As it is contained in two tables, so Moses reduces it to two heads, that we should love God with all our heart, and our neighbor as ourselves; for although he does not unite the two in one passage, yet Christ, by whose Spirit he spoke, explains to us his intention (Matt. 22 : 37). Calv.—The voice of God himself gave forth the Law by which his people were to live; the TEN COMMANDMENTS, on which all other laws were to be founded, and which were themselves summed up under the Old Covenant as well as the New, in two great principles: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and soul and mind and strength, and thy neighbor as thyself.” P. S.

The New Testament is sometimes put in contrast with the Old, as a spirit of love and of life. But love is no less the spirit of the Law than of the Gospel; and though the Law given by Moses, both as a national code and a ritual of worship, required many specific and minute observances, yet its fundamental idea was spiritual consecration to God, as the spring of all duty, the substance of all devotion. This Law was reasonable in its demand, simple in its rule, and had in itself the inspiration of a true life. All its commandments were for good; all its requirements were summed up in the one word love. J. P. T.—As understood by Moses and the people, this Law was not regarded as a series of positive injunctions relating to overt acts, but as inculcating clearly and authoritatively the two great principles which Jesus in the Gospel asserted to be the sum and substance of the Law. It is the singular but very common blunder of even many expounders of the Gospel that Jesus for the first time brought out the great principle of love “as the fulfilling of the Law,” and that it was an original sentiment of Jesus that on the two commands of love to God and love to man depends “the whole Law and the prophets.” Whereas it was Moses himself, the lawgiver, who declared (De. 6 : 4): “And thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy soul, with all thine heart, and with all thy might.” “And now, Israel (De. 10 : 12), what doth the Lord thy God require of thee but to fear the Lord thy God, to walk in his ways, and to love him and serve the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy soul.” So, again, it was Moses who said (Lev. 19 : 18), “Thou shalt not avenge nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people, but thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. I am the Lord.” And it was Moses, the lawgiver, who said (Lev. 19 : 33): “If a stranger sojourn with thee in thy land ye shall not vex him. But the stranger that dwelleth with you shall be as one born among you, and thou shalt love him as thyself, for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt.” And yet, under a strange infatuation, men dare to say and to teach that this Old Testament contains the harsher dispensation, presenting the sterner attributes both of God and man! Whereas, as Tayler Lewis so justly remarks, “the Old Testament is peculiarly the emotional part of Holy Scripture, presenting everything in the strongest manner and in strongest contrast, whether it be wrath or tenderness, indignation against apostasy or love for the oftimes apostate and rebellious people. It may even be maintained that the New Testament, though more didactic, is less tender in its language, less abounding in pictures of melting compassion on the part of God, and devoted affection of one human heart for another.” Is there anything in the New Testament theology more expressive of the love of God for sinners than the theology of the proclamation of Moses—“The Lord, the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abundant in goodness and truth, keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin” (Ex. 34 : 6), or anything more amiable in the New Testament ethics than the ethics of Moses’ summary of the Law? Nay, did not Jesus himself say of that golden rule, so much admired as his teaching, “Whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you do ye even so unto them;” that instead of being original in his teachings—“this is the Law and the prophets”—that is, the spirit of the whole teachings of the Old Testament? On what possible ground, then, can this notion of some general difference between the Old and New Testament theology, ethics, and spirit rest, than upon some strange, invincible ignorance of the teaching and spirit of the Old Testament Gospel? S. R.

The prophets of the Old Testament were continually striving to recall men from mere outward observances to the sincere piety toward God and deeds of kindness to man required by the Law of the two tables; so that the prophets, as well as the Law, were truly said to hang upon one and the same commandment of love. P. F.—There was in the Law of Moses a spiritual law—a law of internal obedience—a law of love, which the Jews might have discerned, had they been willing; and in fact, many among the Jews had discerned it. It is of this spiritual law that the great Law-Maker affirms that not “one jot or tittle” will be lost. Nay, he, Son of God and Son of Man, perfect in truth, in holiness, and in love, came to fulfil the Law and to establish it forever; and this he has done not only in his life and death, but also in his instructions in which he sums it up—that is, gathers together its leading features, and spiritualizes it—that is, acquaints us with its inmost meaning, its whole bearing, extent, and force. In this respect the Gospel is a second edition, perfected by a master-hand, of the writings of the Old Testament. It is, if we prefer it, a Divine translation. The Law henceforth is spiritual for all, even for them who are not spiritual. Vinet.

Nor is the language too strong, if rightly understood, which has often been applied to this law, that it is a kind of transcript of God’s own pure and righteous character—i.e., a faithful and exact representation of that spiritual excellence which eternally belongs to himself, and which he must eternally require of his accountable creatures. The love to God and man, which constitutes its all-pervading element, and for which the several precepts only indicate the particular ways and channels wherein it should flow—this love man is indispensably bound in all times and circumstances to cherish in his heart, and manifest in his conduct. For the God in whom he lives and moves and has his being is love; and as the duty and perfection of the creature is to bear the image of the Creator, so to love as he loves—himself first and supremely, and his offspring in him and for him—must ever be the bounden obligation and highest end of those whom he calls his children. P. F.

