Every lesson of life, wisely read, tells us that we should be happy; that we should seek to be happy from principle, not simply from impulse; that we should make Happiness a great object in life; that our duties, our varied relations to our fellows as friends, as lovers, as companions, as parents, as children; our avocations, our labors, sacrifices, hopes, trials, struggles, should administer to our Happiness. And it is our business to see that they do. Is it a duty to be good? It is just as much a duty to be happy, to train our minds to pleasant moods, and our hearts to cheerful feelings. There is no duty more sanctioned by every moral obligation than the duty to be happy. We have no moral right to make others miserable, or to permit them to remain so when we can help it. No more right have we to torment our own souls, or to permit habitual sadness and despondency to weigh down our spirits. It is well for every young person to seek true moral light upon this subject; and especially for young women, for their peculiarly sensitive and affectionate nature, their confined habits and employments, their cares multiplying as they grow older, and their body-wearying and soul-trying experiences and labors demand the very best philosophy and religion of life; and more so as the men with whom their lots will be likely to be cast appreciate so little the trials and experiences of woman's life. They ought to start out resolutely determined to be happy, to seek the good of every thing. This should be the first precept in their moral mode, the first article in their creed, the first resolution demanded by their religion. We have no confidence in a gloomy religion. Human souls were never made to do penance, to lacerate and torment themselves in worship or duty. Every truth in the theology of the Bible beams with a glory that ought to illuminate our minds with a light almost divine. Every principle of "the glorious Gospel of the blessed God" is benignant and smiling with the love of the Father, and ought to animate our souls with the joy of a steady blessedness. Every duty demanded by the Christian religion is but the requirement of perfect love, and should quicken our consciences to the most lively satisfaction. To be desponding and gloomy is indeed irreligious. Hearty joy is the fruit of religion. Swelling gladness is the praise-note of the truly Christian spirit. There are no possessions like religious possessions to fill the soul with true enjoyment. And what are they? They are, first: a mind in harmony with the works and ways of God, which sees the Father in the daily movements of the spheres and the providential arrangements of the world; in the blossoming life of spring, and the withered death of winter; in the dear relations of domestic life, and the more showy fraternities of nations; in birth, and life, and death; in every provision for happiness found in the wide range of the physical and spiritual universe; secondly, a conscience void of offense toward God and man; in love with right, bound to righteous principle in a wedlock that knows no breaking; devout, honest, kind, because it is right and Godlike so to be; which rules the mind and life with a gentle but powerful sway, leading where angels walk in every pure and honest word and work; and thirdly, a heart swelling with love to God and man; an earnest, warm, good-willing heart, lighting its face with sunshine, and softening its hand with tenderness; a heart that can melt in others' woes, and glow in others' joys, pure and chaste, subdued and calm. Such a mind, such a conscience, such a heart afford true religious enjoyments. The more one has of such possessions, the happier he must be. With such a mind, the true philosophy of life is clear—it is that we were made to be happy in righteousness and truth, and should bend all our energies to guard our hearts from every fretful and desponding feeling, and make every experience in life bless and make us happy. Oh, young woman! set your heart on Happiness; not on pleasure that floats on the surface of life, but on that inward peace that dwells in the soul devoted to all good. The things about us are designed to administer to our Happiness, and we should use them for this purpose. The world we live in is for our use. Food, raiment, money, wealth are for use. They are adapted to good ends in life. They help us to comfort, convenience, beauty, and knowledge. Wisely used, they serve us well; but abused, they sting us with many poisoned darts. The most of us make ourselves miserable by a misuse of the world. We fret our souls well-nigh to death about dress, food, houses, lands, goods, wealth. We live for these things, as though serving them could give us Happiness. We are ambitious of gains and gold, as though these could answer the soul's great wants, as though these could think and love, admire and worship. We chase the illusive glitter of fashion as though it was a crown of glory, and could impart dignity and peace to its wearer. We hunt after pleasure as though it could be found by searching. Pleasure comes of itself. It must never be wooed. She is a coy maid, and ever eludes her flattering followers. She will come and abide with us when we use wisely the world and its good things. But we must put things to their true use, else pleasure will keep away. Oh, how much might we enjoy life if we would put things to their true use! When the sun shines, we must love it and think of its treasures of wealth to the world. When the cloud rises, we must admire its somber glory, for it is big with blessings. The morning must be accepted as a rosy blessing, the evening as a quiet prelude to repose; the day as an opportunity for achievements worthy of us, and the night for refreshing rest and recruit.
