The Essentials of Spirituality Part 2

The cardinal thought I have in mind, which I believe will provide an escape from such intolerable moral dilemmas, can best be set forth by contrasting it with its diametrical opposite. This opposite is contained in the Buddhistic doctrine of the Karma. The doctrine of Karma implies that we are what we are to-day, good or bad, or good and bad, in consequence of good or bad deeds which we performed in previous states of existence. Our present life, according to this view, is but a link added to the chain of the innumerable lives which we have left behind us. It is true, we do not remember those past existences; but all the same, they have left their indelible mark upon us. Our fortunes, too, in this present existence, are determined by our meritorious or unmeritorious behavior in the past. If, for example, a man acts as your enemy to-day, it is because in a previous state you wantonly injured him or some one like him. Bear your disappointments, then, and the harm you receive from others without complaint; you are but suffering the penalty you deserve. Not only our fortune but our character, as has been said, is thus predetermined; we are what we are, in virtue of what we have been. If a man is a mean miser, it is because in a previous existence he was already unduly covetous of wealth. 'Tis but the seed he sowed in the past, that blossoms out in the present. If a man commit murder, it is because he was already guilty of unchecked violence in previous lives. The beginnings which he made in the past culminate in the awful present.

This is indeed a plausible theory, and it would help us to read some dark riddles if it were true, but there is not the slightest reason for supposing that it is. If ever there was a theory in the air, this is one. We not only have no recollections of any past incarnations, but we have no ground for inferring that there were any. I have mentioned the theory merely in order to exhibit its opposite. And the opposite is this: that a man is not responsible for the attractive or repulsive qualities with which he is born; that these are not to be accounted as his, in the sense that he is accountable for them. The son of the dipsomaniac, for instance, is not responsible for the morbid craving that stirs in him. He begins life, so far as responsibility is concerned, so far as merit or demerit is concerned, with a fresh start. He is not responsible for the craving; he is responsible only for a.s.senting to it. True, the pull in his case is incomparably stronger than in others; still he can resist. He is responsible, not for the hideous thing itself, but for the degree in which he yields to it. He is meritorious to the extent of the effort he puts forth not to yield to it. The reason why this point is often obscured is that from the first awakening of consciousness, from the time when first we have been capable of deliberate choice, we have more or less often a.s.sented to these evil propulsions and have thus made them our own. It has therefore become impossible to separate clearly between that element in our acts which is imposed upon us from without, and that deliberate element in the act which is our own. Nevertheless, no fair-minded person will dispute that there are qualities or predispositions, for which--hideous as they may be--we are no more responsible than we are for being born with an unprepossessing face. Men are born with certain attractive qualities and certain atrocious qualities, but moral goodness and badness consists not in having these predispositions, but rather in consenting to them and adopting them into our will.

Now this, it seems to me, throws an entirely new light upon the duality of our inner life. The fact that we discover that there is baseness within us from which we recoil as we should from a venomous snake, need not shake our throne of reason or overthrow our balance. These base things are not we; our true self does not reside in them, until, indeed, we unite with them by a.s.senting to them. A man's natural propensities are motley, but his soul is white. One hears much nowadays of the "white man's burden." There is such a thing as the white soul's burden. These dipsomaniac cravings with which some men are handicapped, these explosive irascibilities with which some are accursed, these tendencies to impurity with which others are defiled--these are the white soul's burden. Some men are more heavily burdened than others. But it is not the nature of the burden that makes men good or bad; it is the way they bear it, or rather it is the extent to which they transform this initial nature of theirs into a better nature.

There is a distinction between the natural character and the moral character; the moral character results from the changes produced in the natural character, by the power of the moral will, or by the energy of the soul striving to imprint its n.o.bler pattern on this difficult, oft intractable material.

But if we are not blameworthy for the repellant propensities, neither are we praiseworthy on account of the attractive and gracious qualities we may possess. The state of mind of one who is conscious of a divided inner life is torture. Nothing but an heroic treatment, nothing but a radical cure will free him from that torture; the cure is to realize that our seeming virtues are often not virtues at all. We must sacrifice our fancied virtues, if we would escape from the horrid sense of utter depravity that arises from our vices. A man puts to himself the question: How is it possible that at one moment I should be sympathetic and kind, should strive to compa.s.s the happiness of my fellow-beings, should take a generous interest in public causes, and try to act justly; and that at another moment I am so selfish and base? How can there be this oscillation from one pole to the other of human character? It is the contradiction that makes the tragedy. Am I, too, not "truly one but truly two"; am I, too, a Jekyll and a Hyde, both dwelling under the same skin? The answer is: You are neither the Hyde nor the Jekyll unless you elect to be. The true self is a principle in you superior to both these natural characters, a kind of oversoul, as Emerson puts it.

Sympathy and kindness lend themselves to the building up of a virtuous character, they are the psychological bases of virtue, but they must not be confounded with virtue itself. Taken by themselves, they represent merely a felicitous mixture of the elements of which we are compounded, no more praiseworthy than their opposites are blameworthy. Sympathy and kindness must be governed and regulated by principle, if they are to be rated as moral qualities. Left uncultivated, they often produce positively immoral results. Likewise, what is called justice is often no more than a hard adherence to rules, a love of order in our relations to others, which must be tempered and softened by the quality of mercy, before it can be accounted a moral virtue. Again, a willingness to advance the interests of a cla.s.s or of a people is often no more than an enlarged egotism, with most of the defects of the narrower egotism, and must be regulated by a moral principle, if it is to attain to the dignity of a moral attribute. It is only by the conformity of our thoughts, our feelings, and our acts to principle, that morality is achieved. It is only by such means that the genial and attractive tendencies of our nature are converted into genuine virtues, and the way of escape from the double life is along the line of the moral transformation of our seeming virtues.