The Law of Moses enjoined love to God with the most unceasing solicitude, and love to our neighbor as extensively and forcibly as the peculiar design of the Jewish economy and the peculiar character of the Jewish people would permit; it impressed the deepest conviction of God’s requiring not mere external observances, but heartfelt piety, well-regulated desires, and active benevolence; it taught that sacrifice could not obtain pardon without repentance, or repentance without reformation and restitution; it described circumcision itself, and by consequence every other legal rite, as designed to typify and inculcate internal holiness, which alone could render men acceptable to God; and it represented the love of God to men as designed to act as a practical principle stimulating to the constant and sincere cultivation of purity, mercy, and truth. Graves.

The kernel of the Law, given to Israel through Moses, is love to God and to man. But this general and central principle finds man a member of a family, of society, of a nation. It finds him living in this world of seed-time and harvest, of work and rest, of buying and selling, of sickness and death. What does the Law do? The Law says, God loves you; and God desires that you may have his presence and blessing always. Therefore the Law takes cognizance of every branch of human life. It refers to our food and to our garment; it accompanies us from our birth to our grave. It claims our time and our wealth; it connects seed-time and harvest, all natural life with spiritual truths, redemption-acts, and anticipations of the future glory. There is nothing in our life in which God is not interested, where he is to be absent; there is nothing wherein we may not glorify and obey him. Saphir.

These Ten Commandments cover the whole duty of man to God and to his fellow. The civil and criminal codes of a State fill volumes with endless definitions and specifications; but here all is reduced to the single principle of love, and to a brief but comprehensive statement of the relations to which that principle must be applied. This Law deals with man as a subject of the government of God, as a member of the family and of society. Toward God he is required to observe the reverence and devotion due to the one Jehovah, his Maker, Preserver, and Redeemer. In the family, filial love and veneration are enjoined as peculiarly acceptable to God. Society is protected by this code in all its vital interests—life, chastity, property, and character; and as love is made the essence of obedience to God, so here we are forbidden to indulge a selfish desire with regard to anything that is our neighbor’s. Obedience to this Law would make a perfect human society, and render every individual secure in his own person and possessions, and happy in his relations to others. The Law manifests the love of God: love is its spirit; love, its rule; and only love will be its reward. J. P. T.

The Mosaic moral code adds to the Egyptian ethics the love of God and that of man as the root of moral obedience, and thus gives that obedience a sufficient motive force, and one that we cannot trace in the Egyptian doctrine. R. S. Poole.

De. 6: 5. To the one indivisible Jehovah undivided devotion and love are due. Hence the injunction, Thou shalt love Jehovah thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. The “heart” is the inner nature of the man, including his intellectual, emotional, and conative faculties; the “soul” is the personality, the entire self-consciousness; and the “might” is the sum of the energies, bodily and mental. Not by profession merely is Jehovah to be loved; the whole man, body, soul, and spirit, is to be yielded to Him in holy and devout affection. W. L. A.

Love to God is the source of everything which is good in man. It is a peculiar excellency in the Jewish and Christian dispensations to have formally and solemnly laid down this principle so as to make it a governing, actuating principle of life. This did Moses, or rather God by the mouth of Moses; expressly, formally, solemnly. This did Christ; adopting, repeating, ratifying what the Law had already declared; and not only ratifying but singling it out from the body of precepts which composed the old institution, and giving it a pre-eminence to every other. Paley.

Supreme love to God our Lord calls the first and great commandment, because He who is the object of it is the first and greatest of all beings, and therefore the duties owing to him must have the precedence and pre-eminence over every other; because it is the grand leading principle of right conduct, the original source and fountain from which all Christian graces flow, from whence the living waters of religion take their rise, and branch out into all the various duties of human life; because, in fine, it is, when fervent and sincere, the grand master-spring of human conduct; the only motive sufficiently powerful to subdue our strongest passions, to carry us triumphantly through the severest trials, and render us superior to the most formidable temptations. Bp. Porteous.

It stands upon the surface of the code that the forms and manifestations of love to God occupy the first and most prominent place, while those which are expressive of love to man take a secondary and, in a sense, dependent rank. Religion is made the basis of morality—piety toward God the living root of good-will and integrity toward men; and on this great principle, that unless there were maintained a dutiful and proper regard to the great Head of the human family, it could not reasonably be expected that men would feel and act aright to the different members of the family. There may be a measure of love and fair dealing between man and man, where there is no spiritual acquaintance with God, and no principle of dutiful allegiance to him. Were it not so society in countries where the true religion is unknown would fall to pieces. But in such cases, the love is destitute of what might give it either the requisite stability or the proper spirit; it is not sustained by adequate views of men’s relationship to God, nor animated by the motives which are supplied by a consideration of their higher calling and destiny; hence it is necessarily defective, partial, irregular, in its manifestations. It was, therefore, in accordance with the truest wisdom, that the things which belong to God were, in this condensed summary of Divine requirement, exalted to the first place; and in further attestation of their pre-eminent rank and importance, it is to the commands connected with this branch of duty chiefly, if not exclusively, that special reasons have been attached enforcing the obedience required. In all the later precepts there is a simple enunciation of the command. P. F.

