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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Essentials of Spirituality, by Felix Adler
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Essentials of Spirituality
+
+Author: Felix Adler
+
+Release Date: June 30, 2007 [EBook #21981]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ESSENTIALS OF SPIRITUALITY ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by David B. Alexander
+
+
+
+
+THE ESSENTIALS OF SPIRITUALITY
+
+by Felix Adler
+
+The Essentials of Spirituality
+
+The first essential is an awakening, a sense of the absence of
+spirituality, the realized need of giving to our lives a new and
+higher quality; first there must be the hunger before there can be
+the satisfaction.
+
+Similar effects are often produced by widely differing processes. In
+the psychical world that quality which we call spirituality may be
+associated with and evoked by Theism, or the belief in a Divine
+Father; by Pantheism, as in the case of Spinoza, whose face at the
+very first glance impresses you with its spiritual cast; or even by
+the Buddhist belief in Nirvana. It may also be attained by following
+the precepts and striving after the ideals of Ethical Culture. For
+spirituality is not indissolubly associated with any one type of
+religion or philosophy; it is a quality of soul manifesting itself in a
+variety of activities and beliefs.
+
+Before we proceed further, however, we must hazard a definition
+of the word. In the region of mental activity which is called the
+spiritual life vagueness is apt to prevail, the outlines of thought are
+apt to be blurred, the feelings aroused are apt to be indistinct and
+transitory. The word 'spiritual' becomes a synonym of muddy
+thought and misty emotionalism. If there were another word in the
+language to take its place, it would be well to use it. But there is
+not. We must use the word 'spiritual,' despite its associations and
+its abuse. We shall endeavor, however, to attach a distinct and
+definite meaning to the word. Mere definition, however, is too
+abstract and nakedly intellectual. Perhaps a description of some
+types of character, combined with definition, will be the better
+way.
+
+Savonarola is surely one of the commanding figures in history. His
+fiery earnestness, his passion for righteousness, the boldness with
+which he censured the corruptions of the Roman Court, the
+personal qualities by which he--a foreigner and a mere monk--made
+himself for a short period the lawgiver, the prophet, and virtually
+the dictator of Florence--that Florence which was at the time the
+very gemmary of the Renaissance--his sudden fall and tragic death;
+all combine to attract toward him our admiration, pity, and love,
+and to leave upon our minds the impression of his extraordinary
+moral genius. And yet, though a spiritual side was not wanting in
+Savonarola, we should not quote him as an outstanding exemplar
+of spirituality. The spiritual life is unperturbed and serene. His
+nature was too passionate, he was too vehement in his philippics,
+too deeply engrossed in the attainment of immediate results,
+too stormy a soul to deserve the name of spiritual.
+
+Again, our own Washington is one of the commanding figures in
+history. He achieved the great task which he set himself; he
+secured the political independence of America. He became the
+master builder of a nation; he laid securely the foundations on
+which succeeding generations have built. He was calm, too, with
+rare exceptions; an expert in self-control. But there was mingled
+with his calmness a certain coldness. He was lofty and pure, but
+we should hardly go to him for instruction in the interior secrets of
+the spiritual life. His achievements were in another field. His claim
+to our gratitude rests on other grounds. The spiritual life is calm,
+but serenely calm; irradiated by a fervor and a depth of feeling that
+were to some extent lacking in our first president. Lincoln,
+perhaps, came nearer to possessing them.
+
+Again, we have such types of men as John Howard, the prison
+reformer, and George Peabody, who devoted his great fortune to
+bettering the housing of the poor and to multiplying and improving
+schools. These men--especially the latter--were practical and sane,
+and were prompted in their endeavors by an active and tender
+benevolence. Yet we should scarcely think of them as conspicuous
+examples of the spiritual quality in human life and conduct.
+Benevolence, be it never so tender and practical, does not reach
+the high mark of spirituality. Spirituality is more than benevolence
+in the ordinary sense of the term. The spiritual man is benevolent
+to a signal degree, but his benevolence is of a peculiar kind. It is
+characterized by a certain serene fervor which we may almost call
+saintliness.
+
+But perhaps some one may object that a standard by which
+personalities like Savonarola, Washington, Howard and Peabody
+fall short is probably set too high, and that in any case the erection
+of such a standard cannot be very helpful to the common run of
+human beings. Where these heroic natures fall short, can you and I
+hope to attain? To such an objection the reply is that we cannot be
+too fastidious or exacting in respect to our standard, however poor
+our performance may be. Nothing less than a kind of divine
+completeness should ever content us. Furthermore, there have
+been some men who approached nearer to the spiritual ideal than
+the patriots and the philanthropists just mentioned--some few men
+among the Greeks, the Hindus, and the Hebrews. And for the
+guidance of conduct, these more excellent spirits avail us more
+than the examples of a Savonarola, a Washington or a Howard. To
+be a prophet or the lawgiver of a nation is not within your
+province and mine. For such a task hardly one among millions has
+the opportunity or the gifts. To be liberators of their country has
+been accorded in all the ages thus far covered by human history to
+so small a number of men that one might count them on the fingers
+of a single hand. Even to be philanthropists on a large scale is the
+restricted privilege of a very few. But to lead the spiritual life is
+possible to you and me if we choose to do so. The best is within
+the reach of all, or it would not be the best. Every one is permitted
+to share life's highest good.
+
+The spiritual life, then, may be described by its characteristic
+marks of serenity, a certain inwardness, a measure of saintliness.
+By the latter we are not to understand merely the aspiration after
+virtue or after a lofty ideal, still pursued and still eluding, but to a
+certain extent the embodiment of this ideal in the life--virtue
+become a normal experience like the inhalation and exhalation of
+breath! Moreover, the spiritually-minded seem always to be
+possessed of a great secret. This air of interior knowledge, of the
+perception of that which is hidden from the uninitiated, is a
+common mark of all refinement, aesthetic as well as moral. In
+studying the face of Leonardo da Vinci's 'Mona Lisa,' for instance,
+one will find that it is this interior insight that explains the so-called
+"cryptic smile." In the case of aesthetic refinement, the secret
+discloses itself as at bottom delicacy, the delicacy which prevents
+intrusion on the personality of others; which abhors a prying
+curiosity; which finds subtle ways of conveying esteem and
+delicate modes of rendering service. But the secret of moral
+refinement is of a far higher order, transcending aesthetic
+refinement by as much as goodness is superior to mere charm. The
+secret in this case consists in the insight vouchsafed to the
+spiritually-minded of the true end of human existence.
+
+Constituted as we are, there exist for us lower and higher ends.
+This distinction is fundamental for ethics. Food is necessary;
+without it we cannot live. But the getting of food--however
+necessary--is a lower end. Knowledge is a necessary end, and a
+higher one. The practical moral ends, such as the reformation of
+prisons, the improvement of the dwellings of the poor, are yet
+higher ends. But above all these is the highest end, that of moral
+completeness, of perfection, not in one particular but in every
+particular. Spirituality consists in always keeping in view this
+supreme end. The spiritually-minded person is one who regards
+whatever he undertakes from the point of view of its hindering or
+furthering his attainment of the supreme end. If a river had a
+consciousness like the human consciousness, we might imagine
+that it hears the murmur of the distant sea from the very moment
+when it leaves its source, and that the murmur grows clearer and
+clearer as the river flows on its way, welcoming every tributary it
+receives as adding to the volume which it will contribute to the
+sea, rejoicing at every turn and bend in its long course that brings
+it nearer to its goal. Such is the consciousness of a spiritually-minded
+human being. Or to take a simile from human experience. There
+are times when we go abroad to travel just for change of scenery
+and the refreshment which change brings with it. When we go in
+this mood we are likely to be intent on wayside pleasures, and
+at every stage of the journey, at every town where we halt, we
+shall suffer ourselves to be engrossed in the points of interest
+which that temporary abiding-place has to offer us, careless of
+what may await us farther on. But there are other times when
+we go abroad on serious business. Some congress of scientists or
+fellow-workers is to meet in which we are to take our part; or there
+is a conflict being waged in which we are to bear our share of
+wounds or death, as in the case of the Japanese, who are now
+setting out from their homes toward the battlefields of Manchuria;
+or there is some loved one at a distance who needs us, calls us,
+expects us. Then the stations on the way are unable to captivate
+our attention; we are impatient to pass them by; we welcome each
+one as we approach it as bringing us one step nearer to the desired
+goal.
+
+Some such analogy will help us understand the inner state of a
+spiritually-minded person. He thinks always of the ultimate end.
+In whatever he does or omits to do he asks himself, Will it advance
+me or divert me from the ultimate goal? Since spirituality consists
+in keeping in mind the ultimate goal, it follows, in accordance with
+what was said in the beginning, that there must be various types of
+spirituality, corresponding to the various ways in which the
+ultimate goal is conceived. For those to whom the final end of
+human life is union with God, the Divine Father, the thought of
+this Divine Father gives color and complexion to their spiritual life.
