The Will, sustaining the relation it does to the Intelligence and Sensibility, must yield itself to the control of one or the other of these departments of our nature. In all acts and states morally right, the Will is in harmony with the Intelligence, from respect to moral obligation or duty; and all the desires and propensities, all the impulses of the Sensibility, are held in strict subordination. In all acts morally wrong, the Will is controlled by the Sensibility, irrespective of the dictates of the Intelligence. Impulse, and not a regard to the just, the right, the true and the good, is the law of its action. In all such cases, as the impulses which control the Will are various, the external forms through which the internal acts, or intentions, will manifest themselves, will be equally diversified. Yet the spring of action is in all instances one and the same, impulse instead of a regard to duty. Virtue does not consist in being controlled by amiable, instead of dissocial and malign impulses, and in a consequent exterior of a corresponding beauty and loveliness. It consists in a voluntary harmony of intention with the just, the right, the true and the good from a sacred respect to moral obligation, instead of being controlled by mere impulse of any kind whatever. On the principle above illustrated, I remark:
[THOSE WHO ARE OR ARE NOT TRULY VIRTUOUS, HOW DISTINGUISHED.]
1. That the real distinction between those who are truly virtuous, and those who are not, now becomes apparent. It does not consist, in all instances, in the mere exterior form of action, but in the spring or intention from which all such action proceeds. In most persons, and in all, at different periods, the amiable and social propensities predominate over the dissocial and malign. Hence much of the exterior will be characterized by much that is truly beautiful and lovely. In many, also, the impulsive power of conscience—that department of the Sensibility which is correlated to the idea of right and wrong, and impels to obedience to the Moral law—is strongly developed, and may consequently take its turn in controlling the Will. In all such instances, there will be the external forms of real virtue. It is one thing, however, to put on the exterior of virtue from mere impulse, and quite another, to do the same thing from an internal respect and sacred regard for duty.
How many individuals, who may be now wearing the fairest forms of virtue, will find within them, as soon as present impulses are supplanted by the strong action of others, in opposition to rectitude, no maxims of Will, in harmony with the law of goodness, to resist and subject such impulses. Their conduct is in conformity to the requirements of virtue, not from any internal intention to be in universal harmony with moral obligation, but simply because, for the time being, the strongest impulse happens to be in that direction. No individual, it should ever be kept in mind, makes any approach to real virtue, whatever impulses he may be controlled by, till, by a sealing act of moral election, the Will is placed in harmony with the universal law of duty, and all external action of a moral character proceeds from this internal, all-controlling intention. Here we find the broad and fundamental distinction between those who are truly virtuous, and those who are not.
[SELFISHNESS AND BENEVOLENCE.]
2. We are also prepared to explain the real difference between Selfishness and Benevolence. The latter expresses and comprehends all the forms of real virtue of every kind and degree. The former comprehends and expresses the forms of vice or sin. Benevolence consists in the full harmony of the Will or intention with the just, the right, the true, and the good, from a regard to moral obligation. Selfishness consists in voluntary subjection to impulse, irrespective of such obligation. Whenever self-gratification is the law of action, there is pure selfishness, whatever the character or direction of the impulse may be. Selfishness has sometimes been very incorrectly defined, as a supreme regard to our own interest or happiness. If this is a correct definition, the drunkard is not selfish at all; for he sacrifices his present and future happiness, to gratify a beastly appetite, and destroys present peace in the act of self-gratification. If selfishness, however, consists in mere subjection to impulse, how supreme his selfishness at once appears! A mother who does not act from moral obligation, when under the strong influence of maternal affection, appears most distinguished in her assiduous care of her offspring. Now let this affection be crossed by some plain question of duty, so that she must violate the latter, or subject the former, and how soon will selfishness manifest itself, in the triumph of impulse over duty! A gift is not more effectual in blinding the eyes, than natural affection uncontrolled by a regard to moral obligation. Men are just as selfish, that is, as perfectly subject to the law of self-gratification, when under the influence of the social and amiable propensities, as when under that of the dissocial and malign, when, in both instances alike, impulse is the law of action. Moral agents were made, and are required to be, social and amiable, from higher principles than mere impulse.
[COMMON MISTAKE.]
3. I notice a mistake of fundamental importance into which many appear to have fallen, in judging of the moral character of individuals. As we have seen, when the Will is wholly controlled by the Sensibility irrespective of moral obligation, the impulsive department of conscience takes its turn, among the other propensities, in controlling the action of the voluntary power. Now because, in all such instances, there are the exterior forms of virtue, together with an apparently sincere internal regard for the same, the presence of real virtue is consequently inferred. Now before such a conclusion can be authorized, one question needs to be determined, the spring from which such apparent virtues originate. They may arise from that regard to moral obligation which constitutes real virtue. Or they may be the result purely of excited Sensibility, which, in such instances happens to be in the direction of the forms of virtue.
[DEFECTIVE FORMS OF VIRTUE.]
4. Another very frequent mistake bearing upon moral character deserves a passing notice here. Men sometimes manifest, and doubtless with a consciousness of inward sincerity, a very high regard for some one or more particular principles of virtue, while they manifest an equal disregard of all other principles. Every real reform, for example, has its basis in some great principle of morality. Men often advocate, with great zeal, such reforms, together with the principle on which they rest. They talk of virtue, when called to defend that principle, of a regard to moral obligation, together with the necessity of self-sacrifice at the shrine of duty, as if respect for universal rectitude commanded the entire powers of their being. Yet but a slight observation will most clearly evince, that their regard for the right, the true, and the good, is wholly circumscribed by this one principle. Still, such persons are very likely to regard themselves as virtuous in a very high degree. In reality, however, they have not made the first approach to real virtue. Their respect for this one principle, together with its specific applications, has its spring in some other department of their nature, than a regard for what is right in itself. Otherwise their respect for what is right, would be co-extensive with the entire range of moral obligation.