Solemn prayers and sacraments, the assemblies of the faithful and acts of external worship, are the solemnities and rites of religion; but the religion of a Christian is in the heart and spirit. And this is that by which Clemens Alexandrinus defined the righteousness of a Christian, “all the parts and faculties that make up a man must make up our religion;” but the heart is “the court” of the great King; and he is properly served with interior graces and moral virtues, with a humble and a good mind, with a bountiful heart and a willing soul, and these will command the eye, and give laws to the hand, and make the shoulders stoop; but

“a man’s soul is the man,” and so is his religion; and so you are bound to understand it. The sum is this: no Christian does his duty to God but he that serves him with all his heart; and although it becomes us to fulfil all righteousness, even the external also, yet that which makes gracious in his eyes is not the external, it is the love of the heart and the real change of the mind, and obedience of the spirit; that is the first great measure of the righteousness evangelical. Bp. Taylor.

When we understand the whole structure of man and his relations, it is as obvious that he was made to love God with all his heart and his neighbor as himself, as it is that the eye was made to see with or the ear to hear with. This is his highest end as active—love itself as an activity, and the further activities that spring from love. This is what he was made to do. As capable of enjoyment, his highest end is the joy that comes from thus loving. These God has inseparably united. The joy can come only from the love; the love cannot be without the joy. M. H.

All the voices of revelation unite in ascribing the supremacy among the virtues to love. The Decalogue of Moses and the new commandment of Jesus; the abstract reasonings of Paul and the practical exhortations of James; the vivid and impulsive rhetoric of Peter and the subdued and tender verses of John—all blend into perfect harmony as they touch the great key-note of the Gospel, that love is of God, and that he that loveth is born of God. It has been remarked, as a striking evidence of the inspiration of the biblical authors and of the real unity of their writings, that, with all their variety of style and individuality in the type of religious truth which they present, they all agree perfectly in defining the sum and essence of the Gospel to be love. So striking a coincidence cannot be accidental. There is a rational unity in all forms of religious truth. The ground of that unity is love, which is the essence of the Divine character, the motive of revelation and redemption, and the ideal for human life. Stevens.

The religion of the Mosaic covenant was not a ritualistic religion. It had a ritual certainly, orimful of Messianic symbol, but its whole core was spiritual. The love of God and one’s neighbor was the inward principle which formed its heart. God, as a merciful Saviour providing a Substitute to bear the sins of Israel, and calling for their grateful love and service, was constantly exhibited to them in every ceremonial, and the words of exhortation from God to them in the Law were most touching and tender. Crosby.

If there be any single attribute in which the moral character of the Supreme attains to unity, that attribute is his love. More truly than any other quality in him, wisdom, power, justice, or even pity, this may be said to be the Divine nature—“God is love.” Especially in his relationship to us as our Deliverer from evils, has his love been made conspicuous. The characteristic attitude assumed by Jehovah in Old and New Testament revelation, and particularly in the Gospel, is this of a Saviour from every evil. Well, let that be the relationship under which we have learned to welcome, embrace, and confide in God through Jesus Christ; and we shall find that we have welcomed to our embrace mere, pure, and boundless love. Trace our redemption to its source: love drew him from the sky; love urged him to the tree; love raised him from the tomb; love seated him on the throne. Are we associated with the company of God’s invited children within his sacred house? Love spreads the table; love furnishes the feast; love invites the guests. Range through the record which memory keeps of God’s private dealings with you: is it not all unmingled, marvellous love? Love bore with your sin and pardoned it; love made you for an enemy a dear son; love chastens and love comforts; you walk abroad with his love environing your steps like a sweet atmosphere. What is the Gospel of his grace but one amazing forthpouring for our benefit of that affection for the fallen sons of men which lay deepest within God’s heart—“Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” Dykes.

God’s revelation of Himself to man is meant to be a redemptive power in man. Man has heart, soul, strength, understanding, emotion, will, energy. God would have no schism in our being. Now we have one inner faculty, even that of love, which is meant to rule, and does in fact rule, the man. According to the love, so intellect thinks, emotion feels, will decides, life moves. Our text says, let love be all concentrated on one grand object—God! Let him have all. Not even in the New Testament have we a greater commandment than this. “The love of God which the Gospel demands is more intensive and cordial than that which the Law of Moses demands of the Israelites, according to the gradual unfolding of the love of God himself, which was displayed in a much grander and more glorious form in the gift of his only begotten Son for our redemption than in the redemption of Israel out of the bondage in Egypt.” (Keil.) God as revealed to us in Christ—that is theology; our love responding to God’s—that is religion. Without the first, in what could the religious faculty find a proper object? Without the second, infinite love is defrauded of its rights! C. C.

