Forbearance

“ Whatever occasion of offence may arise, whatever cause of complaint, in any man, under any circumstances, and however just the complaint may appear, forbearance is to be exercised; and even if the forbearance is abused and injury be added, we must forgive. It is never on one side only that the fault exists. It is one another, each in his turn, that gives and receives forbearance. ”

“ But while the experience of almost a century has in general shown a wise and commend able forbearance in each of these branches from encroachments upon the others, it is not to be denied that such attempts have been made, and it is believed not always without success. ”

“ Her first feeling was that of strong indignation against the man who could for one instant have believed her capable of crimes so heinous; but this first burst of displeasure soon gave place to a grateful sense of the generous forbearance which had so carefully concealed her supposed guilt from the world. A mind less noble and considerate would have blazoned forth those suspicions, to which a train of singular circumstances lent so apparent a reality. ”

“ I could not help thinking, that from time immemorial the differences of men upon approaching a certain point, when "forbearance ceases to be a virtue," have always culminated in this summary way of cutting, slashing, and braining one another. ”

“ It is not the characteristic of a king not giving punishment while thinking to himself, "I am replete with forbearance;" [28] by doing so a good king is looked upon as bad. This reflection on the part of others is the occasion for the infliction of punishment.
83.
The pride of low people increases by the display of too much forbearance; by the chastisement of a bad person others should be deterred from acting like him; by chastisement he is made to desist from evil; by chastisement the king bestows happiness. ”

“ Our enemies will recoil before our attitude, and will then do justice to our legitimate wishes. I hold that to carry our forbearance any further would be to expose our party to be decimated day by day. ”

“ There is however a limit at which forbearance ceases to be a virtue. ”

“ For as all punishment, especially of the more severe cast, has in it some thing, which tho' not repugnant to justice, is at variance, at least, with charity, reason easily suffers us to forbear inflicting it, unless that forbearance is opposed by some weightier, juster, and more undeniable motive of charity. ”

“ Although the Cause is still young and tender, and many of the believers inexperienced, and therefore loving forbearance is often called for in the place of harsh measures, this does not mean that a National Spiritual Assembly can under any circumstances tolerate disgraceful conduct, flagrantly contrary to our Teachings, on the part of any of its members, whoever they may be and from wherever they may come. ”

“ Our readers will excuse us for deviating from the subject, when they take into consideration the abuses, that have been heaped upon us heretofore, which we have tamely submitted to, until forbearance is no longer required at our hands, having frequently turned both the right and left cheek, we believe it our duty now to stand up in our own defence. ”

“ You may indeed be sometimes provoked to retort, by attacks which will make a retort necessary and proper. In that case, your previous habit of forbearance will stand your friend. It will dispose others to presume you to be in the right, and to approve your conduct. ”

“ When every thing is over, then you come:
These tardy tricks of yours will, on my life,
One time or other break some gallows' back.” This may appear to many a very formidable passage. It is spoken, as we may say, in the hearing of the army, and by one intitled as it were by his station to decide on military conduct; and if no punishment immediately follows, the forbearance may be imputed to a regard for the Prince of Wales, whose favour the delinquent was known so unworthily to possess. But this reasoning will by no means apply to the real circumstances of the case. ”

“ but when it is said, as in the Testament, "If a man smite thee on the right cheek, turn to him the other also," it is assassinating the dignity of forbearance, and sinking man into a spaniel. ”

“ Such forfeitures, moreover, whereby his posterity must suffer, as well as himself, will help to restrain a man, not only by the sense of his duty and dread of personal punishment, but also by his passions and natural affections ”

“ For I the Lord love judgment, I hate robbery for burnt-offering; and I will direct their work in truth, and I will make an everlasting covenant with them.
Lev. XIX, 13. Thou shalt not defraud thy neighbor, neither rob him: the wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning.
Prov. XXI, 7. The robbery of the wicked shall destroy them; because they refuse to do judgment.
Ezek. XXII, 29. The people of the land have used oppression, and exercised robbery, and have vexed the poor and needy: yea, they have oppressed the stranger wrongfully. ”

