A Manual of Moral Philosophy

by Andrew P. Peabody

Section III.

Self-Control.

A man must be either self-governed, or under a worse government than his own. God governs men, only by teaching and helping them to govern themselves. Good men, if also wise, seek not, even for the highest ends, to control their fellow-men, but, so far as they can, enable and encourage them to exercise a due self-control. It is only unwise or bad [pg 107] men who usurp the government of other wills than their own. But the individual will is oftener made inefficient by passion, than by direct influence from other minds. Man, in his normal state, wills either what is expedient or what is right. Passion suspends, as to its objects, all reference to expediency and right, even when there is the clearest knowledge of the tendencies of the acts to which it prompts. Thus the sensualist often knows that he is committing sure and rapid suicide, yet cannot arrest himself on the declivity of certain ruin. The man in whom avarice has become a passion is perfectly aware of the comforts and enjoyments which he is sacrificing, yet is as little capable of procuring them as if he were a pauper. Anger and revenge not infrequently force men to crimes which they know will be no less fatal to themselves than to their victims. Now if a man will not put and keep himself under the government of conscience, it concerns him at least to remain under the control of reason, which, if it do not compel him to do right, will restrain him within the limits of expediency, and thus will insure for him reputation, a fair position, and a safe course in life, even though it fail of the highest and most enduring good.

Self-control is easily lost, and is often lost unconsciously. The first surrender of it is prone to be final and lifelong. Indeed, in many cases, the passion destined to be dominant has nearly reached the maturity of its power previously to any outward violation of the expedient or the right. Where the restraining [pg 108] influences of education and surroundings are strong, where important interests are at stake, or where conscience has not been habitually silenced or tampered with, the perilous appetite, desire, or affection broods long in the thought, and is so largely indulged in reverie and anticipation, that it becomes imperious and despotic before it assumes its wonted forms of outward manifestation. Hence, the sudden infatuation and rapid ruin which we sometimes witness,—the cases in which there seems but a single step between innocence and deep depravity. In truth there are many steps; but until they become precipitous, they are veiled from human sight.

Self-control, then, in order to be effective, must be exercised upon the thoughts and feelings, especially upon the imagination, which fills so largely with its phantasms and day-dreams our else unoccupied hours. Let these hours be as few as possible; and let them be filled with thoughts which we would not blush to utter, with plans which we could actualize with the approving suffrage of all good men. The inward life which would dread expression and exposure, already puts the outward life in peril; for passion, thus inwardly nourished and fostered, can hardly fail to assume sooner or later the control of the conduct and the shaping of the character. Let the thoughts be well governed, and the life is emancipated from passion, and under the control of reason and principle.

Section IV.

Moral Self-Culture.

It is evident that, whatever a man's aims may be, the attainment of them depends more upon himself than upon any agency that he can employ. If his aim be extended influence, his words and acts have simply the force which his character gives them. If his aim be usefulness, his own personality measures in part the value of his gifts, and determines entirely the worth of his services. If his aim be happiness, the more of a man he is, the larger is his capacity of enjoyment; for as a dog gets more enjoyment out of life than a zoöphyte, and a man than a dog, so does the fully and symmetrically developed man exceed in receptivity of happiness him whose nature is imperfectly or abnormally developed. Now it is through the thorough training and faithful exercise of his moral faculties and powers that man is most capable of influence, best fitted for usefulness, and endowed with the largest capacity for happiness. History shows this. The men whose lot (if any but our own) we would be willing to assume, have been, without an exception, good men. If there are in our respective circles those whose position we deem in every respect enviable, they are men of preëminent moral excellence. We would not take—could we have it—the most desirable external position with a damaged character. Probably there are few who do not regard [pg 110] a virtuous character as so much to be desired, that in yielding to temptation and falling under the yoke of vicious habits they still mean to reform and to become what they admire. Old men who have led profligate lives always bear visible tokens of having forfeited all the valuable purposes of life, often confess that their whole past has been a mistake, and not infrequently bear faithful testimony to the transcendent worth of moral goodness. To remain satisfied without this is, therefore, a sin against one's own nature, a sacrifice of well-being and happiness which no one has a right to make, and which no prudent man will make.

Self-culture in virtue implies and demands reflection on duty and on the motives to duty, on one's own nature, capacities and liabilities, and on those great themes of thought, which by their amplitude and loftiness enlarge and exalt the minds that become familiar with them. The mere tongue-work or hand-*work, of virtue slackens and becomes deteriorated, when not sustained by profound thought and feeling. Moreover, it is the mind that acts, and it puts into its action all that it has—and no more—of moral and spiritual energy, so that the same outward act means more or less, is of greater or less worth, in proportion to the depth and vigor of feeling and purpose from which it proceeds. It is thus that religious devotion nourishes virtue, and that none are so well fitted for the duties of the earthly life as those who, in their habitual meditation, are the most intimately conversant with the heavenly life.