preaches only self-denial; which every where commands us to do violence upon ourselves, and to strive against our fancies and our affections; which commands that we act through views superior to flesh and blood, and that we hesitate not to sacrifice to the sanctity of faith, and to the sublimity of its rules, not only our caprices, but our most legal inclinations?
It is therefore absurd to allege to us an aversion to your brother, which is itself your guilt. I might farther say; you complain that your brother is displeasing to you, and that it is not possible for you to bear, or to be in agreement with him: but, do you suppose that you yourself are displeasing to none? Can you guarantee to us, that you are universally liked, and that every one applauds and approves you? Now, if you exact, that every thing offensive in your manners be excused, upon the goodness of your heart, and on account of those essential qualities upon which you pride yourself: if to you it appear unreasonable to be offended at nothings, and by certain sallies which we cannot always command; if you insist upon being judged by the consequence, by the groundwork, by the rectitude of your sentiments and conduct, and not in consequence of those humours which sometimes involuntarily escape you, and upon which it is very difficult to be always guarded against one's self; having the same equity for your brother; apply the same rule to yourself? bear with him as you have occasion to be borne with yourself; and do not justify, by your estrangement from him, the unjust aversions which may be had to yourself. And this rule is so much the more equitable as that you have only to cast your eyes upon what is continually passing in the world, to be convinced that those who are loudest in trumpeting forth the faults of their brethren, are the very persons with whom nobody can agree, who are the pest of societies, and a grievance to the rest of men.
And I might here demand of you, my dear hearer, if this principle of contrariety, which renders your brother so insupportable to you, be not more in yourself: that is to say, in your pride, in the capriciousness of your temper, in the contrariety of your character, than in his; — demand of you, if all the world see in him what you believe to see yourself; if his friends, his relations, his intimates, look upon him with the same eyes that you do? What do I know, I might demand of you, if that which displeases you in him be not perhaps his good qualities: if his talents, his reputation, his credit, and his fortune, have not perhaps a greater share in your aversion than his faults; and, if it be not his merit or his rank which have hitherto in your sight constituted his whole crime? We are so easily deceived in this point! Envy is a passion so masked, and so artful in disguising itself! As there is something mean and odious in it, and as it is a secret confession made to ourselves of our own mediocrity, it always shows itself to us under foreign outsides, which completely conceal itself from us; but fathom your heart, and you will see that all those, who either surpass, or who shine with too much lustre near you, have the mis-
