Do not profess perfect love, if you are cross, unamiable, and unkind at home. If you have not natural affection, you certainly have not supernatural. If you do not do as well as the brutes, do not profess to be like the angels of God. If you are not kind to her whom you have sworn to cherish, or to those whose protector nature has constituted you, stop your professions at once. It does not require any grace to love those who agree with our opinions, and who yield in willing deference to our authority.
Common sinners do as well as that.
If you are injuring your brother's influence by unkind words and injurious insinuations, do not profess perfect love. Therefore if you are doing him harm by talking against him when at the same time you say that you love him, you show that at the best, you are self-deceived. You are mistaken in your profession. You do not enjoy that state of grace that you think you do. A little candid reflection would convince you of this.