I. Are we to judge men according to the appearance of their life? There is a general social judgment which we must give. We look upon a man's outer life, and pass a sentence on it, either of praise or blame; and, so far as appearance goes, that sentence may be just, as long as the matters it judges are within the sphere of the broad lines of right and wrong. But in other matters it may be quite unjust. The human heart is hidden from us, and out of that alone can be drawn the materials for a righteous judgment of the lives of men.
II. Again, you are forbidden to judge the whole of a man's life from the results of his acts upon his own life. That is the way in which the world, while the man is alive, usually judges; and it is almost always wrong. We thank God that in the life of the Son of God, in the central life of history, a divine and eternal contradiction has been given to the world's lie that obloquy and slander, and suffering and poverty, and shame and death, are any proof that a man's life is base or foolish or degraded. It is emblazoned on the walls of heaven and earth by the death of Christ, that the prosperous are not always right, and the sufferer not always wrong.
III. Again, you cannot judge a man's character according to the appearance of any single act. You must know the man before you can blame or praise him for the act. You must know the circumstances which preceded it, the many motives which entered into every act the sum of which impelled it before you can truly judge the man from the action.
On the whole, we have scarcely any right to judge at all, just because we know nothing but the appearance. When we know more, then we may with diffidence judge; but, for the most part, we have no business to make the judgment openly, unless it happen to be a judgment of love. Still, after long experience, a long labour towards certain qualities, we may attain some power of judging righteously. (1) The first of these qualities is to love men as Christ loved them, through utter loss of self; the other qualities are secured by love. With love comes (2) patience; (3) freedom from prejudice. These qualities are modes of love; and, in truth, love includes all we need for judging righteously of men.
S. A. Brooke, The Spirit of the Christian Life,p. 42.
References: John 7:24, Clergyman's Magazine,vol. iii., p. 18; Homilist,3rd series, vol. viii., p. 223.