+They think of Him when they lie down at night and when they rise
+up in the morning; his praise is ever on their lips; the desire to win
+his approbation is with them in all their undertakings. To those
+who regard the attainment of Nirvana as the supreme end, like the
+Buddhists, the thought of Nirvana is a perpetual admonition. To
+those who view the supreme end of life as moral perfection, the
+thought of that perfection is the constant inner companion. The
+moral man, commonly so-called; the man who is honest, pays his
+debts, performs his duties to his family; the man who works for
+specific objects, such as political reform; this man, worthy of all
+respect though he be, is still intent on the stages of his journey.
+The spiritual man, as we must now define him from the point of
+view of Ethical Culture, is the man who always thinks of the
+ultimate goal of his journey, i. e., a moral character complete in
+every particular, and who is influenced by that thought at all times
+and in all things. Spirituality, in this conception of it, is nothing but
+morality raised to its highest power.
+
+And now, let us ask what are some of the conditions on which the
+attainment of such a life depends. The prime condition is to
+acquire the habit of ever and anon detaching one's self from one's
+accustomed interests and pursuits, becoming, as it were, a
+spectator of one's self and one's doings, escaping from the
+sweeping current and standing on the shore. For this purpose it is
+advisable to consecrate certain times, preferably a certain time
+each day, to self-recollection; to dedicate an hour--or a half-hour,
+if no more can be spared--to seeing one's life in all its relations;
+that is, as the poet has put it, to seeing life "steadily and seeing it
+whole." The sane view is to see things in their relation to other
+things; the non-sane view is to see them isolated, in such a way
+that they exercise a kind of hypnotic spell over us. And it makes no
+difference what a man's habitual interests may be, whether they be
+sordid or lofty, he needs ever and anon to get away from them. In
+reality, nothing wherewith a man occupies himself need be sordid.
+The spiritual attitude does not consist in turning one's back on
+things mundane and fixing one's gaze on some supernal blaze of
+glory, but rather in seeing things mundane in their relation to
+things ultimate, perfect.
+
+The eating of bread is surely a sufficiently commonplace
+operation. Yet Jesus brake bread with his disciples in such way
+that that simple act has become the symbol of sublimely spiritual
+relations, the centre of the most august rite of the Christian
+Church. In like manner the act of sitting down to an ordinary meal
+with the members of our family may, if seen in its relations, be for
+us a spiritual consecration. The common meal may become for us
+the type of the common life we share, the common love we bear.
+
+On the other hand, seemingly much more lofty pursuits may have a
+narrowing and deadening effect on us if we do not see them in
+their ultimate relations, and so divest them of reference to life's
+highest end. For instance, the pursuit of science may have this
+effect, if the sole object of the scientist be to perform some
+astonishing piece of work for the purpose of attracting attention or
+to secure a well-salaried position, or even if he be so wedded to
+his specialty as to fail to be sensitive to the relations of it to the
+body of truth in general. And the same holds good of the
+narrow-minded reformer, of whom Emerson has said that his
+virtue so painfully resembles vice; the man who puts a moral idol
+in the place of the moral ideal, who erects into the object toward
+which all his enthusiasm goes some particular reform, such as the
+single tax, or socialism, or public parks, or a model school; the
+man, in short, who strives for a good instead of striving for
+goodness. Whatever our pursuits may be, we should often
+mentally detach ourselves from them, and, standing aloof as
+impartial spectators, consider the direction in which they are taking
+us.
+
+This counsel is frequently urged on grounds of health, since the
+wear and tear of too intense absorption in any pursuit is apt to
+wreck the nervous system. I urge it on the ground of mental sanity,
+since a man cannot maintain his mental poise if he follows the
+object of his devotion singly, without seeing it in relation to other
+objects. And I urge it also on the ground of spirituality, for a
+salient characteristic of spirituality is calmness, and without the
+mental repose which comes of detachment we cannot import
+calmness into our lives. There are some persons, notably among
+those engaged in philanthropic activities, who glory in being
+completely engrossed in their tasks, and who hug a secret sense of
+martyrdom, when late at night, perhaps worn out in mind and
+body, they throw themselves upon their couch to snatch a few
+hours of insufficient sleep. Great occasions, of course, do occur
+when every thought of self should be effaced in service; but as a
+rule, complete absorption in philanthropic activity is as little sane
+and as little moral as complete absorption in the race for gain. The
+tired and worn-out worker cannot do justice to others, nor can he
+do justice to that inner self whose demands are not satisfied even
+by philanthropic activity. If, then, self-recollection is essential, let
+us make daily provision for it. Some interest we should have--even
+worldly prudence counsels this much--as far remote as possible
+from our leading interest; and beyond that, some book belonging
+to the world's great spiritual literature on which we may daily feed.
+The Bible used to be in the old days all-sufficient for this purpose,
+and it is still, in part at least, an admirable aid to those who know
+how to use it. But there are other books, such as the legacy of the
+great Stoics, the writings of our latter-day prophets, the essays of
+Arnold and Carlyle and Emerson, the wisdom of Goethe. These
+noble works, even if they do not wholly satisfy us, serve to set
+our thoughts in motion about high concerns, and give to the mind
+a spiritual direction.
+
+A second condition of the spiritual life has been expressed in
+the precept, reiterated in many religions, by many experts in things
+relating to the life of the soul: "Live as if this hour were thy last."
+You will recall, as I pronounce these words, the _memento mori_
+of the Ancients, their custom of exhibiting a skeleton at the feast,
+in order to remind the banqueters of the fate that awaited them.
+You will remember the other-worldliness of Christian monks and
+ascetics who decried this pleasant earth as a vale of tears, and
+endeavored to fix the attention of their followers upon the pale
+joys of the Christian heaven, and you will wonder, perhaps, that I
+should be harking back to these conceptions of the past. I have,
+however, no such intention.
+
+The prevailing attitude toward the thought of death is that of
+studied neglect. Men wish to face it as little as possible. We know,
+of course, what the fate is that awaits us. We know what are the
+terms of the compact. Now and again we are momentarily struck
+by the pathos of it all; for instance, when we walk through some
+crowded thoroughfare on a bright day and reflect that before
+many years this entire multitude will have disappeared. The
+rosy-cheeked girl who has just passed; the gay young fellow at her
+side, full of his hopes, confident of his achievements, acting and
+speaking as if the lease of eternity were his; that "grave and
+reverend seigneur," clad with dignity and authority--all will have
+gone, and others will have taken their places. Yet, as a rule, we are
+not much affected by such reflections. When one of our friends has
+met with a painless death we are apt to solace ourselves with the
+hope that perhaps we shall be as lucky as he; at all events, we
+know that when our time comes we must take our turn. Even
+those who look forward with apprehension to the last moment,
+and who when it approaches, cling desperately to life, are prudent
+enough to hold their peace. There is a general understanding that
+those who go shall not mar the composure of those who stay, and
+that public decorum shall not be disturbed by outcries.
+
+This is the baldly secular view of the matter, and this view, though
+based on low considerations, in some respects is sound enough.
+And yet I reiterate the opinion that to live as if this hour were our
+last--in other words, to frankly face the idea of death--is most
+conducive to the spiritual life. It is for the sake of the reflex action
+upon life that the practice of coming to a right understanding with
+death is so valuable. Take the case of a man who calls on his
+physician, and there unexpectedly discovers that he is afflicted with
+a fatal malady, and is told that he may have only a few months
+longer to live. This visit to the physician has changed the whole
+complexion of life for him. What will be the effect upon him? If he
+be a sane, strong, morally high-bred man, the effect will be
+ennobling; it will certainly not darken the face of nature for him.
+Matthew Arnold wished that when he died he might be placed at
+the open window, that he might see the sun shining on the
+landscape, and catch at evening the gleam of the rising star.
+Everything that is beautiful in the world will still be beautiful; he
+will thankfully accept the last draught of the joy which nature has
+poured into his goblet. Everything that is really uplifting in human
+life will have a more exquisite and tender message for him. The
+gayety of children will thrill him as never before, interpreted as a
+sign of the invincible buoyancy of the human race, of that race
+which will go on battling its way after he has ceased to live. If he
+be a man of large business connections, he will still, and more than
+ever, be interested in planning how what he has begun may be
+safely continued. If he be the father of a family, he will provide
+with a wise solicitude, as far as possible, for every contingency. He
+will dispose of matters now, as if he could see what will happen
+after his departure. On the other hand, all that is vain or frivolous,
+every vile pleasure, gambling, cruelty, harsh language to wife or
+child, trickery in business, social snobbishness, all the base traits
+that disfigure human conduct, he will now recoil from with horror,
+as being incongruous with the solemn realization of his condition.