It is in the presence of God we learn this holy art of loving him. When we can realize him near us, and fill our minds with his loveliness, and summon up to “sessions of sweet thought” what he has done for love, and sit down to muse contritely at the cross-foot, and by patient acts of confession and self-surrender make room within these crowded hearts of ours for the Dove of Purity and Peace—it is then the love of God is shed abroad in us. But if quiet and contemplation be conducive to the nourishment of Divine love within the bosom, activity and struggle in the outward life are needful to elicit its force and give it scope for exercise. Let us retire within, that faith and prayer may nurture a secret love for God our Saviour. Let us go forth abroad, that Divine love may approve itself in active service and a holy life. Let us ever aspire to a more complete, unreserved, and settled dedication of our hearts to him who first loved us; until love make worship delightful, obedience easy, and trial light; and love prepare us for that ideal beatific state of celestial preoccupation, when—all else being swallowed up in adoring love—the pure soul shall find eternal rest and joy ineffable in union to him whose name is Love! . . . Submissive, confident dependence on our Father’s and our Saviour’s grace makes our love to God unpresuming; gratitude makes it ardent. Gratitude for the tender mercy that has washed us in the blood of God and for all the unspeakable benefits he hath bestowed on us, is the fount whence the stream of our love is kept ever warm. And when adoration and contrition and lowly trust and fervent gratitude have done each its own part, and love, like a swollen tide, bears their mingled tribute along to Him who loved us unto death, in what ocean doth it merge at last? Surely in a glad blending of its own with the supreme and blessed will of the Eternal Lover! For the perfection of creature love is to have no other will but his who is very Love Itself; to desire nothing, choose nothing, endeavor nothing, but what pleaseth and fulfilleth God. In resignation and obedience is love consummated. On them is her strength spent. . . . Nothing should be tolerated within ourselves, in our conscious, personal life, that is not inspired, controlled, or sweetened by the love we bear our God. If this be gained, the rest must follow. Such love will overflow through all the three main channels by which our personal life pours itself abroad upon society. The mind, or intellectual activities, will obey it; the soul, or emotional and passionate nature, with its social sympathies and earthly affections, will obey it; the strength, or forces of the will, by which a resolved and energetic nature imposes itself upon others, and subdues circumstances to its purposes—this, too, will do its bidding. In short, the entire organism of the individual life is to stand entirely at the service of our love for God; so that our character, disposition, behavior, and work shall come to be just what a supreme affection for our Saviour God determines them to be. Less than this is less than duty; less than this is less than blessedness! Dykes.

There is an instinctive love, sometimes called natural affection. This is common to animals and to man. It is from the emotive nature simply, and so blind and passionate, not comprehending itself or its object. As instinctive, it is an affection which leads to acts often of great apparent self-denial, which tend to promote or secure the end of the being loved. It tends to secure that, and not the end of the being putting forth the love, and is thus a beautiful type of a higher rational and disinterested love. This rational love always has its root in a generic choice. It is by having its root in such a choice that rational and moral love, and indeed all rational and moral affections, are distinguished from those that are natural. In accordance with the above, rational love presupposes a knowledge of the supreme end of the being loved, and involves the choice for him of that end. Its object must be a person. In strictness we desire things, but love only persons. It is not properly a disposition, though a disposition and a habit of acting so as to secure the end chosen will be generated by any generic act of choice. Only a rational being can have a supreme end, and the choice by us of that end for another so as to be willing to put forth efforts and make sacrifices for its attainment is rational love. In the whole process and formation of this love three things are to be distinguished. There is (1) a perception of worth as distinguished from worthiness. This is rather a condition of love than one of its elements. There is (2) a “propension” of mind, as Edwards calls it, toward the being, and a desire that he should attain his end. This is an indispensable element of love, but not the love itself. That it may become rational love there must be (3) a choice for the being of his end, and such a devotement of ourselves to him—that is, to the attainment by him of his end and good—that we shall be willing to make sacrifices for it as we would for our own. It is this last only which constitutes the whole process, rational and free, and brings it under the control of moral law. M. H.

Love is the foundation of all obedience. Without it, morality degenerates into mere casuistry. Love is the foundation of all knowledge. Without it, religion degenerates into a chattering about Moses, and doctrines, and theories; a thing that will neither kill nor make alive, that never gave life to a single soul or blessing to a single heart, and never put strength into any hand in the conflict and strife of daily life. There is no more contemptible and impotent thing on the face of the earth than morality divorced from love, and religious thoughts divorced from a heart full of the love of God. Quick corruption or long decay, and in either case death and putrefaction, are the end of these! It is of no use for us to condemn Pharisees that have been dead and in their graves for eighteen hundred years. The same thing besets us all; we all of us try to get away from the centre, and dwell contented on the surface. People may try to cultivate virtue without religion, and to acquire correct notions of moral and spiritual truth, and partially and temporarily they may succeed; but the one will be a yoke of bondage, and the other a barren theory. I repeat, love is the basis of all knowledge and of all right-doing. If you have got that firm foundation laid in the soul, then the knowledge and the practice will be built in God’s own good time; and if not, the higher you build the temple, and the more aspiring are its cloud-pointing pinnacles, the more certain will be its toppling some day, and the more awful will be the ruin when it comes. A. M.

