Nothing is so infectious as example.

Life is too short for mean anxieties.

Have charity; have patience; have mercy. Never bring a human being, however silly, ignorant, or weak--above all, any little child--to shame and confusion of face. Never by petulance, by suspicion, by ridicule, even by selfish and silly haste--never, above all, by indulging in the devilish pleasure of a sneer--crush what is finest and rouse up what is coarsest in the heart of any fellow-creature.

It has been said that true religion will make a man a more thorough gentleman than all the courts in Europe. And it is true that you may see simple laboring men as thorough gentlemen as any duke, simply because they have learned to fear God; and, fearing him, to restrain themselves, which is the very root and essence of all good breeding.

Do you think that a man is renewed by God's Spirit, when except for a few religious phrases, and a little more outside respectability, he is just the old man, the same character at heart he ever was?

Every winter, When the great sun has turned his face away, The earth goes down into a vale of grief, And fasts, and weeps, and shrouds herself in sables, Leaving her wedding-garlands to decay- Then leaps in spring to his returning kisses.

If thou art fighting against thy sins, so is God. On thy side is God who made all, and Christ who died for all and the Spirit who alone gives wisdom, purity, and nobleness.