+The frank facing of death, therefore, has the effect of sifting out
+the true values of life from the false, the things that are worth
+while from the things that are not worth while, the things that
+are related to the highest end from those related to the lower
+partial ends. The precept, "Live as if this hour were thy last," is
+enjoined as a touchstone; not for the purpose of dampening the
+healthy relish of life, but as a means of enhancing the relish for
+real living, the kind of living that is devoted to things really worth
+while. As such a test it is invaluable. The question, "Should I care
+to be surprised by death in what I am doing now?"--put it to the
+dissipated young man in his cups, put it to the respectable
+rogue--nay, put it to each one of us, and it will often bring the
+blush of shame to our cheeks. When, therefore, I commend the
+thought of death, I think of death not as a grim, grisly skeleton, a
+King of Terrors, but rather as a mighty angel, holding with averted
+face a wondrous lamp. By that lamp--hold it still nearer, O
+Death--I would read the scripture of my life, and what I read in
+that searching light, that would I take to heart.
+
+Finally, there is a third condition of the spiritual life which I would
+mention, and which comes nearer to the heart of the matter than
+anything that has yet been said. Learn to look upon any pains and
+injuries which you may have to endure as you would upon the
+same pains and injuries endured by someone else. If sick and
+suffering, remember what you would say to someone else who is
+sick and suffering, remember how you would admonish him that
+he is not the first or the only one that has been in like case, how
+you would expect of him fortitude in bearing pain as an evidence
+of human dignity. Exhort yourself in like manner; expect the same
+fortitude of yourself. If any one has done you a wrong, remember
+what you would adduce in palliation of the offence if another were
+in the same situation; remember how you would suggest that
+perhaps the one injured had given some provocation to the
+wrongdoer, how you would perhaps have quoted the saying:
+_"Tout comprendre est tout pardonner"_--"to understand is to
+pardon," how you would in any case have condemned vindictive
+resentment. In the moral world each one counts for one and not
+more than one. The judgment that you pass on others, pass on
+yourself, and the fact that you are able to do so, that you have the
+power to rise above your subjective self and take the public
+universal point of view with respect to yourself, will give you a
+wonderful sense of enfranchisement and poise and spiritual dignity.
+And, on the other hand (and this is but the obverse of the same
+rule), look upon everyone else as being from the moral point of
+view just as important as you are; nay, realize that every human
+being is but another self, a part of the same spiritual being that is in
+you, a complement of yourself, a part of your essential being.
+Realize the unity that subsists between you and your fellow-men,
+and then your life will be spiritual indeed. For the highest end with
+which we must be ever in touch, toward which we must be ever
+looking, is to make actual that unity between ourselves and others
+of which our moral nature is the prophecy. The realization of that
+unity is the goal toward which humanity tends.
+
+Spirituality depends upon our tutoring ourselves to regard the
+welfare of others--moral as well as external--as much our concern
+as our own. What this practically means the following illustration
+will indicate. A certain bank official, a man of excellent education
+and of high social standing, committed a crime. He allowed himself
+in a moment of lamentable weakness to use certain trust funds
+which had been committed to him to cover losses which he had
+sustained. He intended to replace what he had taken, of course,
+but he could not do so, for he became more and more deeply
+involved. One night as he was alone in his office it became plain to
+him that the day of reckoning could no longer be put off. He was
+at the end of his resources. The morrow would bring exposure and
+ruin. Then the temptation seized him to make away with himself.
+He had a charming wife and two lovely daughters. He was the
+revered head of the household; in the eyes of his family the
+paragon of honor. He was universally esteemed by his friends, who
+knew not his temptation and his fall. On that night in the lonely
+office he could not bear to think of meeting the future, of being
+exposed as a criminal in the eyes of his friends, of bringing upon
+his family the infamy and the agony of his disgrace. Should a man
+in his situation be permitted to commit suicide? If we were at his
+elbow should we allow him to do so? This question was submitted
+to one of my Ethics classes. The students at first impulsively
+decided in the affirmative, for they argued, as many do, that right
+conduct consists in bestowing happiness on others, and wrong
+conduct in inflicting suffering on others; and now that the man had
+committed the crime, they maintained he could at least relieve
+those whom he loved of his presence by taking himself out of their
+way. True, someone said, the exposure was inevitable in any case,
+and the shock of discovery could not be averted; but we were
+forced to concede that from the point of view of suffering, the pain
+involved in the sudden shock could not be compared to the
+long-drawn-out anguish which would result if he continued to live.
+For presently he would forfeit his liberty; he would sit as a prisoner
+in the dock. His wife and daughters, loyal to their duties even
+toward an unworthy husband and father, would be found at his
+side. They would hear the whispers, they would see the significant
+nods, they would endure all the shame. Later on, when the trial
+was at an end, the prisoner would stand up to hear the verdict.
+They would still be near him. Still later there would be the
+pilgrimage to the prison on the Hudson. They would see their
+beloved husband and father in striped garb among the scum and
+refuse of society, and these weary journeys would be repeated
+during long years until his term was over and he returned a broken
+and outcast man to what was once a home. Could not this
+lamentable issue at least be forestalled? But then there came a
+new light into our discussion. One of the students suggested that
+he must face the consequences of his wrongdoing, and that one of
+the consequences is the very suffering which he inflicts upon the
+innocent. He must see that day by day. That would be a part of his
+expiation, the purifying fire that may consume the dross of his
+nature. And, on the other hand, it would be right for the innocent
+to bear, not the guilt, but the consequences of the guilt of the
+wrongdoer whom they have loved, whom they still love. For this is
+the holy law: that the other whom we love shall be taken into our
+self as a part of our very self, that in his joy we shall rejoice as if
+his joy were ours, that in his achievements we shall triumph, that in
+his humiliations we shall be humbled, and that we shall work out
+his redemption by traveling with him the hard road that leads out
+of the dark depths upward again to the levels of peace and
+reconciliation.
+
+The spiritual life depends on self-recollection and detachment from
+the rush of life; it depends on facing frankly the thought of death; it
+is signalized, especially, by the identification of self with others,
+even of the guiltless with the guilty. Spirituality is sometimes
+spoken of as if it were a kind of moral luxury, a work of
+supererogation, a token of fastidiousness and over-refinement. It is
+nothing of the sort. Spirituality is simply morality carried to its
+farthest bounds; it is not an airy bauble of the fancy, it is of "the
+tough fibre of the human heart."
+
+
+II. THE SPIRITUAL ATTITUDE TOWARD ONE'S
+NEIGHBOR.
+
+Sunday, Nov. 27, 1904.
+
+Those whom we call our neighbors, our fellow-men, may stand to
+us in a threefold relation. Some possess gifts far greater than our
+own, and in point of development are our superiors; some are on
+the same level; and some are much inferior to us. The spiritual
+attitude toward our neighbor--though always governed by the
+same principle, expresses itself in different ways, according as
+our neighbor is related to us in one or another of these three ways.
+
+I recently read a biography of Matthew Arnold, the author of
+which constantly speaks of himself as Arnold's disciple. It is not
+often nowadays that we hear men proclaim themselves disciples
+and glory in their discipleship. At the present day the tendency is
+for every one to assert an equality with others; and most persons
+would resent the imputation of subordination implied in such a
+word as disciple. And yet the writer in question is a self-respecting
+man, he is thoroughly alive to his dignity, and he has keen and
+unsparing words for certain of the faults of the master whom he
+reveres. He is not blind, he is not wax in the hands of the master,
+he does not look upon him with undiscerning admiration, and yet
+he takes toward him the reverent attitude--what I should call the
+spiritual attitude--for he recognizes that this master of his is a
+casket in which nature has deposited a treasure of extraordinary
+value, that he possesses a genius much superior to that of others.
+The loyal disciple is concerned that this genius should appear in its
+full potency and in undiminished radiance. To this end is the
+upward look, the appreciation and reverence, and to this end also
+the misgiving and the remonstrance when the great man deviates
+from the course which he ought to follow. The same attitude of
+loyalty we sometimes find among the disciples of great artists, and
+the followers of great religious teachers. Loyalty is a virtue which
+is somewhat underrated at the present day. Loyalty is not
+debasing, not unworthy of a self-respecting man; it is but another
+name for the spiritual attitude toward those who have a superior
+genius, to whose height we are lifted by our appreciation of them.
+
+Furthermore, in our spiritual relation toward those who occupy
+about the same plane of development with ourselves, the same
+principle of sympathy with the best possible attainment should be
+the rule. To rejoice in the failure of others, to accentuate in our
+thinking and in our conversation the faults of others, to triumph at
+their expense, is the utterly unspiritual attitude. To desire that
+others may manifest the excellence that is latent in them--be it like
+to or different from our own, to desire that they shall have credit
+for every excellence they possess, and to sedulously aid them in
+developing such excellence as they can attain to, that is the
+spiritual attitude.
