Neighborliness

“ In the forest he learned charity, sympathy, helpfulness—in a word neighborliness—for in that far-off frontier life all the wealth of India, had a man possessed it, could not have bought relief from danger or help in time of need, and neighborliness became of prime importance. ”

“ If the first foundation of New England's strength and growth was godliness, its next was neighborliness, and a firm rock it proved to build upon. It may seem anomalous to assert that while there was in olden times infinitely greater independence in each household than at present, yet there was also greater interdependence with surrounding households.
It is curious to see how completely social ethics and relations have changed since olden days. Aid in our families in times of stress and need is not given to us now by kindly neighbors as of yore ”

“ Old neighbors, as they come to town, call upon them, and their lives are diversified and enlivened two or three times a week by such visits. Their children, most of whom reside within driving distance of their parents, drop in upon them at any time, and thus in perfect happiness and serenity they pass down the sunset slope of life. Their lives and individual characters are towers of strength in the neighborhood for rectitude and uprightness, and the community without a dissent recognizes their true worth. ”

“ Now you occupy yourself with charity and duty to one's neighbour. You examine into the distinction of like and unlike, the changes of motion and rest, the canons of giving and receiving, the emotions of love and hate, and the restraint of joy and anger. ”

“ Picture to yourself the delight of living in a community of friends and neighbours, each of whom loves the other, and takes every opportunity to help another from the love of the Lord and from the love of the neighbour:—everyone an embodiment of charity, seeking not his own, never failing. ”

“ Love your neighbor as yourself, and your country more than yourself. ”

“ In the country one might pretend to care, but in the city flowers come from your friends, not your neighbors. You have no neighbors in the city, and that is one of its great advantages. No neighbors, no gossip. ”

“ To know one's neighbours and to be on good terms with the community in which one lives are the beginning of sound relations to the world at large; but one never knows his village in any real sense until he knows the world. ”

“ He looks his rich-neighbor full in the face, with a fearless, but respectful gaze, and bolts from his manly breast a hearty, “Good day to ye, sir!” To his other neighbor, his equal in worldly matters, he extends his broad hand, and gives him a shake that is felt to the bottom of the heart. ”

“ Why drifts thy lonely voice always to me?
Why am I the neighbour always
Of those who force to sing thy trembling strings?
Life is more heavy—thy song says—
Than the vast, heavy burden of all things. ”

“ How sayest thou, I have loved my neighbor as myself, when thou hast stopped thine ears and shut thine eyes and stalked on by all those who are lying by the wayside of the Kingdom, dying through all these years of your history and theirs? ”

“ We renewed our invitation after that, and, when he didn’t respond, sent him four blossoming geraniums with the friendly regards of a neighbor who bore no grudge. For in our social creed the longing for a flower in the child-heart covers a maze of mischief; and a maze it is always with the boys. ”

“ He empties the clouds into the basins of the earth and gives us oceans, gulfs and lakes; but we must build boats to ride them. He puts humanity on the earth and bids us love our neighbor as ourselves.
Who is my neighbor? Some seem to think only those who live in our immediate community. I read of a minister of a city church who called upon one of his country members for a contribution for foreign missionary work. The country brother said: "I don't believe in foreign missions, and I must say, 'No'."
"Brother," the pastor said, "the Bible says you should love your neighbor as yourself." ”

“ I do my duty amongst my neighbours, and those dependent on me, and they think of me what they please. You who know me, love and trust me, and that shall be enough. We have our quiet home, and our children, and their children, and the friends who have stood by us. ”

“ Houses were divided against themselves; neighbors who had lived in friendliness and hourly intercourse and exchanged continual acts of kindness, discussed, contended, quarrelled, threatened, and fought or passed by on the other side scowling and embittered. ”

“ Thirdly, one’s neighbour. In the expression, as thyself, the word as does not signify equality, but similarity of love. For we ought to love ourselves more than our neighbour; but yet the same things which we desire for ourselves we ought to desire for our neighbour. ”

“ Indeed it was my desire to acquaint them as fully and as soon as possible with the fact of their having a neighbor: a weak-eyed half-alive innocent to be sure, but yet a neighbor who would keep his door open night and day—for the warmth of the hall of course—and who with the fretful habit of an old man who had once been a gentleman and a beau, went rambling about through the hall speaking to those he met and expecting a civil word in return. ”

“ Our neighbor includes any one of the human race with whom we may come in contact, without regard to place of residence; whether he or she resides in the vicinity of our home or far from us. Generally speaking of those people who reside near our homes, we speak of them as neighbors because we meet them frequently, and generally treat each other like the Good Samaritan treated the man who fell among thieves, which makes us neighborly. ”

“ The neighbors, ever ready, from a principle of pure benevolence, to take a lively interest in all that was going on, gave advice in rich profusion, and sent the poor man flying hither and thither, in vain. ”

“ I look around among the world of mankind and see them grabbing, scrambling, contending, and every one seeking to aggrandize himself, and to accomplish his own individual purposes, passing the community by, walking upon the heads of his neighbors—all are seeking, planning, contriving in their wakeful hours, and when asleep dreaming," How can I get the advantage of my neighbor? ”

“ They look at times as though they were putting their heads together to gossip and smile about their odd, old neighbor that has such out-of-date fan-lights, that has no electric bell, no folding-beds, and not a bit of zinc cornicing. ”

