"Love them who
love us;" or, "love them who are worthy of our love," the difficulty is
obviously lessened, if not in fact removed. But such a limit, while it
might amount to prudence, would not reach up to beatitude. "If ye love
them who love you, what do ye more than others?" "Thou shalt love thy
neighbour as thyself." But who is thy neighbour? And Jesus answers,
"thy neighbour is he who bears thy nature." This is iteration, but I
venture it because I want us to confront the real insistence of this
text. They who share our nature may be, and often are, those who hate
us with or without a cause. There are people who perpetuate an
existence on others which is little better than a moral and physical
calamity. To tell us to tolerate them, not to speak about loving them,
is like telling us to attempt the impossible. And yet Jesus did not
forget these people when He said: "Love your enemies, bless them that
curse you, pray for them who despitefully use you and persecute you."

We, then, who say we accept Christ's teaching must accept it. This is
one of the places where we cannot escape behind some ingenuity of
exegesis or manipulation of text. The command is plain. We can take
it or leave it. One thing we cannot do, we cannot re-write it. "Thou
shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." As thyself. If this but fixes a
hard standard; or simply indicates the measurement of neighbourly love,
then we may almost as well close the discussion--its practical
attainment is out of our reach.

But, as some one has very wisely said: "Love of self must become a
medium before it becomes a measure." [1] In other words, we cannot
love our neighbour as we ought until we love ourselves as we should.
Out of love of self "flow the ingredients which must enter into
neighbour love."

The text, then, lays down a twofold obligation: to cultivate a right
love of self, and to translate this love of self into love for others.

As touching the first part of this obligation, it is useless to ask
what it is in our neighbour we are to love as ourselves, until we know
what it is in ourselves we are to love. In what sense is a man to love
himself? Because there is a radical difference between self-love as
taught and practised in the world, and the love of self sanctioned and
regulated by the Royal Law. Love of self is a right anxiety to secure
the things we need in this world. It is based upon the principle that
life is not to be unclot