+
+I have spoken of superiors and equals, of our attitude toward
+those who are more developed than we are, and toward those who
+are about equally developed; but my address to-day will be mainly
+occupied with our duty toward those who are or seem to be
+wholly undeveloped. The fundamental principle of Ethics is that
+every human being possesses indefeasible worth. It is comparatively
+easy to apply the principle of anticipating our neighbor's latent
+talents to the highly gifted, to the great authors, scientists,
+statesmen, artists, and even to the moderately gifted, for
+their worth is, in part, already manifested in their lives. But it is not
+so easy to apply or justify the principle in the case of the obscure
+masses, whose lives are uneventful, unilluminated by talent, charm,
+or conspicuous service, and who, as individuals at least, it might
+appear, could well be spared without impairing the progress of the
+human race. And yet this doctrine of the worth of all is the
+cornerstone of our democracy. Upon it rests the principle of the
+equal rights of even the humblest before the law, the equal right of
+all to participate in the government. It is also the cornerstone of all
+private morality; for unless we accept it, we cannot take the
+spiritual attitude toward those who are undeveloped.
+
+The doctrine, then, that every man possesses indefeasible worth is
+the basis of public morality, and at the same time the moral
+principle by which our private relations to our fellow-men are
+regulated. What does it mean to ascribe indefeasible worth to
+every man? It means, for instance, that human beings may not be
+hunted and killed in sport as hunters kill birds or other game; that
+human beings may not be devoured for food as they have been by
+cannibals or sometimes by men in starvation camps when hard
+pressed by hunger; that human beings may not be forced to work
+without pay, or in any way treated as mere tools or instruments for
+the satisfaction of the desires of others. This, and more to the same
+purpose, is implied in the ascription of indefeasible worth to every
+man. Moreover, on the same principle, it follows that it is morally
+wrong to deprive another of the property which he needs for his
+livelihood or for the expression of his personality, and to blast the
+reputation of another--thereby destroying what may be called his
+social existence. And it also follows that a society is morally most
+imperfect, the conditions of which are such that many lives are
+indirectly sacrificed because of the lack of sufficient food, and that
+many persons are deprived of their property through cunning and
+fraud. The life of animals we do take, and whatever secret
+compunction we may have in the matter, the most confirmed
+vegetarian will not regard himself in the light of a cannibal when he
+partakes of animal food. The liberty of animals we do abridge
+without scruple; we harness horses to our carriages, regardless of
+what may be their inclinations, and we do not regard ourselves as
+slaveholders when we thus use them. Why is there this enormous
+distinction between animals and men? Are the Hottentots so
+greatly elevated above the animal level; are the lowest classes of
+negroes so much superior in intelligence to animals? Have the
+black race and the brown race any claim to be treated as the equals
+of the white? Among white men themselves is there not a similar
+difference between inferiors and superiors? Such questions
+naturally suggest themselves; and they have been asked at all
+times. It seems obvious that value should be ascribed to those who
+possess genius or even talent, or at least average intelligence; but
+why should value be ascribed to every human being just because
+he wears the human form?
+
+The positive belief in human worth on which is based the belief in
+human equality, so far as it has rooted itself in the world at all, we
+owe to religion, and more particularly to the Hebrew and Christian
+religions. The Hebrew Bible says: "In the image of God did He
+create man"--it is this God-likeness that to the Hebrew mind
+attests the worth of man. As some of the great masters on
+completing a painting have placed a miniature portrait of
+themselves by way of signature below their work, so the great
+World-Artist when He had created the human soul stamped it with
+the likeness of Himself to attest its divine origin. And the greatest
+of the Hebrew thinkers conceived of this dignity as belonging to all
+human beings alike, irrespective of race or creed. In practice,
+however, the idea of equal human worth was more or less limited
+to the Chosen People. At least, to keep within the bounds of the
+artistic simile, the members of the Hebrew people were regarded
+as first-proof copies, and other men as somewhat dim and less
+perfect duplicates.
+
+In the Christian religion a new idea was introduced. The belief in
+the worth of man was founded on the doctrine of redemption. The
+sacrifice of atonement had been offered up for the benefit of all
+persons who chose to avail themselves of it. Christ had come to
+save the Gentile as well as the Jew, the bond as well as the free,
+men, women and children of every race, living under every sky, of
+every color of skin and degree of intelligence. The sacred respect
+which we owe to every human being is due from this point of view
+to the circumstance that every human being is a possible
+beneficiary of the Atonement. For him too--as the theological
+phrase is--Christ died upon the cross. But in Christianity too we
+find that the idea of brotherhood, of equal worth, universal as
+it is in theory, in practice came to be considerably restricted. It did
+not really extend to all human beings as such; it did not extend to
+those who refused to be the beneficiaries of the act of atonement.
+In reality, it applied only to Christians or to those who were not
+averse to receiving the Christian faith. The theological formulation
+of the fundamental idea which we are discussing, therefore, is
+beset by two difficulties: it is limited in application, and it is based
+on theological conceptions. As soon as these theological
+conceptions are relinquished, the doctrine of equality is in danger
+of being abandoned.
+
+In 1776, the founders of the American Republic undertook to
+supply a new and a secular foundation for this doctrine. In the
+Declaration of Independence, Jefferson wrote: "We hold these
+truths to be self-evident, that all men are created free and equal."
+In other words, he put forth the astonishing proposition that
+human equality is self-evident. Many of us would incline to the
+opinion that the opposite is self-evident, that the inequalities which
+subsist between men are so palpable that we cannot overlook
+them. If, however, we inquire what led Jefferson to this statement,
+we shall find that, at the time when the Declaration of
+Independence was written, there existed a basis of fact that gave
+color to his assumption. The population of the United Colonies
+was small--only about three millions--and on the whole
+homogeneous. The great majority of the people were
+agriculturists, pursuing the same occupations and on the whole
+exhibiting the same traits. They were all, or almost all, of vigorous
+stock, capable of self-government, jealous of their rights,
+independent in spirit. At that particular time, the points of
+similarity and equality among the members of the American
+Colonies far outweighed the points of dissimilarity. It was, then, to
+a certain extent on facts of experience, and not entirely on the
+hypothesis of the eighteenth century philosophy, that Jefferson's
+famous proclamation rested.
+
+Since Jefferson's day the facts have markedly changed. We have
+passed beyond the agricultural stage, and have entered the stage of
+industrial development. The occupations of our citizens have
+become greatly diversified. Large bodies of foreign immigrants
+have come to us. If we survey the conditions of American life at
+present, we are strongly impressed with the differences that exist
+between the various strata of our population: differences in mental
+ability, differences in vital energy, differences in the point of
+culture attained, differences in capacity to rise. As a consequence,
+the Declaration of Independence is treated by many as an obsolete
+document, and its assertions as mere bombast and rhetoric;
+unjustly so, because the truth which it attempts to convey is valid,
+though the form in which the truth is expressed and the grounds on
+which it is put are no longer adequate.
+
+We have arrived, then, at this pass: the theological foundation
+for the doctrine of human equality has failed or is failing us; the
+facts to which the Declaration of Independence appealed have
+altered. Are we, then, to give up the belief in human equality--that
+priceless postulate of the moral law, the basis alike of democracy
+and of private morality? At times it seems to us that the world is
+almost ready to do so. Nietzsche in Germany puts it forth as a
+philosophic principle that humanity exists not for the democratic
+purpose of securing the highest development of all, but for the
+aristocratic purpose of producing a race of supermen, an elite of
+strong, forceful, "leonine" beings. And in his doctrine that the
+many exist as a kind of pedestal for the grandeur of the few, he
+finds support the world over. Men are but too ready in this age,
+when the energies of the strong have been unfettered and moral
+restraints have become weakened, to put Nietzche's doctrine into
+practice too. From the Congo we hear appalling accounts of the
+cruelty of civilized men in their dealings with the uncivilized.
+Rubber and ivory, it appears, must be obtained in large quantities
+to secure a handsome profit on investments that have been made in
+those regions. Railroads must be built to make the supply of
+rubber and of ivory accessible. In consequence, a system of forced
+labor, of virtual slavery, has been imposed on the miserable natives
+in order to make the building of these railroads possible. Human
+life has not been spared, for human life in the Congo is as dust in
+the balance when weighed against the profits from rubber. Punitive
+expeditions have been organized (in other words, wholesale
+slaughter has been resorted to), in order to coerce the reluctant
+natives to bring in their supplies more punctually. The wives and
+daughters of the natives have been seized, brutally chained, and
+detained as hostages in order to influence their husbands and
+fathers to a more ready obedience. The story of the Congo reads
+like an incredible nightmare; the civilized world is aghast at the
+partial revelations of it which have been published. From Armenia
+we hear similar stories of ruthless contempt for human life and
+merciless outrage. With Kishineff and Siberia in mind, we need not
+comment on the conditions that exist in Russia. In the United
+States, the heartrending circumstances that accompany negro
+lynchings, the conditions in the sweated industries, and the
+widespread evil of child labor show us clearly enough how little
+the doctrine of the intrinsic and indefeasible worth of man has
+as yet become the property of even the most advanced nations. In
+the face of all these odds on the other side, in the face of these
+confederate forces working the world over for the abasement of
+man, how urgent is the appeal to rescue and fortify the doctrine, to
+make it effectual, first in our own conduct and then in that of
+others! And on what tenable foundations can we rest it, that it may
+become operative?
