Page:Wuthering Heights and Agnes Grey (1st edition), Volume 3 (Agnes Grey).djvu/179

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AGNES GREY.
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impossible to do so, unless, he would leave his sack behind him. But you Nancy, I dare say, have no sins that you would not gladly throw aside, if you knew how?

"'Indeed sir, you speak truth,' says I.

"'Well,' says he 'you know the first, and great commandment—and the second which is like unto it—on which two commandments hang all the law and the prophets? You say you cannot love God; but it strikes me, that if you rightly consider who and what he is, you cannot help it. He is your father, your best friend; every blessing, everything good, pleasant, or useful comes from him; and everything evil, everything you have reason to hate, to shun, or to fear comes from Satan, His enemy as well as ours; and for this cause was God manifest in the flesh, that he might destroy the works of the devil: in one word God is love; and the more of love we have within us, the nearer we are to him, and the more of his spirit we possess.'

"'Well sir,' I said 'if I can always think on these things, I think I might well love God; but how can I love my neighours—when they vex me, and be so contrairy and sinful as some on 'em is?'

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