Love is an uncompromising principle. He has no true love, no complacency in goodness, who does not from the soul condemn everything that is evil. There is no benevolence anywhere in any moral being which is not instinctively opposed to selfishness in all its forms. One may say with truth love hates malevolence, hates all that is opposed to itself in the feelings or the manifestations of the inner life. The conception of it as consisting in a weak good-nature which is indifferent to character has no foundation in the Word of God or in the lives of men whom we cannot help revering. Love is an eleelement of a strong character which views men as they are in all their sins, which feels no favor toward the principles by which the worldly, the selfish, the proud are governed. And thus as it looks on moral evil in all its deformity, it can feel intense pity toward the blind in sin, the misguided, the fallen, the unworthy, and is ever ready to sacrifice its own interests for their good. This is the sign of love that it is capable of self-sacrifice. But no true self-sacrifice can exist without a sense of the misery of sin. Even the lower forms of love hardly deserve to be called by the name, when the motive is mere compassion, without a sense of the greatest evil in human nature. He who can relieve misery but is indifferent to the sin he sees around him, who only excuses it or makes light of it, he is not, to say the least, made perfect in love. The possibility is, that he has no true love at all. Let us remember, then, that the love that dwelt in Christ is something more than instinctive benevolence, good-nature, and compassion; that it is a moral quality of the highest order, implying in the soul repugnance to sin, to selfishness, to malevolence, to ungodliness; and that it is prompted, in the effort of doing away with sin and of reforming sinners, to all compassionate, self-sacrificing efforts. Woolsey.

Love is a personal relation. In our common usage, we have greatly extended the meaning of the word “love.” We often apply it to mere objects of sense or matters of fancy. These are degradations of that noblest, sublimest word which the Scriptures have consecrated to express the highest perfections of the human and the Divine character. In the biblical sense, love exists only between persons. It is a moral union of kindred beings. The outer world and the lower orders of creation are never spoken of as the objects of God’s love. He takes pleasure in them; has a care for them: “his tender mercies are over all his works;” but he loves only man, because love is moral union based upon kinship of spirit. All those attachments and fancies which are beneath a high and pure moral union of spirits are excluded from the sphere of love in the sense of the New Testament. Love is a real affinity and fellowship of life. It is not a mere feeling. The conception of love as a mere stirring of emotion leads many into the dark as to what is meant when we are commanded to love God supremely. Let us put the meaning of that “first and great commandment” before ourselves as simply as possible. God is the absolutely perfect being. Love to God is sympathy, affinity, harmony, with his perfection. It is the fixed choice and constant striving of our hearts toward the perfect life. As such, love is subject to growth and progress. It is a principle of character which is at once the simplest and the profoundest. To reveal this Divine perfection to men through a life human in its experiences, yet Divine in its purity, and then to help men to choose that true and perfect life and make it the type and law of their own, is the chief purpose of Christianity. Hence religion is not mere ethics, nor mere belief, but a personal relation of sympathy and likeness to God as revealed in Jesus Christ.

Love involves an intelligent choice. Love is not blind; it acts in the light of reason. Mere sensuous desire or fancy (often called “love”) is blind, because it does not act from rational motives. The union of two human lives in feeling and purpose is radiant with intelligence. Their love deepens only as they understand each other, and grow into each other’s thoughts more and more. No real love is possible between persons without an intelligent choice of each other. The absence of this element in that which is supposed to be love is the cause of many unhappy unions. The emotions are the warmth of love, but intelligence is its light. This consideration helps us to understand the great commandment. We are to choose God in the light of what we know him to be as the object of our service and the goal of our hopes. God has revealed himself in Christ as perfectly as our finite understandings will permit us to know him. The revelation is in the motives, principles, spirit, and teaching of Jesus. We are to choose these for our own, and make them such; to live, as Paul says, “unto Christ.” To trust in the divinely revealed Saviour, and to choose and exemplify the divinely revealed principles of life, is to love God.

Love enlists the whole being. It fixes every noble emotion. It kindles the life into a calm, steady flame of zeal and devotion. Love longs to give, to serve, to bless. The type of all love is the love of God for man, and God is the great giver. The whole life of Christ is a grand example of this giving impulse of love. All the truest endearments of earth serve to illustrate it. The love that gives nothing for its object may well be doubted. But the gifts of sympathy, time, kindly attentions, and thoughtful care—these are the language of love. Love to God, then, is the gift of our hearts to him.