+
+First, as to its meaning. It does not mean equality of gifts, or
+equality of mental energy, or equality in any of the traits that lead
+to successful careers. It means equality in the sense that each is the
+vehicle of some talent, however small, the bearer of some gift,
+however seemingly inconsiderable, which in the sum total of
+humanity's development is needed; that each one in his place and
+with his gift, however insignificant in appearance, is in fact
+indispensable.
+
+And what is the reason for ascribing such worth to human beings?
+The sole reason is, that the moral law enjoins us to do so. Before
+ever we have discovered whether a man has worth in him or not,
+the moral law enjoins us to ascribe it to him, to treat him as if he
+had it, to see in him the light of the possibilities which he has never
+made good and which he never wholly will make good: and thus,
+and thus only, shall we bring to light, in part at least, the precious
+things in his nature, the existence of which we can only divine. The
+moral law is wholly misunderstood if it be founded on the actual
+worth or value of men, for none of us has great worth or value.
+The moral law is a law for the eliciting of possibilities. Briefly put,
+it enjoins that we shall invest others with a garment of light, that
+we shall ascribe worth to others and to ourselves, in order that
+they and we may become worthy. This is the spiritual basis of the
+doctrine of equality; this is the spiritual conception which should
+regulate our attitude toward our neighbors.
+
+And yet if there were no evidence at all to support our faith in
+human goodness, our faith, however vigorous at first, would soon
+decline, and hope and courage might utterly desert us. If men on
+nearer acquaintance turned out to be, as some pessimists have
+represented them to be, hard egotists, ingrates, slanderers,
+backbiters, envious, incapable of generous admirations, sodden in
+sensuality, knaves devoid of scruple; if experience indeed bore out
+this sweeping impeachment, if especially the so-called masses of
+mankind were hopelessly delivered over to the sway of brutal
+instincts, of superstition and folly; the faith of which I speak might
+justly be termed mere fatuousness, and the rule of acting on the
+assumption that men are better than they appear would turn out a
+blind delusion. But the striking fact is, that as soon as we act on
+the principle of looking for the latent good in others, we are
+rewarded by finding far more than we had any reason to expect.
+
+Take as an instance the masses of the poor and ignorant, upon
+whom we are so apt to pass sweeping judgments, as Carlyle did
+when he said that the population of England was forty millions--
+mostly fools. The experience of those who have had to do with
+popular education does not corroborate this rash condemnation.
+There is hardly a child in our public schools that is not found to
+possess mental power of some sort, if only we possess the right
+method of calling it out. The new education is new and significant
+just because it has succeeded in devising methods for gaining
+access to the latent mental power, and thus reaching what had
+been supposed to be non-existent. Every so-called educational
+campaign in the field of politics brings out the same truth. The
+capacity for hard thinking and sound judgment which resides in the
+working class is surprising to us, only because in our preposterous
+pride we had supposed them to be baked of different clay than we
+are. In the matter of artistic endowment, too, what wonderful
+discoveries do we constantly make among poor children, even
+among children that come from the lowest dregs of society! What
+fine fancy, what prompt response to the appeal of the beautiful, in
+spite of all the debasing inheritance!
+
+But it is, in the last analysis, the moral qualities upon which
+our respect for human nature rests, and in this respect how often
+are we astonished, yes and abashed, when we observe the extent to
+which the moral virtues express themselves in the life of those
+who, in point of so-called culture, are infinitely our inferiors! What
+power of self-sacrifice is displayed by these poor people, whom
+sometimes in our wicked moods we are disposed to despise; what
+readiness to share the last crust with those who are, I will not say
+hungry, but hungrier! Who of us would take into his own house,
+his own bedchamber, a dying consumptive, a mere acquaintance, in
+order that the last days of the sufferer might be soothed by friendly
+nursing? Who of us would make provision in our will to share our
+grave with a worthy stranger, in order to avert from him the
+dreaded fate of being buried in the Potter's Field? Which of our
+young men would be willing to refuse the proffered opportunity of
+an education in one of the foremost colleges in the land, in order
+to stay with the old folks at home and work at a menial occupation
+for their support? Who of us would give up the joys of youth to
+devote his whole life to the care of a bed-ridden, half-demented
+parent? Yet all of these things and many others like them I have
+known to be done by people who live in the tenement houses of
+this great city. It sometimes seems as if the angelic aspect of
+human nature displayed itself by preference in the house of
+poverty, as if those who possessed no other treasure, no other
+jewels with which to adorn themselves, were compensated for
+their penury in other ways by these priceless gems of the most
+unselfish virtue. Such conduct, of course, is not universal. There
+are abundant instances of the opposite. But the truth remains that
+it is the worth which those who seem to lead the least desirable
+lives display toward others that assures us of their own worth.
+This, too, is the lesson of the oft-quoted and oft-misunderstood
+parable of the Good Samaritan, upon which here, for the moment,
+I should like to dwell.
+
+The Jewish State in the time of Jesus was substantially an
+ecclesiastical aristocracy. The highest rank was occupied by the
+priests and their assessors, the Levites; after them, sometimes
+disputing the first place, came the doctors learned in the sacred
+law; below them the commonalty; and still lower in the social scale
+were the people of Samaria, who accepted the current Jewish
+religion only in part, and who were regarded by the blue-blood
+ecclesiastical aristocrats with contempt, indeed almost as outcasts.
+This fact it is necessary to remember in order to understand the
+parable. The designation Good Samaritan has become so associated
+with the idea of mercifulness, that I doubt not there are
+many persons who have the impression that Samaritans in the
+ancient Hebrew days were people specially noted for their
+benevolent disposition. Nothing of the kind, of course, is true. The
+Samaritans were a despised lower stratum of the population of
+Palestine. Read the parable in this light, and you will perceive that
+the moral of it is not as commonly stated--every one who has need
+of me is my neighbor; but that there is a far deeper meaning in it.
+
+There came to Jesus one day a man versed in the sacred law, and
+asked him what he must do to inherit eternal life. And Jesus
+replied: The substance of right conduct is plain enough. Why do
+you ask as if it were a thing very recondite and difficult? Love thy
+God and thy neighbor. But the doctor of the sacred law, wishing
+to justify himself (wishing to show that the way of the upright life
+is not so plain, that it may be difficult to decide whom one should
+regard as one's equal, to whom one should ascribe worth), asked:
+Who is my neighbor? And Jesus replied in the words of the
+well-known parable concerning a certain man who had fallen among
+thieves, and these stripped him of his raiment and left him for dead
+on the public road that runs between Jerusalem and Jericho.
+Presently a member of the high aristocracy, a priest, passed by, but
+paid no attention to the sufferer; then another, a Levite, came that
+way, looked at the man who was lying there helpless, and turned
+and went on his journey. Then there came one of those low-caste
+despised Samaritans; and he acted like a tender human brother,
+bound up the man's wounds, poured oil and wine into them, etc.
+And Jesus said: Which one of these three showed himself to be a
+neighbor to the man that had fallen among thieves? In which of the
+social classes did there appear to be the truest understanding of the
+conduct which moral duty requires of us toward our fellow-men--in
+the upper classes or in the lowest? And the answer evidently is--in
+the lowest. The point of the parable is that the Samaritan himself,
+whom priest and Levite and doctor of the law refused to regard
+as a neighbor, was worthy to be treated as a neighbor, because
+he understood, as they did not, how to treat others as neighbors.
+The lesson of the parable is a twofold one: not only that the
+wounded man lying untended on the road was a neighbor because
+of his need, but more especially that the Samaritan was a neighbor
+because he responded to the need, and set an example of truly
+human behavior to those who had doubted whether, because of
+his extreme social degradation, he was himself to be regarded as human.
+
+The moral qualities in men, then, constitute their most universal
+title to respect, and these qualities we find in all social grades and
+among all races and nationalities. We find them among the
+Chinese, as their devoted family life, the honesty of their
+merchants, and the ethics of Confucius indicate. We find them
+among the negroes, not only in the case of exceptional persons
+like Booker Washington or Dubois or Atkinson, but also in the
+undistinguished life of many an obscure man and woman, whom to
+know more intimately is to learn to respect as a neighbor and a
+moral equal. What we need to build up our faith in human
+goodness is the clairvoyance that discerns the hidden treasures of
+character in others. And one other quality is indispensable for the
+moral appreciation of our neighbors, namely, the quality of
+humility. Strange as it may seem, the less we plume ourselves on
+our own goodness, the more we shall be ready to believe in the
+goodness of other people; the more we realize the infinite nature
+of the moral ideal and our own distance from it, the more we shall
+esteem as of relatively small importance the distance that separates
+us from others, the slight extent to which we may morally surpass
+them. The more we are aware of our own frequent and serious
+shortcomings, the more, when we perceive the moral delinquencies
+of others, shall we recognize in their nature the same recuperative
+agency which we believe to be in ourselves, namely, the power of
+divine regeneration that can make all things new. If we regard
+ourselves as morally little and yet as never lost, we shall regard no
+one else as lost, however morally little he may seem to be.