Our friends we must prize and appreciate while we are with them. It is a shame not to know how much we love our friends, and how good they are till they die. We must seize with joy all our opportunities; our duties we must perform with pleasure; our sacrifices we must make cheerfully, knowing that he who sacrifices most is noblest; we must forgive with an understanding of the glory of forgiveness, and use the blessings we have, realizing how great are small blessings when properly accepted. I have known men sit to a table comfortably spread with wholesome food and make themselves and all with them miserable because it lacked something their pampered palate craved. A true man will enjoy a crust of bread, and if he has nothing more, count it a God-send that may save his life. I have seen women embroil a comfortable home with constant disquiet because it was not so grand as their vanity desired; and others never tire in their complaints against a very good house because it was destitute of a convenience or two that some other house had. I have seen young women completely miserable because some article of dress did not harmonize with the last fashioned plait, or some of their surroundings were not quite so beautiful or agreeable as those of some wealthier friend. Forgetting to use what they had to administer to their Happiness, they tormented their souls because they had not something else. All these repinings and complaints come from unchaste spirits. Wisdom dwells not in such souls. The little we have we should enjoy, and if we need or wish more we should labor cheerfully to obtain it, and rejoice in our labor and hope. We should seek to draw Happiness from every little incident in life, from every thing we have, and every thing by which we are surrounded. This is the secret of much Happiness. I believe all desire to be happy. It seems to be the one great wish of the human soul in which all the others center. But desire is not enough. We must seek the Happiness we wish; seek it in the wisdom which opens life's mysteries plainly to our view; which reveals our present and eternal relations, and points out the ways of pleasantness and peace. Would we know the truth, the gemmy walks of knowledge, the flowery bowers of inward and joyous life, the teachings of nature, revelation, the Son and the Father? We must seek, else how shall we find them? These things do not come of themselves. Our minds do not develop truth as the forest develops leaves or the prairie flowers, without effort. Truth is without, and must be sought. Would we find the path of duty? We must seek it in earnest effort to find and enjoy. And we must seek it with a full determination to enjoy it when so found. We may seek gold, honor, worldly pleasures, and not enjoy them when we find them, because we do not seek them in the right spirit, with an enlightened view of their uses and a determination to enjoy them in those uses. So we may seek Gospel riches, divine light, the instructions of the Word, and find much for which we seek, and be but little benefited because we have not resolved to be guided by the light we find and blessed by its divine spirit. If we would be happy, then, we must seek to be happy, not without the use of proper and ordained means—not without a thorough consecration of our souls to the good of what we seek, but with a resolute will and determination in the use of all proper means to mold our spirits into the best and happiest moods.
We must seek Happiness in the ways in which it is to be found, in study, duty, labor, improving pleasure, with a constant inward effort to find it, to make it out of what we find. We must seek it in domestic and business life; in the relations we hold to our fellow-men; in the opportunities for discipline, self-sacrifice, forgiveness, resistance of temptation; in the changes and vicissitudes of life; in nature, revelation, ourselves, and God. If we thus seek, we shall find. This is the promise, and thousands have realized it. It is not a promise for the future world only, but for this also. We have the promise of this world as well as that which is to come. We need not wait for the golden gate to open to be as happy as our capacity will admit. We may be happy here. Happiness is not hid away beyond our search, nor laid above our reach, nor reserved for the spirit-world. We may enjoy this life and its holy relations. Our hearts, our homes, our lives may all glow with Happiness on earth. The means for it are all in our hands. The opportunities are daily open to us. In the dear amenities of home and its dulcet loves; in the elevating pleasures of society; in the instructing pursuits of science, duty, and daily life; in the cultivation of every personal virtue and every Gospel grace, we may enjoy in this life a sweet antepast of heaven. Only put forth the effort in the right way and the happy result will be ours.