_Mend your virtues, and your vices will take care of themselves._

But if the illusion is dispelled that the goodness or badness of an action as it appears to the eye is the measure of the virtuousness or viciousness of the agent; if the principle that governs the act and the effort put forth to conform to the principle be recognized as the true standard by which we are to judge, then two consequences will follow with respect to the conduct of life. The first is that the seemingly petty occasions of life are to be treated as grand occasions in so far as a moral principle is involved. For instance, a petty falsehood spoken for the purpose of securing business advantage or of avoiding business loss may seem to the average man a trivial affair; and it is so, so far as the results are concerned. And yet a morally high-bred man could no more condescend to such a falsehood than a man of cleanly habits would willingly steep himself in the mire. It is not the consequences, one way or the other, that matter. It is the eternal issue between the moral realities, truth and untruth, that is at stake. And in the light of this issue, in the light of the principle involved, petty as the circ.u.mstances may be, the occasion is not to be considered trivial.

The eternal forces that have been at war since mankind first existed are at war on this occasion also; he must cast in his lot on the side of the good.

Another instance of action seemingly trivial is that of simulating a personal interest in others, of pretending agreement in the foibles of others or of affecting a personal homage which one does not feel, in order to use others as instruments for the achievement of one's ends, whether those ends be selfish pecuniary advantage or political preferment, or even financial aid and support for some important philanthropic enterprise. As if philanthropy--which is based on respect for the worth of man--did not defeat its own ends, the moment it seeks to accomplish them by methods which degrade both him who gives and him who receives. The occasion is small, but the principle involved as to the choice of means is great. Another instance relates to the degree to which we may trench upon the personality of others, or seek to enter into that part of their life which they keep secret from us. We may suspect, for instance, that a friend is oppressed by some secret trouble, and we may believe that we could help him if only he would consent to reveal himself; but the act of self-revelation must come from his side, and the permission to help him must first be granted. We may give him the opportunity to declare himself, but we may not invade the sanctuary of his silence. The principle involved is great; it is that of respect for the precincts within which every soul has the right to live its own life.

And there are other ill.u.s.trations in abundance that might be quoted. For instance, custom prescribes rules of behavior in respect to many things which are really indifferent; in regard to the cut of the clothes we wear, in regard to the accepted form of salutation, in regard to the language of polite speech, and much more of the same sort. Now, the ethically-minded man is not a pedantic micrologist who wastes his time on the minutiae of conduct. But where custom relates to things not indifferent, where a principle is involved, there is no detail of conduct so minute as not to challenge the most vigorous protest, the utmost a.s.sertion of independence. The ethically-minded man is one who endeavors to shake off the yoke of custom, wherever it interferes with the affirmation of the great principles of life; who disdains to follow the mult.i.tude in doing not only what is palpably wrong, but what is morally unfine. He seeks to be a free man, an independent being, and to a.s.sert without acrimony or invidious criticism of others, yet firmly and unflinchingly, a strong and self-poised manhood. This, then, is one consequence that flows from our point of view: namely, that in the moral sphere the small occasions are to be treated as if they were grand occasions. As the poet puts it, "Rightly to be great is not to stir without great argument, but greatly to find quarrel in a straw when honor is at stake," or, as we should put it, greatly to find quarrel in the straws of life when principle is at stake.

And the second consequence is the obverse of this: To treat what seem to be great occasions because of their outward results, as if they were small. Is it a fortune that smiles upon you, that you can win by suppressing a moral scruple, by transgressing the eternal law? Put it aside as a thing not worth a second glance, if the price exacted be the loss of self-respect, if the bargain to which you must subscribe be the betrayal of principle. Is it life itself that is at stake; the dear life to which we cling so fondly? Yes, life is precious in its n.o.bler uses; but life itself shall not be esteemed as great in the hour in which we must choose between it and fidelity to principle. And that it is really possible to take this high att.i.tude the example of the world's great martyrs shows.

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The leading thoughts I have endeavored to state in these addresses are the following: Spirituality is morality carried out to the finish.

It depends on always keeping the ultimate end of existence in view, and on not resting in the partial ends. Intervals set aside for self-recollection and the facing of the thought of death are useful aids. The ultimate end itself is to elicit worth in others, and, by so doing, in one's self. The indispensable condition of this att.i.tude is to ascribe worth to every human being before even we observe it, to cast as it were a mantle of glory over him, to take toward every fellow human being the expectant att.i.tude, to seek the worth in him until we find it. Even toward oppressors we should take the same att.i.tude. Furthermore, our true self resides neither in our poorer nor in our better natural endowments, but in the will that suppresses the one and alone gives moral significance to the other.

Finally, we must testify to our respect for principle by treating the small occasions of life as great if they involve a moral issue, and the great prizes of life as small if they are offered at the price of moral integrity. These are thoughts which I have found helpful in my own experience; I submit them to you, in the hope that they may be of use to you also.