| Garden of the Heart |
Chapter 18 |
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We may be peacemakers also by living so that it will be impossible for any one to quarrel with us. The influence of such a life in a community works continually toward peaceableness. One contentious person can fill a whole neighbourhood with strife. A quarrelsome man stirs up bitterness wherever he goes. But one person who has the forbearing spirit, who meekly endures wrongs himself rather than contend against them, is a maker of peace. Others are influenced by his example. Every time we keep silent under insult, and loving and sweet under provocation, we have made it easier for all about us to do the same.
We may seek to be peacemakers also by exerting all our influence to prevent dissensions among others. We find continually, as we go among men, the beginnings of bitterness and estrangement. In every community there are whisperers who go about retailing gossip, the tendency of which is to separate friends. Every Christian should be a discourager of tale bearing. Too many people encourage it. They are glad to hear something unpleasant about another, and are quick to pass it on. Such eagerness is not commendable. Some one tells us a good way to deal with this evil:
“If you are tempted to reveal
A tale some one to you has told
About another, make it pass,
Before you speak three gates of gold.
“Three narrow gates: First, ‘Is it true?’
Then, ‘Is it needful?’ In your mind
Give truthful answer. And the next
Is last and narrowest–’Is it kind?’
“And if to reach your lips at last
It passes through these gateways three,
Then you may tell the tale, nor fear
What the result of speech may be.”
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