+
+Respect, then, for the indefeasible worth of every human being
+must be based not on theological systems which are fast decaying,
+nor on the fancied self-evidence of Jefferson's Declaration, but
+solely on the moral law which commands us to ascribe such worth
+to others whether we perceive it or not, nay, to create it in others
+by ascribing it to them.
+
+Such is the spiritual attitude toward our fellow-men. And though
+our confidence may not always be demonstrably justified by the
+result, though we not always succeed in uplifting others, yet by
+pursuing this line of conduct we ourselves at all events shall be
+uplifted, our own life will be touched to finer issues.
+
+
+III. THE SPIRITUAL ATTITUDE TOWARD OPPRESSORS.
+
+Sunday, Dec. 4, 1904.
+
+The problem of our spiritual attitude toward positive badness,
+social and individual wrongdoing, cruelty and oppression, is far
+more difficult of solution than the problem of our attitude toward
+worth really existent but concealed. The thorny question, how we
+are to deal with wicked persons, whether we are to observe the
+spiritual attitude toward them, and in what that attitude consists,
+requires the most sincere and straightforward treatment.
+
+Should we cultivate an attitude of indifference in such cases? A
+ruffian cruelly beats his horse, the poor beast that has rendered him
+faithful service for many a day, but is feeble now and sinks beneath
+its load. With curses and the sharp persuasion of the lash, the
+merciless driver seeks to force the animal to efforts of which it is
+plainly incapable. Can we stand by and witness such a scene in
+philosophic calm? Shall we say that the wretch is the product of
+circumstances, and cannot be expected to act otherwise than he
+does? Shall we liken evildoers generally, as at present is customary
+in certain quarters, to the sick? Shall we say that such men are the
+outcome of their heredity, their education, their environment? I
+have known of a husband who in a state of intoxication brutally
+struck and injured his wife, while she was holding in her arms a
+babe not eight days old. Shall we say that that man was morally
+sick, that he could not help becoming intoxicated, and therefore
+was not responsible for the havoc he wrought when the demon of
+drink had gained possession of him? Shall we say of the syndicate
+of traders who hunt the natives on the Congo like rabbits,
+massacre and mutilate them, that they are sick? A bad deed done
+with intention argues badness in the doer. We impute to the man
+the act and its consequences. We cannot separate the sin from the
+sinner, and merely condemn sin in the abstract. There is no such
+thing as sin in the abstract. Sin is sin only when it is incorporated
+in the will of a human individual. We condemn the sinner because
+he has wedded himself to the sin. If this were not the case, we
+might as well close our courts of justice. We hold men accountable,
+then, for their misdeeds, whatever speculative philosophy may urge
+to the contrary. How could we revere virtue if we did not stigmatize its
+opposite; how could we believe in human worth if we did not condemn
+unworth where it appears?
+
+But the ordinary judgment stops short right here. It recognizes
+the particular badness of a particular act, and desires that the agent
+be made to suffer for it. It says, this act is the expression of an evil
+disposition, and it identifies the whole man with the particular act
+of which he was guilty. The spiritual attitude is characterized by
+discriminating between the particular act and the whole of the
+man's nature. It recognizes that there is an evil strand; but it also
+sees or divines the good that exists along with the evil, even in the
+most seemingly hopeless cases. It trusts to the good, and builds
+upon it with a view to making it paramount over evil. Upon the
+basis of this spiritual attitude, what should be our mode of dealing
+with the bad? There are a number of steps to be taken in order,
+and much depends on our following the right order.
+
+The first step is to arrest the course of evil, to prevent its channel
+from being deepened, its area from being enlarged. Pluck the whip
+from the hand of the ruffian who is lashing his beast; stay the arm
+that is uplifted to strike the cowardly murderous blow. Much has
+been said of the need of considering the good of society, of
+protecting the community at large from the depredations  of the
+violent and fraudulent; and of subjecting the latter to exemplary
+punishment, in order to deter others from following their example.
+But the welfare of society and the welfare of the criminal are
+always identical. Nothing should be done to the worst criminal, not
+a hair of his head should be touched merely for the sake of
+securing the public good, if the thing done be not also for his
+private good. And on the other hand, nothing can be done to the
+criminal which is for his own lasting good that will not also
+profoundly react for the good of society, assuring its security, and
+deterring others from a like career of crime. The very first claim
+which the criminal has upon the services of his fellow-men is that
+they stop him in his headlong course of wickedness. Arrest,
+whether by the agents of the law or in some other way, is the first
+step. The most spiritual concern for a degraded and demoralized
+fellow-being does not exclude the sharp intervention implied in
+arrest, for the spiritual attitude is not mawkish or incompatible
+with the infliction of pain.
+
+This, I think, will be readily granted. But the second step, a step
+far more important than the arrest of the evildoer in order to arrest
+the evildoing, is more likely to be contested and misunderstood.
+The second step consists in fixing the mark of shame upon the
+offender and publicly humiliating him by means of the solemn
+sentence of the judge. It may be asked, What human being is fit to
+exercise this awful office of acting as judge of another? Remember
+the words of Shakespeare in King Lear: ". . . .See how yond
+justice rails upon yond simple thief. Hark in thine ear: change
+places; and . . . . which is the justice, which the thief?" Or recall
+what the Puritan preacher said when he saw from his window a
+culprit being led to the gallows: "There, but for the grace of God,
+go I." In other words, had I been born as this man was, had I been
+played upon by the influences to which he was subject, had I been
+tempted as he was, how dare I say that I should not have fallen as
+he did? Had it not been for some grace extended to me through no
+desert of mine, I might be traveling the road on which he travels
+now.
+
+Furthermore, can we say that the sentence of the judge is
+proportioned to the heinousness of the deed? Is the murderer who
+in a fit of uncontrolled passion has taken a human life--it may have
+been his first and only crime--necessarily more depraved than the
+thief; or is the thief in jail who has indeed broken the law,
+necessarily more depraved than numbers of others who have
+dexterously circumvented the law, violating the spirit though
+keeping within the letter of it? Is even the abject creature who
+strikes his wife more abandoned than a man of the type of
+Grandcourt in _Daniel Deronda_, whose insults are dealt with a
+marble politeness, and who crushes his wife's sensibilities, not with
+a vulgar blow but with the cold and calculating cruelty of a cynic?
+When it comes to passing moral judgments and fixing blame, and
+especially to measuring the degree of another's guilt, who of us is
+good enough, who of us is pure enough, who of us is himself free
+enough from wrong to exercise so terrible an office? Is not Lear
+right, after all: ". . . .change places; and. . . .which is the justice,
+which is the thief?"
+
+It may be said in reply to these objections: First, that the judge
+does not speak in his private capacity, but that he delivers the
+judgment of mankind on the doer and the deed, serving as the
+mouthpiece of the moral law, so far as it is incorporated in the
+human law. We should select the highest characters available for
+so exalted a duty, but freedom from even great human infirmity we
+cannot expect to find. Again, it is not the judge's business to fix the
+degree of moral guilt; that not even the best and wisest of men can
+do. The inscrutable fact of the degree of moral guilt eludes all
+human insight. Only omniscience could decide who is more guilty
+relatively to opportunities, advantages, circumstances; who has
+made the braver effort to escape wrongdoing; whether the admired
+preacher, or the culprit on his way to the gallows; whether the
+President in the White House or the wretch behind the bars. The
+office of the judge is to pronounce that crime has been committed,
+irrespective of the subtle question of the degree of guilt. Murder
+has been done, property has been stolen, the sin and the sinner
+wedded together. The office of the judge is to declare the fact of
+that infelicitous union, and to pronounce the penalty according to
+the law. And this, in particular. The object of the punishment
+which the law pronounces is not vindictive chastisement of the
+culprit. The object of punishment is purely reformatory. Only it
+must not be forgotten that there can be no reformation without
+penitence, and no penitence without self-abasement. And this
+consists in confessing one's self guilty, admitting that the guilt has
+become a part of one's being, and humbling one's pride to the
+ground. The public sentence pronounced by the judge, the shame
+which he fixes upon the culprit, has, then, for its object to pave the
+way toward reformation, to break down the defenses which the
+sophistry of wickedness sets up, to compel the man to see himself
+as others see him, to force him to realize to the full the evil of his
+present state. Not to blast him utterly, not to exclude him forever
+from the kindly society of men, but to lead him into the way along
+which--if he travel it--he may eventually return, though perhaps
+only after many years, to human fellowship. If the verdict is
+pronounced in any other spirit, it is false and inhuman. The
+methods to be employed to bring about reformation must often be
+severe and painful, and one of these methods is shock, shock sharp
+and sudden enough to loosen the incrustations of evil habit,
+and to shake a wicked nature down to its foundations. The
+purpose of the trial of a criminal in a court of justice, and of the
+verdict in which the trial culminates, is to supply such a shock, a
+searching and terrible experience, yet salutary and indispensable in
+order that better things may ensue.
