Chap. XI.] DUTIES OF GOOD NEIGHBOURHOOD.

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without number, of this criminal abuse, must crowd on the mem-ory of every one who is at all acquainted with the later Romanwriters, especially Juvenal, and even with those of the Augustanage, who frequently contrast the extreme luxury, extravagance,and excess of the times in which they lived, and the accompany-ing decay of virtue, decline of the national energies, and extinc-tion of the spirit of liberty, with the plain living, independenceof mind, energy of character, self-reliance, unconquerable spiritof liberty, and the rest of the host of hardy virtues, which flour-ished in the times of the Commonwealth. I cannot enter intodetails, — but the luxury and extravagance of the later Romansbecame such, that, as M. Peignot has remarked, “ The gastro-nomic reputation of the Romans became no less colossal, thantheir political and military renown.” The luxuries and extrava-gances of the table among the modern nations of Europe do notseem to equal those, which, we are assured, existed in the ancientnation I have just mentioned ; but they are quite enough to ex-cite the disgust of every man of sense and sobriety, much moreof every serious Christian.*

CHAPTER XL

THE DUTIES OF GOOD NEIGHBOURHOOD.

The duties of good neighbourhood forma branch of our rela-tive and social duties, which ought not to pass entirely unnoticed.The chief duties of good neighbourhood are, to render mutualaid, as circumstances may require, to cultivate social and friendlyintercourse, and to preserve harmony and good feeling amongthose whose lot in life Providence has cast near each other. Asingle individual may do immense good in his neighbourhood, byusing his influence to promote peace, to improve morals, man-

* An industrious writer has collected a vast number of details on this subject,pertaining both to the Greeks and Romans, and to the nations of modern Eu-rope, in “The American Quarterly Review,” Vol. II. pp. 422-458; and in“The Southern Review,” Vol. HI. pp. 416 - 400.