Love is the most comprehensive virtue. Paul teaches this clearly when, in speaking of the graces of the Christian life—kindness, humility, forbearance, and forgiveness—he adds: “And above all these things put on love, which is the bond of perfectness” (Col. 3:14). All other virtues have their unity in love. Hence the same apostle teaches that the end of Christian instruction is love (1 Tim. 1:5), and that love is “the fulfilment of the Law” (Rom. 13:10). We can easily see that every form of goodness is included in the sphere of love, since love is the supreme choice and service of God, the perfect character. All truths concerning God find their unity in the supreme truth that “God is love” (1 John 4:8, 16). Love is moral completeness. God is righteous because he is love, since love is eternally holy. He is kind and merciful because he is love, since love is eternally benevolent. In this grand truth all Christian doctrines are brought into unity and harmony.

Love is the only principle on which any high form of human society is possible. If the members of a community do not minister to each other’s good; if they do not serve or help one another—that is, if they do not act, in greater or less degree, on the principle of love, no society is possible. Selfishness, which is the opposite of love, is isolation, and would be the destruction of social life. Love is the only bond that can hold men together in pleasant and helpful relations. Christianity, therefore, holds the only principle on which a true civilization can be built. The law of sacrifice is the law of life for communities and nations as well as for individuals. Even the other elements which must enter into all high civilizations, such as wealth, science, and the arts, can be but sparingly utilized for the good of the community except under the law of love. To look not only on one’s own things, but also on the things of others, is the essential condition of all social happiness and well-being.

The law of love is the law of freedom from sin. It is not too strong language to say that love works a moral impossibility of sinning. He that is born of God (he whose life is under the sway of the law of love) cannot commit sin, because he is born of God (1 John 3:9). Sin and love are opposite principles, and if we sin, this is proof that our lives are not perfectly under the sway of the law of love. The more completely they shall become so, the more complete will be our deliverance from sin and our harmony with the Divine life. In Jesus alone, among men, do we see this reign of love supreme and perfect, and to him sin is morally impossible. A strength and a freedom like his will be ours in proportion as we are filled with his spirit. Sevens.

This celestial principle of love is really the only one in which we can perceive the possibility of a reciprocation between our God and ourselves. If we rest upon God by faith, yet he cannot rest upon us; if we pour ourselves upon him in gratitude, yet he cannot return gratitude to us; if we approach him in fear, yet he cannot fear his creatures—but in love alone our God and we are fitted to combine! there alone the human and the Divine nature are one! “We love him, because he first loved us”—“I love them that love me.” W. A. B.—Faith works not by the constraining force of law, but by the energizing force of love. This is the fulfilling of the Law: love sums it up in one sentence, simple, comprehensive, complete. The fruit of this spiritual obedience is seen in all that makes society endurable, home blessed, and life beautiful—in all that gives hope to the world through the coming-in of the kingdom of God. J. P. T.

How can we Love God?

The problem being, How is human love to such a being as God possible? the simple answer is, we love God by loving Christ. That which we love in Jesus Christ is the lineaments of his spiritual nature, the virtues and graces of his inner life, as manifested by his words, his works, and his sufferings. The Gospel narrative is a record of them, and as we read we love. The picture is formed in our mind, and rises before us; but it is a moral image, and the sum of the traits is holiness. Now, these spiritual attractions, though manifested to us through a human soul, are nevertheless Divine; because divinity shines through that manhood. The Godhead, yea, the whole undivided Godhead, has its union there with human nature. Nowhere else in the universe is so much of God presented for our adoration as in the Lord Jesus Christ. The constitution of this adorable person was for the very purpose of manifesting God. We behold more of God in the face of Christ than elsewhere in all the universe. Is not the question answered, then? When we love Christ we love God. We cannot in any way so intelligently love God as when we love Christ. And therefore we need not be afraid to let our thoughts and powers go out with all their fulness toward the Son; we need not be apprehensive lest we defraud the Father of his glory. In loving him, we are performing our great duty to God. J. W. A.—Take Christ in all his fulness, not as God merely, not as man merely; not in his life on earth only, not in his death only, not in his exaltation at God’s right hand only, but in all his fulness, the Christ of

God, God and Man, our Prophet, our Priest, our King and Lord, redeeming us by his blood, sanctifying us by his Spirit; and then worship him and love him with all the heart, and with all the soul, and with all the strength; and we shall see how all evil will be barred, and all good will abound. Arnold.

Love an Unending Obligation. God is infinitely amiable and perfect; and what does he require of his creatures but that they should love him with all the soul, strength, and heart which he hath given them? Can this ever cease to be an obligation? What should make it cease? Nothing but that God should become less amiable, that his perfection should fade, his goodness be exhausted, or his greatness impaired. On the other hand, what is it that he threatens to those who withdraw their hearts from him? Is it not the loss of his favor and friendship? Can either the obligation or penalty be accused of severity? Surely in this God does nothing unbecoming a wise and righteous governor. Nay, with reverence be it said, he could not do otherwise without denying himself. R. W.

Lev. 19:18. Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. What every man’s mind ought to be toward his neighbor could not be better expressed in many pages than in this one sentence. We are all of us not only inclined to love ourselves more than we should, but all our powers hurry us away in this direction. Naturally, we are blinded by our immoderate self-love; and God, in order to turn us away from this, has substituted our neighbors, whom we are to love no less than ourselves; nor will any one ever perform what Paul teaches us to be a part of charity—viz., that she “seeketh not her own,” until he shall have renounced himself. Not only those with whom we have some connection are called our neighbors, but all without exception; for the whole human race forms one body, of which all are members. Cale.