“ The maintenance of authority is like the preservation of a siring of beads—break but the "silken cord on which they hang," and the pearls are scattered in disorder, if not irretrievably lost. By suffering the rule of obedience to be set aside, an endless catalogue of evil tempers, vexations, disappointments, artifices, mean subterfuges, and even the worst of all, bribery—the bribery of self-interested endearments—are allowed to take the place of that steady, calm, and undeviating submission, which costs no pain, and requires no sacrifice, simply because it is habitual. ”

“ Can't you avoid them? Let their Vengeance light
On others' Heads, no matter whose, if you
Are but secure, and have the Cain in Hand:
For they're indiff'rent where they take Revenge,
Whether on him that cheated, or his Friend,
Or on a Stranger whom they never saw,
Perhaps an honest Peasant, who ne'er dreamt [Pg 122]
Of Fraud or Villainy in all his life;
Such let them murder, if they will a Score,
The Guilt is theirs, while we secure the Gain,
Nor shall we feel the bleeding Victims Pain. ”

“ But it made a fairer show in men’s eyes to undergo forfeiture and banishment in the character of a persecuted confessor than to undergo the same amount of loss in the character of a convicted traitor. ”

“ The large number of forfeitures, and the large sums exacted as fines on restoration, show that scarcely any amount of political guilt was beyond forgiveness, if the repentance were accompanied by a handsome sum down. On the whole, where society was just recovering from a condition in which nothing was certain for two days together, and nearly every household was divided against itself, anything like settled peace was worth paying for, and the people generally justified by acquiescence in fact, however much and rightly they might in words complain of the mercenary policy of the court. ”

“ The setting aside of that will, and consequent division of property between three which he had intended to take for himself, was sufficient to account for any degree of revenge in such a man as he: and the proclamation exhibits an audacity and ingenuity of falsehood which must consign the man beyond appeal to the order of mere rogues. Enough of the real standpoint of the forger, traitor, and butcher, of whom some would make a hero! ”

“ For at the conclusion of your acts you have promulged a sentence, in which, while ordering the searching out of those heretics, you have brought in that those who neglect the duty are to be punished by forfeiture of their possessions and dignities. ”

“ Think not that we are powerless because forbearing. We have a decree—though it rests among our archives like a sword in its scabbard—a decree by which thy life would be made to pay the forfeit of thy crimes. And, should I order thee to be instantly seized and put to death, I make just doubt whether all good men would not think it done rather too late, than any man too cruelly. ”

“ You have gone on for a long time in your nefarious course, unchecked by any consideration for those innocent beings against whom your evil practices have been directed, and undeterred either by the pangs of that remorse, which must at times have overshadowed even such a hardened soul as yours, or by the fear of that punishment which, though long deferred, was certain to arrive at last. ”

“ That is to say to give to a nephew who presses me some wealth to satisfy a mad passion; no I would become your accomplice in authorizing it." And a hundred like remarks, in a somewhat pleasant tone, made against marriage. "Be like us, a forfeiture makes you wise. Imitate our strength of character. One refusal will keep you at least from any forfeiture."
VALERE: What stupid remarks. Always the same rubric. But nothing comes from their gothic spirit. Without worldliness, visiting no one except her sister who is less hard than she is, but crazier from misfortune. ”

“ If there be any under forfeiture to the king, and he will come boldly into his presence, while the candle burns, the king will forgive the forfeiture. And whosoever is in this predicament, and comes not before the expiration of the candle, he shall perish by an ignominious death. ”

“ Among these means, one of the most important is the employment of such agents for the preservation of order as are in a position to manifest their own evil inclinations in the course of their destructive work, namely, their self-will, abuse of authority, and, most important of all, bribery. ”

“ Thus, when the corruption had run its course, and the original disobedience had reproduced itself all over the earth in a harvest of evil and disorder, the time for the work of reparation was come, and the Divine Word, the Image of the Father, took flesh. ”

