'...true charity is wakeful, fervent, full of solicitude, full of good offices, not so easily satisfied, not so ready to believe that everything is going well, as a matter of course; but jealous of mischief, apt to suspect danger, and prompt to extend relief. These are symptons by which genuine regard will manifest itself in a wife or mother, in the case of the bodily health of the object of her affections. And where there is any real concern for the spiritual intercessions of others, it is characterized by the same infallible marks. That wretched quality, by which the sacred name of charity is now so generally and so falsely usurped, is no other than indifference, which, against the plainest evidence, or at least where there is strong ground or apprehension is easily contented to believe that all goes well, because it has no anxieties to allay, no fears to repress. It undergoes no alternation of passions; it is not at one time flushed with hope, nor at another chilled with disappointment.'
William Wilberforce, A Practical View of Christianity, p.246.