In our duties to others the Law is that we shall love our neighbor as ourselves. For ourselves, we are to regard our own rights, to supply our wants, and to perfect and direct our powers. If, then, we would love our fellow-men as we do ourselves, we must (1) Regard, and, if necessary, aid in securing their rights. (2) Supply their wants. (3) Do what we can to perfect and direct their powers. These will include, and in their order as lower and higher, all our duties to our fellow-men. M. H.

The love of our neighbor as ourselves regards each man as possessing the same sacred character which we personally possess, and thus makes us jealous for our neighbor’s rights and welfare. And this sacred character is only found in the image of God which we bear, so that the whole of the Law has one grand foundation, reverence for God. This principle, and not any philosophical speculation about natural rights, is the root of the entire Ten Commandments. So we see in fact that a morality based on natural rights is always a failure, both from the vague definitions of natural rights and the ease with which human lust or ambition will resist and overcome such a motive, while a morality based on regard for God, a reverential love for his holy name, is never a failure. This is a religious morality, the only one to be trusted. The whole formula, then, of the Law, as seen through the Gospel, is this: “Love God, and love man for God’s sake, through Jesus Christ, the God-man.” Crosby.

The neighbor-love which can be enjoined as a duty must imply choice. It must be something over which conscience and the will have power. It can neither be an instinctive feeling of delight in the loved person’s presence nor an unreasoning attachment based on subtle affinities of temperament. It needs to rest upon the consciousness of a deeper unity than springs from mere identity of tastes; and it expresses itself not in terms or gestures of endearment, but in a settled purpose to do all the good one can to the object loved. It implies, therefore, a moral resolution which will often act contrary to instinct or inclination. It implies a moral earnestness in seeking the welfare of its object which is not to be turned aside even by his unloveliness or repulsiveness. In a word, it is a settled purpose to care for and benefit man as man, for the sake of that manhood which is common to us all; not a fondness for this or that particular person on account of something lovable which I find in him. And this neighbor-love, this principle of a concern for the good of others not second to the care we expend upon our own, is one which had its birth on the soil of God’s revelation, and came to its maturity only within the kingdom of our Lord and Saviour. Originally the rule stands on [this] Old Testament page as a revelation from heaven; but it stood there for centuries, a revelation unappreciated, till in the mission of God’s Son to save mankind, it received the illumination of a heavenly example. Then it became plain how God himself understood love—neighbor-love—love for mankind. Then a pure unselfish devotion to the interests of humanity, apart from preference, sentiment, instinct, or unreasoning fondness—such devotion as prompts active compassion for misery, patient forbearance with evil, forgiveness of wrongs, and self-sacrifice to rescue the lost—received its earliest and supreme illustration. Then men learned for the first time what God in his Law had asked for at men’s hands, but hitherto had asked for in vain. In the strong words of one who drank as deep as any of the new wine from heaven, then was “love” itself made apparent. “Herein is love,” such love as fulfils the Law, “that he sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins.” If, therefore, you would know what love for your neighbor means, learn it here. If you would feel such love for your neighbor, kindle your torch at this sun. “If we love one another, then is God’s own love perfected in us.” It is no growth of nature; no instinct of the fallen heart; no sentiment born of the imagination in tender enthusiasts. It is a fruit of the Spirit. Nay, it is the fruit of the Spirit, the most characteristic of all and the most excellent of all; first of all strong and abiding graces of the Divine nature, wrought in every one who is begotten of God, and hath the strong Son of God abiding in him. . . . You cannot dream yourself into this as into an imaginative attachment to ideal humanity. It is of too masculine fibre for that, and asks for too much undemonstrative and unattractive service at our hands. Neither does it fly abroad for picturesque objects on which to lavish its enthusiasm, but finds its needy neighbors at its very door, and girds itself to serve them with a girdle of humanity. This genuine Christian concern for one’s neighbors can be shown everywhere—at home, in business, behind the counter, as well as in the mission-room or the hospital ward, or the squalid cellar of the pauper. It means simply a universal respect for every man’s rights, a care for every man’s interest, a willingness to be every man’s equal, brother, and, if need be, servant, for Christ’s sake who loved us all and gave himself for all. Dykes.

This is the marvellous point about love, that all other good things have evils yoked with them; but love is free from every such mischief. He who loves will guard his soul from envy and anger, from jealousy and arrogance, from vain-glory and evil desire, from every unhallowed love, and every moral disorder. He will be as far from doing any evil to his neighbors as any other man from doing evil to himself. Consider how vast a blessing is the mere act of loving; how much cheerfulness it produces, in how great grace it establishes the soul. Yea, love changes the nature of things, and appears with all blessings in her hands, gentler than any mother, wealthier than any queen, and makes difficult things light, rendering virtue easy and vice most bitter. Hence it is that Paul says that love is the mother of all good things, and prefers it to miracles and all other gifts. We seek for no other indication of sovereignty if we see the purple and the diadem. So when a man wears the diadem of love, that is enough to point out the thorough disciple of Christ, not to us only, but also to the unbeliever. For, says he, “by this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another.” So that this sign is greater than all signs, since by means of it the disciple is recognized. Chrysostom.

