"He is a friend to all and a brother to every other scout."
The English version of this law has the following paragraph in addition:
"Thus if a scout meets another scout, even though a stranger to him, he must speak to him, and help him in any way that he can, either to carry out the duty he is then doing, or by giving him food, or, as far as possible, anything that he may be in want of. A scout must never be a snob. A snob is one who looks down upon another because he is poorer, or who is poor and resents another because he is rich. A scout accepts the other man as he finds him and makes the best of him."
It is a good thing for every man and every scout to remember that the things he has in common with all other men are more important than the things which men may or may not have according to particular circumstances. It is a good thing and a wise thing, because it prevents men from falling unawares into certain pitfalls of character which weaken their power and limit their intelligence and their influence with others.
There is an old Roman saying: "Nihil humani mihi alienum puto," -- which means that nothing which is human, or within the range of human experience, should be beyond any man's range of comprehension. No matter how strange, or how barbarous, or how absurd the conduct of another person may appear, it is the duty of every broad-minded man to put himself in that other's place sufficiently to understand with his own imagination what the other's actions mean from that other's point of view.
This breadth of mind is necessary if we want to form true judgements and to be just in interpreting the acts of other people, and it is part of the intelligence of which we have just been speaking as necessary "to help other people at all times."
Judging the conduct of people entirely according to their conformity or non-conformity to the ordinary customs of life is a very unsafe thing to do; for, in the first place, there are sometimes special circumstances in life which require action different from that which is customary, and we are not treating even custom with right respect if we make it take the place of independent and courageous action which may be entirely contrary to custom when occasion requires.
When we have put ourselves in another person's place and learned, by the aid of our human sympathy and imagination, what the significance of his act was to him, then only can we form a clear idea of whether it was right or wrong from our point of view, -- and to what extent.
If our judgement is adverse, and we condemn the act, we can do so with all the greater force if we understand how the mistake was made; and we then can realize that just punishment must follow, not only for the sake of protecting society (as in the case of crime), but because just punishment is often the very best means of helping a man to realize his mistake and to rise above it. Truly speaking, the germ of punishment springs into being with the mistake itself, and by an unchangeable law of life it must follow sooner or later. It is not necessarily inflicted from without, for often the worst punishments are those which come from the mere consciousness of having done wrong; but in cases where the conscience has become hardened and coarse, external punishment is frequently the only means left to save a man from utter ruin.
When, on the other hand, after carefully considering the meaning of another person's act from his own point of view, we come to the conclusion that his act was justified and good in itself, our judgement will have far more weight than if it were merely a "snap judgment" in imitation of public opinion or the judgments of others.
When we say that the human nature which we have in common with all other men is more important than the more superficial circumstances in respect to which men differ from one another, we mean that it is more important to consider whether a man is honest or dishonest, efficient or inefficient, sensitive or coarse, -- qualities or attributes of all human beings as such, -- than to ask whether he lives in one part of the town or another, whether his father is a day-laborer or president of a bank, what kind of clothes he wears, or whether he has been to college. Moreover, every man needs God; and, sooner or later, must perish if he disregards the divine law. Every man needs food, shelter, clothing, and work to live by, and these needs that are common to all men are more important than the possession of exceptional luxuries or extraordinary wealth. All men are alike in the fundamental things of life, -- their fundamental physical and moral needs, -- although the ways in which these needs are satisfied and developed may be very different; for there is great variety in the way men use their opportunities, and great inequality in the results. All men have a right to what they can earn or honestly come by and nothing more; and those who injure society by destructive or corrupting acts have the right to go to jail, just as much as a man who builds a house or who educates a child has a right to the shelter of his house or the grateful affection of the child. It is a mistake to say that all men are equal in the sense of giving equal service, because ordinary experience shows that the value of service varies immensely, and the laborer is worthy of his hire. But in another and a deeper sense, it is true to say that men are equal, because they have the same fundamental needs and the same right to a fair start and a square deal.
When we accept these principles as a matter of course, we are in a better position to obey the law "a scout is friendly" than when we are tied down by what is called "call prejudice" and give too much importance to the mere circumstances of life, such as wealth of poverty, luxury or hardship. We must remember that these things are only the conditions in which we live, or the setting of life. Life itself is distinct from these and far more important, and the only good that life can bring us in the end is a strong and true character as a means of service.
"Being friendly" means being willing to serve any one at any time, without having any axe of our own to grind.
It should be understood, of course, that a scout who is friendly from a broad-minded motive of justice is equally ready to receive such friendliness and aid as he is to give it. Some people are very much afraid of "putting themselves under obligations" to others, as they call it, for fear that they may be asked to give something in return. Such a feeling is impossible under the scout law; for it would be just as narrow and ungenerous to refuse a kindness for fear of being obliged to return it, as it would be to "work" another fellow for the sake of one's own advantage.
The law requires us to be friendly toward all men in the broadest sense; but there are some men whom it is possible to serve in one way, while others need a very different kind of friendliness. We are much nearer to those who love the laws that we believe in than we are to those who oppose and disobey them; and while we are required to be "friendly" toward all sorts and conditions of men, we reserve the word "friendship" to express something more.
I knew a man once who jumped into the water to save some one who was in danger of drowning. He
found that the drowning man was drunk and resisted all his efforts to help him. In order to save his
life, it became necessary to strike him senseless and then to bring him ashore. This was a case of true
friendliness which might perhaps have ripened into friendship afterwards; but the word "friendship"
represents such a beautiful and lovely idea that we should reserve it for individual instances of
mutual affection, strengthened and developed along the line of those things for which we have the
deepest reverence.