+
+From what has been said, it follows that the death penalty as a
+punishment even for the worst crimes is morally untenable; for
+either the culprit is really irredeemable, that is to say, he is an
+irresponsible moral idiot, in which case an asylum for the insane is
+the proper place for him; or he is not irredeemable, in
+which case the chance of reformation should not be taken from
+him by cutting off his life. The death penalty is the last lingering
+vestige of the _Lex Talionis_, of the law which attempts to
+equalize the penalty with the crime, a conception of justice which
+in all other respects we have happily outgrown. It does not
+necessarily follow that the immediate abolition of capital
+punishment is expedient. It is not expedient in fact, because of the
+condition of our prisons, and because of the abuses to which the
+pardoning power of the State is subjected; because security is
+lacking that the worst offenders, before ever they can be
+reclaimed, may not be returned unrepentant into the bosom of
+society, to prey upon it anew with impunity. But, then, we must
+not defend the death penalty as such, but rather deplore and do our
+utmost to change our political conditions, which make it still
+unwise to abolish a form of punishment so barbarous and so
+repugnant to the moral sense.
+
+The step which follows the arrest and condemnation of the
+evildoer is isolation, with a view to the formation of new habits. A
+change of heart is the necessary pre-requisite of any permanent
+change in conduct; but the change of heart, and the resolution to
+turn over a new leaf to which it gives birth, must be gradually and
+slowly worked out into a corresponding practice. The old body of
+sin cannot be stripped off in a moment; the old encumbrance of
+bad habits cannot be sloughed off like a serpent's coil. The new
+spirit must incorporate itself slowly in new habits; and to this end
+the delinquent must be aided in his efforts by a more or less
+prolonged absence from the scene of his former temptations.
+He must be placed in an entirely new and suitable environment,
+and encouraging pressure must be exerted upon him to acquire
+new habits of order, diligent application to work, obedience,
+self-control. It is upon this idea that the moral propriety of
+imprisonment and of prison discipline is based, whether the actual
+treatment of prisoners be in accord with it or not.
+
+And so we may pass on at once to the last and chief element in
+the process of the reclamation of the evildoer, namely, forgiveness.
+An angel's tongue, the wisdom and insight of the loftiest of the
+sages, would be required to describe all the wealth of meaning
+contained in the sublime spiritual process which we designate by
+the word pardon. It is a process which affects equally both parties
+to the act, the one who forgives and the one who is forgiven. It
+exalts both, transfigures both, indeed establishes a new tie of
+wonderful tenderness and sublimity between them. The person
+who forgives is a benefactor.
+
+Is it a little thing, when a man is sunk in the slough of poverty,
+denuded of all the decencies of life, harassed day and night by
+grinding cares, knows not whither to turn to find shelter and food,
+for some fellow human being, moved by pure human kindness, or
+let us rather say moved by respect for the worth which he sees in
+his perishing fellow-man, to come to the aid of the latter, to lift
+him out of his distress, to place him on sun-lit levels, to put him on
+his feet and give him a new chance, to open for him a new career
+in which effort may meet with its reward? Such an act of human
+helpfulness is not a little thing; the man who does it is rightly
+esteemed a great benefactor. Or is it a little thing to save the
+imperiled sick, to bring back from the brink of the grave a precious
+life, already despaired of? This, too, surely is not a little thing,
+and the good physician who accomplishes such a miracle is rightly
+esteemed a benefactor to whom lifelong gratitude is due.
+
+But there is a yet greater thing, a benefit, by the side of which even
+these--great as they are--appear almost insignificant. To take a
+man who is sinking in the moral slough and has no courage left to
+rise out of it; to give him back his lost self-esteem, that jewel
+without which health and wealth are of little avail; to put him in a
+position once more to look his fellow-men straight in the eye; to
+place him morally on the sun-lit levels; to put him morally on his
+feet--this assuredly is the supreme benefit, and the man who
+accomplishes this for another is the supreme benefactor. And a
+note of exquisite moral beauty is added if the benefactor be the
+same person whom the guilty man had injured. This is what is
+meant by forgiveness. This is why forgiveness is so divine a thing.
+This is the reason why, when an act of genuine forgiveness occurs,
+"the music of the spheres" seems to become audible in our nether
+world. And this is also the reason why we often see such a strange
+kind of tie springing up between a person who has been chastised
+and the one who has chastised him in the right spirit and then
+forgiven him--a tie into which there enters shame for the wrong
+done, gratitude for the unmerited good received, and a reverence
+akin to idolatry toward the one upon whose faith in him the sinner
+rebuilt his faith in himself.
+
+There should be some organ of the State to exercise this office of
+forgiveness toward criminals, this pardoning power in the finer
+sense of the term. The prison warden, if he be a man of the right
+stamp, sometimes exercises it. The Society for the Befriending of
+Released Prisoners has here an appropriate function open to it;
+also the employer who after due inquiry has the courage to dismiss
+suspicion and to give work to the released prisoner.
+
+The methods and principles which I have described in the case of
+the criminal are used for illustration, not that I am interested today
+in discussing the special problem of the criminal, but because
+principles can best be exemplified in extreme cases. The same
+methods, the same maxims should control punishment in general;
+our dealings, for instance, with the misdeeds of which our own
+children are guilty. Here, too, there should be by no means
+unvarying gentleness and pleading, but when need arises the sharp
+check, that evil may be instantaneously stopped. Here, too, there
+should be the temporary disgrace, the clear presentation of the
+magnitude of the fault, if it have magnitude, the humiliation that
+calls forth penitence and good resolutions. Here, too, there should
+be sedulous care, to work out the better habits. And all these steps
+should be taken with a view to ultimate reconciliation, forgiveness,
+and the holier bond between parent and child.
+
+But now can we take one step further? Can we dispose our minds
+and our hearts in the same fashion toward oppressors? I have in
+mind, for instance, the hard proprietors of houses who pitilessly
+wring the last penny from their tenants; the cruel taskmasters who
+drive the workers, sometimes only children not yet full-grown,
+twelve and fifteen hours a day; the unscrupulous exploiters on a
+large scale, who raise the price of the people's food, and in their
+eagerness for fabulous gain conspire by every corrupt means to
+crush their less crafty or less shameless competitors. As we hate
+wrong, must we not hate them? Shall we assail greed and
+exploitation merely in the abstract? What effect will that have?
+Which one of the oppressors will not hypocritically assent to such
+abstract denunciation? If we seek to produce a change, must we
+not proceed to more specific allegations and point the finger of
+scorn at the offenders, saying as the Prophet Nathan said to King
+David: "Thou art the man"? Is it not necessary to arouse the
+popular anger against the oppressors and to encourage hatred
+against the hateful?
+
+Clearly the case is not the same as that of the criminal in the dock.
+He stands there dishonored; the evil he has done has been brought
+home to him; he is covered with the garment of shame. But those
+others are invested--despite the evil they have done and are still
+doing--with every outward symbol of success; they triumph
+defiantly over the better moral sense of the community; they
+inhabit, as it were, impregnable citadels; they have harvested
+unholy gains which no one seems strong enough to take from
+them; and the influence they wield in consequence of their power
+to benefit or harm is immense. Is it a wonder, then, that such
+oppressors are branded as monsters, and that the hoarse note of
+some of the Hebrew psalms is sometimes to be heard re-echoing in
+the cry of the social radicals of our time--Let vengeance be visited
+upon the wicked; let the oppressors be destroyed from the face of
+the earth!
+
+But the logical and inevitable conclusion of the thought I have
+developed to-day is, that we are bound to recognize the
+indefeasible worth latent even in the cruel exploiter and the
+merciless expropriator. I have already sufficiently indicated that the
+spiritual view is consistent with severe and stringent treatment.
+Checks there should be by the heavy hand of legislation laid upon
+the arrogant evildoers. They should be stopped if possible in
+mid-career. The oppressed, also, should oppose those who oppress
+them. No one is worth his salt who is not willing to defend his
+rights against those who would trample on them. So far from
+ruling out conflict, I regard conflict as a weapon of progress--an
+ethical weapon, if it be waged with the right intentions.
+Furthermore, when speaking of oppression, I have in mind not
+merely the cupidity of the few as it operates mercilessly upon the
+many, but also the banded arrogance of the many as it sometimes
+displays  itself in contempt for the rights of the few. From
+whichever side oppression proceeds, there should be resistance to
+it; the check imposed by resistance is one of the means of
+educating to new habits those who find themselves checked.
+Individuals, and social classes, too, as history proves, learn to
+respect the rights which they find in practice they cannot traverse.