Christ said: Love is the fulfilling of the Law. Christ found men working their passage to heaven by keeping the Divine commandments, and the one hundred and ten others which they had manufactured. Christ told them that if they loved they would do these things. If a man loved he would do the thing which the Law required. He would not have any desire to do anything different. Paul had learned this, and so in the thirteenth chapter of 1 Cor. we have the summum bonum. Paul takes this up in three ways in the chapter. He contrasts it, analyzes it, and diffuses it. It is contrasted with the things men loved in those days. Love is greater than faith, because the end is greater. We have faith in order that we may love. Charity is but a part of love, and the whole is greater than a part. Love is greater than sacrifice and martyrdom.

We find by analysis that love is a compound thing like light. As a man takes a prism and lets the light show through it and the light is broken and separated into elements, so we can analyze love and get the spectrum and elements of it. And by it we get common names representing ordinary virtues which can be practised by all. The nine names, colors of the spectrum of love, are: Patience, kindness, generosity, humility, courtesy, unselfishness, good temper, guilelessness, and sincerity. These constitute the supreme gift—the stature of the perfect man. They relate to man to-day, not to-morrow or in eternity. Patience, “love suffereth long,” represents love as passive, waiting to begin. Kindness represents love as active. Christ’s time was largely taken up in making people happy. There is but one greater thing than happiness, and that is holiness, which is not in our keeping, so the greatest thing we can do is kindness. After these things have been done we must go back into the shade. Generosity is a part of love. Love is not puffed up, which shows that we must have humility. Love does not behave itself unseemly. Politeness has been described as love in little things. “Love seeketh not her own,” and therefore is unselfish. A man prides himself on standing up for his rights, but he should give up his own if necessary. There is no happiness in having or in getting, but in giving and in serving others. He that would be great, let him serve, and he that would be happy, let him give. Love is not easily provoked, and a good temper is requisite. It is commonly spoken of as if a bad temper is an infirmity or a misfortune, but it is not a thing to smile at. It is a blot on our otherwise perfect life. It is the blackest sin and is a symbol of a want of love at the bottom. It shows that he must go to the root and smother his whole nature. How can a man with this lack of love enter the kingdom? Guilelessness is love which thinketh no evil. Courtesy is love in society, good temper is love restraining, guilelessness is love believing, and sincerity, love learning. Guilelessness is the virtue for suspicious people. Love does not rejoice in this or that issue, but in the truth. The great business of all is to fit these things into character. You must learn to love. There is a great opportunity of loving. How does a man become a good artist, or a good foot-ball player, or a good sculptor—by practice. How does a man become a good man—by practice. We do not train the soul by a different method than the body. Love is not emotion and gush; it is robust, and robustness is only secured by practice. Do not be annoyed at the obstacles that you find in your work. It is God’s method of training you, and every stroke is making your nature better. . . . How do you learn to love? Love is governed by the law of cause and effect. If we fulfil the condition we get the results. “We love him because he first loved us.” Because he first loved us we love all men. Stand before him and you will be changed into his image. Look at the great sacrifices of Christ and his life of love and you must love. Drummond.

Love is the grand principle on which God intends to bind all worlds in harmony. In his government, God intends that this principle shall have the ascendancy and shall rule. It will bind the most lofty spirit of the skies to his throne, and the most humble among the saints on earth—like the mighty law which binds planets in their orbits, and which bids the floating particle of dust to seek the centre.

Had this love been always shown, there would have been no sin, no crime, no war, no death. Barnes.—And as love is the fulfilling of all law, so it is the end of life itself. Whether in the calm of a quiet life or amid the turbulence of trying scenes, so long as the Divine Law of love is obeyed happiness is an ever-abiding guest. The heart filled with the double love, that of God and one’s fellow-man, preserves its whiteness; and he who keeps that in this world need have no fear of losing it in any other. An.—When all things have passed away love remaineth. Covet that and give your life for it, and you have the character which Paul describes, you are created in God’s image. Why do you want to live to-morrow? Because you love some one. There is no other thing to live for but love. To live is to love. If love dies a man has no contract with life, no reason to live, and he dies—by his own hand. No greater misfortune can befall a man than to grow old unloving and unloved. The final religious test at the great assizes is not how I have lived, but how I have loved. Prof. Drummond.

MORAL LAW: TO BE LAID UP IN THEIR HEARTS, AND TAUGHT DILIGENTLY TO THEIR CHILDREN. PHYLACTERIES, INSCRIPTIONS UPON DOOR-POSTS, AND FRINGES, AS REMINDERS OF GOD’S WORDS.