing”; but calculation might come to value love for its profit. Love is fabled to be blind; but kindness is necessary to perception. Love is not a hood, but an eye-water. If you meet a sectary, or a hostile partisan, never rec- ognize the dividing lines; but meet on what common ground remains,—if only that the sun shines, and the rain rains for both; the area will widen very fast, and ere you know it the boundary mountains, on which the eye had fastened, have melted into air. If they set out to contend, Saint Paul will lie, and Saint Iohn will hate. What low, poor, paltry, hypocritical people an argument on religion will make of the pure and chosen souls! They will shuflle, and crow, crook, and hide, feign to confess here, only that they may brag and conquer there, and not a thought has en- riched either party, and not an emotion of bravery, modesty, or hope. So neither should you put your- self in a false position with your contemporaries, by indulging a vein of hostility and bitterness. Though your views are in straight antagonism. to theirs, as- sume an identity of sentiment, assume that you are saying precisely that which all think, and in the flow of wit and love roll out your paradoxes in solid col- umn, with not the infirmity of a doubt. So at least shall you get an adequate deliverance. The natural motions of the soul are so much better than the vol- untary ones, that you will never do yourself justice in dispute. The thought is not then taken hold of by the right handle, does not show itself proportioned,