Prescriptions… for Our Friends

There are many important principles on which most of us can agree. There are many standards of conduct that most of us feel others should observe. But the point where we often part company is in deciding when and to whom the principles should apply.

Of course there are some wholly unprincipled people who don’t even give lip service to a high code of conduct. But most people whom most of us are likely to meet are people who at least pay lip service to high principles⎯people who concede, for example, that the Golden rule is a desirable code of conduct, that the Ten Commandments are not purely of the past but still apply to people in the present; that honesty, morality, fair dealing, clean living, and considering others as we should consider ourselves are all indispensable principles that should apply to all persons.

Such things most of us agree to in the abstract, but we are sometimes disposed to think more of their application to others and to make liberal allowances for ourselves. And when we hear some sound advice, when we hear a sensible sermon, or when we hear a recipe or precept for improving people, we frequently think of others who we wish had heard it. We think how fine it would be for our friends.

Almost every day we hear or read of remarkable means and methods that tell how to improve talents, how to make better use of time, how to live within income, how to avoid marital misunderstandings, how to get along with neighbors, how to teach children. We rarely hear or read of such suggestions without thinking how fine they would be for our friends.

And if there is a community cause or project we are frequently full of suggestions as to others who should be interested primarily in improving other people, our own approach to improvement will be much more slow than if we should begin with ourselves, and see first what the recommended remedy would do for us, and second how fine it would be for our friends