Charity (Coulson) n. 17

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17. 2. Wishing to do good to the neighbour is of charity.

This is well known, for it is believed that giving to the poor, succouring the needy, assisting widows and orphans, benefiting ministers, contributing to churches, hospitals, and various pious uses, is of charity ; again, that feeding the hungry, giving drink to the thirsty, sheltering the stranger, clothing the naked, visiting the sick, going to those bound in prison, and many other things, are good works of charity. But yet they are good only in so far as a man shuns evils as sins. If the man does these good works before shunning evils as sins, they are external, even merit-seeking, because they spring from an Impure fountain, and things issuing from such a fountain are inwardly evil. There is the man in them, and the world in them.


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