is no mere traffic with words however skilfully
manipulated. There is a language of God transcending all words, and
intelligible only when we meet Him spirit to spirit in the secret
places of His eternity.

"Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." Observe the setting of
this admonition when first given: "Thou shalt not avenge, nor bear
grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy
neighbour as thyself." This word "neighbour" connoted something that
was a distinct advance in the upward trend of the race. It did, at any
rate, a little to lift the Israelite out of himself into the lives of
others. But it meant to him, at the most, only those who were of the
same tribe or nation. In the fulness of time--when the world was
ready--Jesus took up His own word spoken through Moses, and limited in
its interpretation by the moral intelligence of that day; took up His
own word, and made it co-extensive with humanity.

This is what I mean by a language of God transcending all speech. "You
have been told," says Jesus, "to love your neighbour"; and to the
question, "Who is my neighbour?" He makes the answer reach out to its
full circumference--"Thy neighbour is he or she who bears thy nature."
By the law which declares that God has made of one blood all the
nations of the earth, the physical unity of the race is implied; so by
the operation of the law of love the moral unity, or, what we now call
the "solidarity of humanity," is intended.

"Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." And I hardly need point
out, that it is this little word _as_ in the text which gives us pause.
Is it possible, then, to bring down this command and incarnate it in
our daily life? It does not say, "Thou shalt love thy neighbour with
certain arbitrary qualifications of thy own." It evidently means what
it says: "Thou shalt love thy neighbour _as thyself_." Is it possible
to do it? And many of us are ready to answer, It is not. Either there
has been some mistake in the way it is reported, we tell ourselves, or
it is useless to try to fulfil it with such natures as ours in such a
world as this.

Put it in this way: granted we loved others as we love ourselves--this
should be good and pleasant for those who possessed our love, if it had
genuine strength in it. Granted, again, we had the fulness of the
strong love of others, that should be helpful to us. If we may
condition the Royal Law in some such manner as this,