BROTHERLY LOVE NOT MERE FRIENDSHIP.
By Joseph Clarke
WORLDLY friendship is based, generally, upon similarity of views and tastes, or identity of interest. In fact, friendship is generally of a selfish nature; or, at least, it is used for selfish interests, and in no sphere of life is selfishness exercised to a greater extent than in the formation of friendship. Not that friendship is in itself wrong, by any means; it is the last remains of that natural regard which mankind had for each other in their primeval state; but it is so degenerated that when no selfish tie binds it to the heart, it is snapped asunder like a thread of tow. Perhaps some one will object that friendship is not all of this nature; that disinterested friendship still exists in many hearts. I answer that disinterested friendship is something to which the world in general are entire strangers. Examine everywhere, and you will find a tendency to form such connexions and friendships, as shall be advantageous in some way or other; and when these considerations find nothing, how soon is a face forgotten. Friendship, in itself, is right; but the motive it is that curses all human joys. This is the canker that turns gold into dross, that makes the ploughing of the wicked to be sin. How different is brotherly love! Of celestial origin, it comes to us from the heavenly world, full of grace and beauty, a stranger to ostentation, an enemy to pomp and noise, and a hater of hypocrisy. It is found sometimes in the courts of kings, or the mansions of the rich, but much oftener in the cottages of the poor. Oftener it is in the hearts of the lowly, than among the great and wise. Brotherly love is purely disinterested. It was developed in the life of Christ and his primitive followers. They braved every danger in order to rescue their fellow-men from the thralldom of sin, and received, in return, scoffs, contempt, imprisonment and death; but this only incited them to still further effort166in the same direction. This is disinterested love. The object of these remarks is to warn against a possible, perhaps common, error, viz., that of mistaking friendship for brotherly love, or allowing brotherly love to degenerate into mere interested friendship. To this end it is indispensable to distinguish clearly between the two kinds of love; for they are as different in their tendency, as opposite can be, although they may seem to the careless, superficial observer to be precisely the same thing. Trials, sooner or later, will test all on this head; for in this imperfect state, there are many drafts on the brethren for this pure, disinterested love; and he whose stock consists of mere friendship, will find himself very poor amid this drain of specie deposits; while he who possesses the genuine christian charity, or brotherly love, will find the fountain inexhaustible; for its source is in heaven. Let us be very cautious and careful lest we mingle the love of God and the brethren with mere interested friendship. For this let us cultivate godlike charity, and if any do not by experience understand its leavening influence upon the heart, let us ask for the eyesalve. Oh for discernment! Then when love rules all our hearts, may God work through us, and by us, and in us, in power and glory, for his own sake, that his name may be glorified."
JOSEPH CLARKE.