Catholic Spirit

It is allowed even by those who do not pay this great debt, that love is due to all mankind, the royal law, “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself,” carrying its own evidence to all that hear it: and that, not according to the miserable construction put upon it by the zealots of old times, “Thou shalt love thy neighbour,” thy relation, acquaintance, friend, “and hate thine enemy;” not so; “I say unto you,” said our Lord, “Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you, and persecute you; that ye may be the children,” may appear so to all mankind, “of your Father which is in heaven; who maketh his sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.