“ Wherefore we strictly forbid you to do any hurt, mischief, or injury whatsoever, to them, in persons, lands or goods, under penalty of forfeiture of your own goods and estates to the said Lord the King, or to kill them, or any of them, under pain of death. ”

“ No individual was allowed to touch the body of the king or queen; and every one who should stand over them, or pass the hand over their heads, would be liable to pay for the sacrilegious act with the forfeiture of his life. ”

“ From unabashed, hardened crime, to those who, sinking under the consequences of vice, are passing down to death—without an ear to listen to their groans, without sympathy and without hope—every grade of moral corruption, may be found festering and fermenting in this Old Brewery ”

“ Also, that no manner of person do pick any quarrel, matter, or cause for any old grudge or malice to make any perturbation or trouble, upon pain of five pounds, to be forfeited to the lord, and their bodies to be imprisoned. Also, that none buy or sell in corners, back sides, or hidden places, but in open fair or market, upon pain of forfeiture of all such goods and merchandise so bought and sold, and their bodies to imprisonment. ”

“ Hegel: “Penalty is the other half of crime.” R. W. Emerson: “Punishment not follows, but accompanies, crime.”Sagebeer, The Bible in Court, 59—“Corruption is destruction, and the sinner is a suicide; penalty corresponds with transgression and is the outcome of it; sin is death in the making; death is sin in the final infliction.” ”

“ Nevertheless, I do think my innocence can be established; for, in corroboration of a paper which my father gave me, acknowledging the act as his, and exculpating me, some of the innkeepers at whose houses I staid, while seeking your father in Northumberland and in Wales, must still be living, and can show that I was not, as has been asserted, flying from justice with the money obtained by forgery, but eagerly following a nobleman of unimpeached honour, upon business of importance. ”

“ Sins unrepented of, mercy slighted, and the day of grace ending.—They look forward, and nothing presents itself but the righteous Judge, the dreadful tribunal, and a most solemn reckoning.———They roll around their arighted eyes on attending friends. If accomplices in debauchery, it sharpens their anguish, to consider this further aggravation of their guilt that they have not finned alone, but drawn others into the snare. ”

“ I would even admit—and how could I well go further, and “hope to be forgiven?”—that, in view of Man’s nature, as developed by our social institutions, Law and Lawyers both, may be, and sometimes are, under special circumstances, not only a necessary evil, but a very good thing. ”

“ If he sold his estate without license from his lord, [***] or if he sold it upon any other tenure or title than that by which he himself held it, [****] he lost all right to it. The adhering to his lord’s enemies, [*****] deserting him in war, [******] betraying his secrets, [*******] debauching his wife or his near relations, [********] or even using indecent freedoms with them, [*********] might be punished by forfeiture. The higher crimes, rapes, robbery, murder, arson, etc., were called felony; and being interpreted want of fidelity to his lord, made him lose his fief. ”

“ Was there some terrible law in Nature that slow forgiveness of the greatest wrong that can be wrought must perforce be granted to its inflictor, through the gracious survivor of a brutal indifference that would almost add to his crime, if that were possible? ”

“ With the tender pity natural to his rare character, he said that forgery was in his opinion and observation an unconquerable weakness; that a man who committed the crime once, would do the same thing again, whenever the temptation came to him. ”

“ Should he violate such obligation, and become a rebel or traitor to that government, he not only can have no merits in the view of that government, but he becomes obnoxious to the forfeiture of both property and life. ”

“ No people had statutes and judgments so righteous as they had, and yet corrupt judges found ways to turn aside the needy from judgment, to hinder them from coming at their right and recovering what was their due, because they were needy and poor, and such as they could get nothing by nor expect any bribes from. 3. With enriching themselves by oppressing those that lay at their mercy, whom they ought to have protected. They make widows' houses and estates their prey, and they rob the fatherless of the little that is left them, because they have no friend to appear for them. ”