{Forgiveness}[20th August 1988]

[Redbook5:329-330][19880820:1007e]{Forgiveness}[20th August 1988]

19880820.1007

[continued]

Related to this* is the question of whether it as right (or is in fact possible) to forgive** in all circumstances, which is a part of not dwelling in the past. It is best from one’s own point of view; but is it right? I think the answer is that the worse the offence, the worse the state of the offender, the weaker he is to help himself (however strong he may seem), and the more to be pitied – by Love; and by Charity (Christian Love). I hope I can do it. Keeping in mind the state of the offender – if I am right – after Life as well as during it, might arouse pity (not to mention one’s own state if it doesn’t).

What of people who, when offended against, restore the psychic balance by offending in their turn? Do they feel better and avoid the need to forgive? It is difficult to be sure one way or the other. Speaking for myself, I haven’t found that countering an offence received with an offence returned has ever made me feel better about the original offence, if the original offence was offence enough to be worth worrying about. And villains, who are perhaps the men who live mostly by the doctrine of returning offence for offence (I do not mean just villains in crime, but in business too), seem to me to show in their faces, for the most part, the withering effect of all those offences taken and given.***

Justice, of course, may well require an offence given to balance the offence taken; but that is a different matter, which is the reason why Justice can never be private, only public.

*[See last previous entry]

**[See last previous entry but one, [Redbook5:327-328][19880820:1007c]{A Dream: Of a House Haunted by Memories [continued]}[20th August 1988], fns*&#]

***[Or perhaps it’s just the frazzling effect of all that alcohol.]

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