making them obey.

Now that power, again, can only be got by loving human beings. There is
nothing so blind as hardness, nothing so weak as violence. I, of course,
can only speak from my own experience; and my experience is this: that
whensoever in my past life I have been angry and scornful, I have said or
done an unwise thing; I have more or less injured my own cause; weakened
my own influence on my fellow-men; repelled them instead of attracting
them; made them rebel against me, rather than obey me. By patience,
courtesy, and gentleness, we not only make ourselves stronger; we not
only attract our fellow-men, and make them help us and follow us
willingly and joyfully: but we make ourselves wiser; we give ourselves
time and light to see what we ought to do, and how to do it.

And next; this Spirit is also "the spirit of knowledge, and of the fear
of the Lord." Ay, they, indeed, both begin in love, and end in love. If
you wish for knowledge, you must begin by loving knowledge for its own
sake. And the more knowledge you gain, the more you will long to know,
and more, and yet more for ever. You cannot succeed in a study, unless
you love that study. Men of science must begin with an interest in, a
love for, an enthusiasm, in the very deepest sense of the word, for the
phaenomena which they study. But the more they learn of them, the more
their love increases; as they see more and more of their wonder, of their
beauty, of the unspeakable wisdom and power of God, shewn forth in every
blade of grass which grows in the sunshine and the rain.

And if this be true of things earthly and temporary, how much more of
things heavenly and eternal? We must begin by loving whatsoever things
are true, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, honest,
and of good report. We must begin, I say, by loving them with a sort of