Common Sense Applied to Religion; Or, The Bible and the People

by Catharine Esther Beecher

Again: we find that, both in sorrow and in joy, the mind seeks for the sympathy of others, while this grateful and soothing boon it is delightful to bestow. So, also, the consciousness of being the cause of good to another sends joy to the heart, while the recipient is filled with the pleasing glow of gratitude in receiving the benefit. The consciousness of virtue in acting for the general good, instead of for contracted, selfish purposes, is another source of happiness, while those who witness its delightful results rejoice to behold and acknowledge it. What bursts of rapturous applause have followed the exhibition of virtuous self-sacrifice for the good of others from bosoms who rejoiced in this display, and who could owe this pleasure to no other cause than the natural constitution of mind, which is formed to be made happy both in beholding and in exercising virtue.

This same beneficial economy is manifested in a close analysis of all that is included in the affections of love and gratitude.

It has been shown that, in the commencement of existence, the young mind first learns the sources of good and evil to self, and its sole motives are desire for its own enjoyment.

Soon, however, it begins to experience the happiness resulting from the relations of minds to each other, and then is developed the superior power of love, and its importance as a regulating principle.

In the analysis of this affection, it is seen to consist, first, in the pleasurable emotions which arise in view of those traits of character in another mind pointed out on previous pages. When these qualities are discovered, the first result is emotions of pleasure in the contemplation. Immediately there follows a desire of good to the cause of this pleasure. Next follows the desire of reciprocated affection—that is, a desire is awakened to become the cause of the same pleasure to another; for the desire of being loved is the desire to be the cause of pleasurable emotions in another mind, in view of our own good qualities. When we secure this desired appreciation, then follows an increased desire of good to the one who bestows it.

Thus the affection of love is a combination of the action and reaction of pleasurable emotions, all tending to awaken the desire of good to another. This passion may become so intensified that it will become more delightful to secure enjoyments to another than to procure them for self.

Gratitude is the emotion of pleasure toward the author of voluntary good to self, attended by a desire of good to the benefactor. This principle can be added to augment the power of love.

There is a foundation for a very important distinction in the analysis of the principle of love. In what is thus far presented, we find that the desire of good to another results solely from the fact that certain mental qualities are causes of pleasure to self. Of course, this desire ceases when those qualities cease to exist or cease to be appreciated. This kind of love is the natural result of the constitution of minds in their relations to each other, making it easy and pleasant to live for the good of another in return for the pleasure received from their agreeable qualities and manifestations.

But the highest kind of love consists in the desire of good to another without reference to any good received in return. It is good willing. It consists in an abiding feeling of desire for the happiness of another mind.

This principle exists as a natural impulse more or less powerful in differently constituted minds. It is the cause of that pleasure which is felt in the consciousness of being the cause of good to another. But this natural impulse can be so developed and increased by voluntary culture as to become the strongest impulse of the mind, and thus the source of the highest and most satisfying enjoyments. In many minds this becomes so strongly developed that securing happiness to others is sought with far more earnestness and pleasure than any modes of enjoyment that terminate solely in self. This analysis lays the foundation for the distinction expressed by the terms the love of complacency and the love of benevolence. The first is the involuntary result of good conferred on self; the last is a voluntary act. It is good willing toward others without reference to self.