There must be humility if we mean to be at peace

For it is only by pride that men make contention, but humility pulls down the heart and makes it pliant and easy to be dealt with.

But where wrongs lie heavy, sin lies light; where those seem great, this seems little—which humility would easily remedy. For humility makes a man no thing in himself … he will not make a great matter of a small one, or stand up on his terms of reputation.

And thus the mind must be purified and qualified if you would have peace. Furnish the will with love and charity towards God and men. For when we think, “God loves me, bears with my infirmities, forgives me my offenses and trespasses,” this will cause us, out of love and thankfulness to God, to count it a very small matter to pass by and forgive the weaknesses of our brethren.

Besides, love is sociable. A good interpreter takes everything in the best way. It “suffereth long, is kind, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil, beareth all things, seeketh not her own” (1 Cor 13:4-7).

Love puts aside all private claims, and shares all in common. It is not selfish, looking not on its own things, but on the things of others also, prizing their well-being even as its own.

—Robert Harris, 1581-1658
President of Trinity College at Oxford

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