“ HOW TO LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR. Love your neighbor as yourself? How are you to do it? If your neighbor is in danger, protect him to the utmost of your power. If you see your neighbor's property in danger of injury, protect his property as you would your own, as far as it lies in your power: If your neighbor's boy or girl is going astray, go directly to your neighbor, in the spirit of love, and help him to reclaim his child. ”

“ But it counts much whether we have had good companions, in that time; — almost as much as what we have been doing. And see the overpowering importance of neighborhood in all association. As it is marriage, fit or unfit, that makes our home, so it is who lives near us of equal social degree, — a few people at convenient distance, no matter how bad company, — these, and these only, shall be your life's companions: and all those who are native, congenial, and by many an oath of the heart, sacramented to you, are gradually and totally lost. ”

“ One day his nearest neighbor, meaning to do him a kindness, told him with a rough good-will that he might as well quit hiding now, “Whatever ’tis you done, ’tis so long past now! And up here ... nobody from your part of the country, wherever ’tis, would ever be coming up here. ”

“ But you must know that a bit farther on in the wood was a wolf's den, and there lived two graylegs. So when they saw that a new house had risen up hard by, they wanted to know what sort of folk their neighbours were, for they thought to themselves that a good neighbour was better than a brother in a foreign land, and that it was better to live in a good neighbourhood than to know many people miles and miles off. ”

“ Neither are these commands to each of us by ourselves, but to all of us together, as members of a family. If you will look through them they are not things to be done to ourselves, but to our neighbours; not experiences to be felt about our own souls: but rules of conduct to our fellow-men. They are all different branches and flowers from that one root: “Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.” ”

“ These little folk who appear to be our neighbours, with only some small difference of vibration to separate us, will become familiar. The thought of them, even when unseen, will add a charm to every brook and valley and give romantic interest to every country walk. The recognition of their existence will jolt the material twentieth-century mind out of its heavy ruts in the mud, and will make it admit that there is a glamour and a mystery to life. ”

“ And if there be any other commandment, it is comprised in this word, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. The love of our neighbour worketh no evil. Love, therefore, is the fulfilling of the law. ”

“ And the Lord taught him that every one to whom he could be or for whom he could do anything was his neighbour, therefore, that each of the race, as he comes within the touch of one tentacle of our nature, is our neighbour. ”

“ Do I advise you to neighbour-love? Rather do I advise you to neighbour-flight and to furthest love!
Higher than love to your neighbour is love to the furthest and future ones; higher still than love to men, is love to things and phantoms. ”

“ You shall love your neighbour as yourselves because you are your neighbour; a mere illusion makes you believe that your neighbour is something different from yourselves. Or in the words of the Bhagaradgitah: He who knows himself in everything and everything in himself, will not injure himself by himself. ”

“ Here again we fall back on our analogy of what goes on in a small community where neighbours know each other. Take, for instance, when a lad who is recognised as bright, promising, honest, and industrious, who wants to make a start in life which requires some little outlay, his better-to-do neighbour will often assist him by providing the capital necessary to enable him to make a way for himself in the world. ”

“ If it be the duty of neighbours, when they have occasion and opportunity, rather to join together in praises of common concernment, than to do it dividedly, then much more is this the duty of families: but it is the duty of neighbours ”

“ Most laudable, or rather I should say lovable, is this feeling of good neighbourship, which keeps the constant fashion of the olden time, not shadowed by thoughts of evil, not practised in untruths, not veneered with false colours, undisciplined in the arts of the suburb and of the city. ”

“ As we are near neighbours I see no reason why we should not be good friends, and often interchange such civilities as make up the amenities of existence, and which, in the country, more particularly, are valuable. ”

“ Certainly we have, before and beyond our neighbours, given ourselves to these three things with ardent passion and with high success. And this our neighbours cannot but acknowledge; and they must needs, when they themselves turn to these things, have an eye to our example, and take something of our practice. ”

“ And He has also commanded us to love our neighbor from our hearts: "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." If you are determined to satisfy your conscience and your obligation in this respect, you will find abundant occasions of working for the good of souls. ”

“ For you do have neighbors here. It is true that they know all your business and who and what your grandfather was and wasn't, and they are prone to discuss it with a frankness to make the scalp prickle. ”

“ Blair, innocently. "An' I do trust I've got good neighbors. I like to keep to myself, but if I've got a neighbor, I want her to be somebody you can depend upon."
"I'm sure Miss Dyer means to be very neighborly." ”

“ All our experience of foreign life and manners neither guides us in difficulty nor warns us when in danger. Let us go back to where we are, at least, as wise as our neighbors,—where we are familiar with the customs, and where, whatever our shortcomings, we meet with the indulgent judgment that comes of old acquaintance."
"Where 's that?" said she. "I 'm curious to know where is this elegant garden of paradise?"
"Bruff, ma'am,—our own neighborhood."
"Where we were always in hot water with every one. Were you ever out of a squabble on the Bench or at the poorhouse? ”

“ As for neighbours, accept those nearest at hand; you will find them surprisingly human, like yourself. If you like them you will be surprised to find how much they all like you (and will upon occasion lend you a spring-tooth harrow or a butter tub, or help you with your plowing) ; but if you hate them they will return your hatred with interest. I have discovered that those who travel in pursuit of better neighbours never find them. ”

“ My neighbour therefore being of the same nature as myself, what passes within me may be regarded as amounting to a commanding evidence that he is a real being, having a proper and independent existence. ”

“ But of these also, many were carried off, most of them alone and deserted by all the world, themselves having previously set the example. Thus it was, that one citizen fled from another—a neighbour from his neighbours—a relation from his relations ”