The Need of Sympathy
G. M. G. Dana. Luke 10:29-37 But he, willing to justify himself, said to Jesus, And who is my neighbor?… The great undertakings that we have entered upon in the name of charity have been those that have had their beginnings in this feeling of sympathy. I do not suppose John Howard would have undertaken his mission to the prisons of the world if he had not been first moved by a fellow-feeling for those who were confined in dungeons that had never been exposed to publicity, and whose cruelties and sufferings had never been made known to the public. He never could have aroused all British Christendom unless he had borne himself the strait-jacket, and subjected himself to some of the tortures that prisoners were compelled to endure. He spells from a personal experience concerning their sufferings, and respecting brutal punishments from which hitherto there had been no escape. Dr. Guthrie, with others, did a great work in Edinburgh in behalf of the street boys, awakened thereto by his sympathy with them in their life of hardship and peril. Artist-like, he detected the possibilities of these otherwise wasted and blighted lives. He saw what could be made of them, and therefore appealed with impassioned eloquence to the dull and uninformed public of Scotland's metropolis, urging the importance of training these street Arabs till they might develop into merchants and useful citizens — ay, even through patient instruction unfold those latent powers which would enable them to become benefactors and men of genius. You may hold in your hand a diamond glittering in the ring you prize or sparkling in the pin which is a cherished keepsake, and observing its beauty, its pureness, try .to estimate the value of the gem. So, too, you may hold in the other hand a piece of charcoal, which smuts the fingers touching it, and you will see nothing to admire in the latter. The brilliance of the one but makes the dullness of the other more apparent. Yet these two are substantially the same: they are differentiated by the processes to which each has been subjected, and because of which they are so wide apart in work and appearance. In like manner do those we meet differ. A fortunate environment, great privileges, fill some with noble hopes, and make possible a glorious life. The little gamin of the street, devoid of all this, eking out his career in the dark tenement and noisome alley, has little at first to attract you. But there may be locked up in him capacities now unsuspected. Under certain conditions, and with the guiding hand of some gifted teacher, he may become the artist of whom the community will be proud, or the architect able to build the cathedral famed for its lines of beauty, or the philanthropist whose good works will bless generations and embalm his name in the fragrant odours of loving hearts. When we learn to sympathize with such young life, then will we understand the significance of all schemes of child-saving and all efforts to reclaim erring youth. The true artist always has this sympathy. Hence, he is quickly interested in the rude etchings shown him, the work of some tyro in art. He inquires about the subject who has thus revealed the signs of slumbering genius, waiting for the helping word and needed culture which some master is able to afford. He knows what can be made of one already revealing talents that else must go to waste. "I can teach him," he says, "till he shall become an artist able with his own brush to immortalize his name, or the sculptor carving out of the shapeless marble the speaking statue, or the architect constructing the dome for some noted lane, which shall seem to be hung in the air, full of grace, a marvel of human skill." (G. M. G. Dana.) Parallel Verses KJV: But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour? WEB: But he, desiring to justify himself, asked Jesus, "Who is my neighbor?"