1262. Should not the great object of cultivation be sympathy and benevolence, which are general in their nature? We may deeply sympathize with a sufferer, even with a brute, whom we do not love. Benevolence should we not also cultivate, by endeavouring habitually to take the most favourable view of those around us which our observation and reason can permit? Does it not argue a want of discrimination to treat love as a sentiment, to be entertained toward all other mortals by mere volition? Is it reasonable that Christ, or any other teacher, assuming to be missionaries of the Creator, should enjoin us to love, when the capacity for that sentiment manifestly varies through organization and education, derived from that Creator by various human beings, as much nearly, as the opposite propensities of the wolf and dog? Behold the difference between the elephant and rhinoceros: the former capable of a canine fidelity and affection, the latter irretrievably hostile; and again between a wild elephant and one tamed by education. 1263. Were his organization and education dependent on himself, it might be reasonable to say to a human being, Love your neighbour as yourself, love your enemies; but how can that Deity who determines man’s race and his parentage, and of course whether he be a savage or a civilized man, whether a Thug or a _real_ Christian, if such a thing can be,—how can that Deity require a being to do that which is irreconcilable with his passions, opinions, and habits, derived from nature and education, as well as the examples set by those around him? 1264. The inutility of precepts in controlling human passions, may be seen in the history of Christendom, in which, as already urged, the morals and conduct of mankind, with very few exceptions, have been diametrically opposite to that of their divine Master, so called. Who have been more aggressive than the great majority of professed Christians? Who have been more actuated by cupidity? Yet these votaries have been, for the most part, vociferous in their professions of devotedness to Christ, making him the Son of God as well as their teacher, and too often cruelly maltreating those who have denied his divinity.