+First come the limits set to the aggression, and then the opening of
+the eyes to perceive the justice of the limitation. But conflict is an
+ethical weapon only if it is wielded like the knife in the surgeon's
+hands. The knife wounds and hurts; the method is apparently cruel;
+but the purpose is benevolent. So should the battle of social reform
+be animated by concern not only for the oppressed, but also for the
+oppressor. And such a motive does not exceed the capacity of
+human nature, but, on the contrary, is the only motive which will
+permanently satisfy human nature. Certain of the Socialists have
+made it their deliberate policy for years to stir up hatred between
+the poor and the rich, on the ground that hatred alone can
+overcome the lethargy of the masses and arouse in them the
+intensity of feeling necessary for conflict. On the contrary, hatred
+engenders hatred on the opposite side, action provokes reaction.
+As the individual can be uplifted in his life only by accepting the
+spiritual motive, by trying to act always so as to recognize in
+others and to make manifest the indefeasible worth of the human
+soul, so the social classes can be uplifted only by acting on the
+same spiritual motive. Despite the efforts of a hundred years, the
+real progress that has been achieved in ameliorating the relations
+between the social classes at the present day is slight, and
+sometimes one is impelled to doubt whether there has been any
+progress at all. The egotism of one side is met by the egotism of
+the other side. But appeals to mass egotism will no more elevate
+mankind, than appeals to individual egotism. Appeals to
+sympathy also will not permanently help. Only the highest motive
+of all can furnish the power needed to accomplish the miracle of
+social transformation; only that conflict which is waged for the
+purpose not of striking down the oppressor and rescuing his
+victim, but for the rescue of both the victim and the oppressor, will
+attain its end.
+
+The oppressor may be regarded as a man who has consented so to
+degrade himself as to become for the time being a heartless
+automaton, ruthlessly working for gain, a being like one of those
+terrible ogres of the popular mythology who feed on human flesh.
+But he is not a mere automaton or ogre. There is a better side to
+his nature, as we often discover, to our amazement, when we learn
+about the facts of his private life. These private virtues do not
+indeed condone his social sins--far from it--but they indicate that
+there exists a better side. If that side could be made victorious, if
+conditions could be shaped so as to starve out the worse nature
+and bring to the fore the better nature in the oppressor as well as in
+the oppressed, the problem would be advanced toward a solution.
+
+There is a story told of two brothers, sons of the same father, who
+grew up in the same home and were deeply attached to each other.
+It happened that the older wandered away and fell into the power
+of an evil magician, who changed him into a ravening wolf. The
+younger mourned his loss, and treasured in his heart the image of
+the brother as he had been in the days before the wicked spell fell
+upon him. Impelled by his longing, he at last went out into the
+world to find his brother, and if possible to redeem him. One day
+as he passed through a lonely forest, a hungry wolf set upon him.
+The horrid, brutal face was near to his, the hot breath breathed
+upon him, and the fierce eyes flamed into his own. But by the
+might of his love, the younger brother was able to detect beneath
+the wolfish disguise the faint outlines of the brother whom he had
+long ago lost, and by the strength of his gaze, which saw only the
+brother and refused to see the wolf, he was able to give shape and
+substance to that faint outline. The outer frame of brutishness
+gradually melted away, and the human brother was restored to his
+senses and to his home. This is a parable of the spiritual attitude
+toward oppressors, toward those who oppress the people in
+public, as well as toward those who oppress us in our private lives.
+We must liberate them from the brutal frame in which they are
+inclosed; we must give them back their human shape!
+
+
+IV. THE TWO SOULS IN THE HUMAN BREAST.
+
+Sunday, Dec. 11, 1904.
+
+Painful and revolting associations are called up by the
+phrase--"leading the double life." To the aversion provoked by the
+evil itself, is added in such cases the disgust excited by the hypocrisy
+with which it is cloaked. He who leads a double life offends not
+only by the wrong he does, but by borrowing the plumes of virtue.
+He lives a perpetual lie; he is "a whited sepulchre, clean on the
+outside, full of filth and corruption within." The Beecher trial at
+the time so profoundly agitated the whole country, because the
+accusations brought forward associated the name of one of the
+most prominent characters of the nation, a man of brilliant talent
+and meritorious service, with secret impurity. The more
+meritorious such a man's services, the more damning the charges if
+they be established. Nor do we admit in such cases the sophistical
+argument, that the interests of public morality require the facts to
+be hushed up in order to avoid a scandal. Nothing is so imperative
+where guilt really exists as that it be confessed and expiated. The
+public conscience requires the truth. Let the sinner make a clean
+breast of it; let the atmosphere be cleared by an act of public
+humiliation. No injury to the cause of public morality is so great as
+the lurking suspicion that men who stand forth as exponents of
+morality are themselves corrupt. Lurking suspicion, distrust of all
+the moral values, is worse than recognition of human weakness,
+however deplorable.
+
+There are other examples of the double life, with which all who
+have knowledge of the world's ways are familiar. That of the
+merchant, for instance, who, though he has long been virtually a
+bankrupt, conceals his position behind a screen of opulence,
+emulating the sumptuous expenditure of the rich, living a life of
+glittering show; tortured inwardly by the fear of exposure, yet not
+courageous enough to be honest; sinking deeper himself and, what
+is worse, dragging others down with him. A young man at college
+sometimes leads a double life, his letters home being filled with
+accounts of his legitimate employments, while at the same time he
+is leading the life of the prodigal, the spendthrift, the dissipated
+sot.
+
+The dual life has been depicted in powerful colors by poets and
+writers of fiction; as, for instance, by Hawthorne in his "Scarlet
+Letter," by Robert Louis Stevenson in his "Doctor Jekyll and Mr.
+Hyde." I suppose if there be such a thing as hell on earth, the
+double life is another name for it. Yet I know of no writer of
+fiction whose plummet has sounded the depths of this hell. In
+Stevenson's story one gets the impression of a too mechanical
+separation between the two sides. The man is at one moment the
+benevolent doctor, and at another the malignant fiend. The device
+of the drug is introduced to explain the transition; but the
+transformation is too sudden, too abrupt. Jekyll and Hyde dwell
+side by side in the same body, and the relations between them have
+not been wrought out with sufficient subtlety. It is rather a broad
+moral parable than a subtle study of man's dual nature.
+
+The initial point I desire to make is, that in certain cases the inner
+torture and anguish of the dual life can only be ended by publishing
+the secret, so long and jealously hidden. Just as the criminal must
+stand judgment in a court of law, so must the double-minded man
+stand judgment in the court of public opinion. It is not possible to
+determine by a hard and fast line, when such exposure is
+obligatory; but in general it may be said that it is required in those
+cases where publicity is necessary to set things right and to repair
+the wrong that has been done to others.
+
+There are, however, cases in which others are not affected, or only
+indirectly so; in which the evil relates to the personal life and its
+consequences are private to the man himself. The situation is such
+as is described by Goethe, when he speaks of the two souls
+dwelling within the human breast; the soul itself in its own sphere
+being divided against itself. The man is conscious of rectitude in
+one part of his conduct, of magnanimous impulses, of high and
+noble aspirations. He feels himself allied on one side to what is
+best and purest, and at the same time is aware of another side
+which in his saner moments fills him with loathing, and poisons for
+him life's cup of satisfaction. It is of this class of cases that I
+propose to speak. And here the terrible fact stares us in the face,
+that if the dual life be interpreted in this sense, there is hardly a
+man who is not leading it. Even the best of men have been aware
+of an abhorrent side of their nature. What else can St. Paul mean
+when he speaks of the continual warfare between the two
+laws--"the law of the flesh that is in his members, and the law
+of God that is in his spirit"? What else do the confessions of St.
+Augustine reveal but the continual oscillations of a finely poised
+nature between the two extremes? What else can we gather from
+certain passages in Tennyson's writings, but hints of a miserable
+and grievous struggle of the same sort? And what an intolerable
+burden to any  person of integrity, to any one who would at least
+be honest, to think that he passes for better than he is, to think that
+if men only could see his heart as he sees it, they would pass him
+by with scorn instead of admiration! Yet as a rule, in such cases
+self-revelation is not only not demanded, but not even allowable.
+The opening of the secret chambers of one's life to the public,
+confessions like those of Rousseau, are, if anything, indecent and
+nauseating. The case of a man in such situations is bad enough, but
+the remedy for it is perforce committed to his own hands. Let him
+put his hand to the plough and not turn back, let him grapple with
+the evil in his nature and subdue and transform it, let him
+accomplish his inner redemption, let him make himself what he
+ought to be--what others perhaps think he is. What aid can the
+spiritual view of life extend to him in this stupendous business?
+
+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 assenting 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 assented 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
+assenting 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 nobler 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
+compass 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 class 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
+circumstances 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 illustrations 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 assertion 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 multitude 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 assert 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 nobler 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 attitude
+the example of the world's great martyrs shows.
+
+********************************
+
+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 attitude
+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 attitude, to seek the worth
+in him until we find it. Even toward oppressors we should take the
+same attitude. 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.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg's The Essentials of Spirituality, by Felix Adler
+
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