st spring a proud spirit, and it cannot fail that I
should count myself more righteous than another, and should despise
other people while I deceive myself. For a married woman, if she
abides in faith, is better in the sight of God than I am with the
Order I belong to. So that when this is understood, that faith brings
with it all that a Christian ought to have, we all of us have one aim
and view, and there is no difference among works.

Wherefore we are thus to understand this passage of St. Peter, that
he means the aim of the soul,--not that which refers to outward
matters,--and an internal view or plan which aspires to those things
that are esteemed with God; so that both the doctrine and the life be
one, and I hold that for excellent which you hold as excellent,--and
again, that is well-pleasing to you which is well-pleasing to me, as
I have said. This sense of things is possessed by Christians, and to
this view we should hold fast, that it may not be perverted, as St.
Paul says; for when the devil has corrupted it, he has forced the
castle of true purity, and all then is lost.

V. 8. _Be ye compassionate, affectionate as brethren, heartily kind,
courteous._ To be compassionate is, that one should make himself a
sharer with another, and have a heart to feel his neighbor's
necessity. When misfortune overtakes him you are not to think,--Ah!
it is right, it is no more than he should have, he has well deserved
it. Where there is love, it identifies itself with its neighbor; and
when it goes ill with him, the heart feels it as though it were its
own experience. But to be brotherly (affectionate as brethren) is
this much, that one should regard another as his own brother. This
certainly may be easily understood, for nature itself teaches it; by
which you see what those that are truly brothers are, that they are
united more heartily together than any friends even. So ought we, as
Christians, to act; for we are all brethren by baptism,--so that
after baptism even father and mother are brother and sister, for I
have the same blessing and inheritance that they have from Christ,
through faith.

_Heartily kind,--Viscerosi._ This word I cannot explain except by
giving an illustration. Observe how a mother or a father act toward
their child,--as when a mother sees her child enduring anguish, her
whole inward being is moved, and her heart within her body; whence is
derived that mode of speech that occurs in many places in S