The humility of the Sermon on the Mount may possibly by careful
analysis be shown to be identical at bottom with the magnanimity of
Aristotle's Ethics. But the presentation of the two is so utterly
opposed that in the effect on life the identity is altogether lost. And
as justice and mercy, so too self-discipline is pushed as far as it can
go. Instead of the enjoyment of life being an integral part of the aim
set before the will, hunger and thirst for righteousness, and penitence
for failure in keeping to it, are to fill up the believer's hopes for
himself. Of inward satisfaction and peace he is often assured; but
these, and these only, are the means to that peace. The disciple's life
is to consist in bearing the cross, and bearing it cheerfully; in
returning good for evil, and love for indifference and even for hatred;
in detaching his affections from all the pleasures to be obtained from
external things; in fixing his trust and his love on his Eternal Father.
Taken as a whole, this is quite unlike all moral teaching that preceded
it, and there is no indication that any philosophy could ever have
evolved it. It has fastened on the human conscience from the day that
it was uttered; and whatever moral teaching since has not been inspired
from this source has soon passed out of power and been forgotten.
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