But we must not be too dictatorial as to how we enjoy life. We must not be too positive as to the manner in which we must find Happiness. We must not determine that it must come in just the way we wish, or else we will be miserable in the grief of disappointment. It is not for man wholly to direct his steps. Sometimes what he thinks for his good, turns out ill; and what he thinks a great evil, develops a great blessing in disguise. It is folly, almost madness, to be miserable because things are not as we would have them, or because we are disappointed in our plans. Many of our plans must be defeated. A multitude of little hopes must every day be crushed, and now and then a great one. Besides, the success of our plans is not always essential to our best interests or our Happiness. Sometimes success is our misery. Our plans are often our idols, to worship which is false and wrong. It is not in this, or that, or the other peculiar mode of life, nor in any particular class of outward circumstances; nor in any definite kind of labor, or duty, or pleasure, that we must look positively for Happiness; nor yet in any chosen place or society, or surroundings, or under any particular class of influences. If we do, we shall be disappointed; for it is not in our power to have things just our way, or to control our outward or associational life just as we would. We live amid a multitude of influences we can not altogether control. Nor is it best we should. Our vanity, or ignorance, or selfishness might do us great spiritual injury. We might soon become like spoiled children, or nerveless drones, or pampered aristocrats. What we are to control is ourselves, our minds. We must seek Happiness in the right state of mind, in the legitimate labors, duties, and pleasures of life, and then we shall find what we seek; yet we may often find it under very different circumstances from what we expected. We may look for it in one pursuit and find it in another; and sometimes where we expect the least we shall find the most; and where we look for the most we shall find the least. "The first shall be last and the last first." We are short-sighted, and fail to see the end of things. There is not a little of the misery of life comes from this disposition to have things our own way, as though we could not be happy under any circumstances only just those we have framed to suit our minds. Circumstances are not half so essential to our Happiness as most people imagine. A cabin is often the theater of more true Happiness than a palace. The dunghill as often enthrones the true philosophy of life as the seats which kings occupy. Women in humble circumstances often possess richer minds, sweeter hearts, a nobler and profounder peace than those of magnificent surroundings. The disposition to make the best of life is what we want to make us happy. Those who are so willful and seemingly perverse about their outward circumstances, are often intensely affected by the merest trifles. A little thing shadows their life for days. The want of some little convenience, some personal gratification, some outward form or ornament, will blight a day's joy. They can often bear a great calamity better than a small disappointment, because they nerve themselves to meet the former, and yield to the latter without an effort to resist. Mole-hills are magnified into mountains, and in the shadow of these mountains they sit down and weep. The very things they ought to have sometimes come unasked, and because they are not ready for them, they will not enjoy them, but rather make them the causes of misery. There is a disposition also in such minds to multiply their troubles as well as magnify them. They make troubles of many things which should really be regarded as privileges, opportunities for self-sacrifice, for culture, for improving effort. They make troubles of the ordinary allotments of life, its duties, charities, changes, unavoidable accidents, reverses, and experiences. All this can be considered in no other light than morally wrong, for these common allotments and experiences were beyond all question ordained by Infinite Wisdom as a most healthy discipline for both the body and mind of man. All such complaining is ingratitude, practical impiety.
Nearly all people have their secret repinings, their unexpressed disquietude, because things are not as they would have them; because they do not possess some fancied good, or do experience some fancied misfortune. There is a tendency in all our minds to such inward murmurings. And this is wrong, and when we indulge in it, it is wicked. We ought not to make idols of our plans. We ought not to have too great attachments to our own ideas of what we must have, to be happy. If we do, we shall be very miserable, while we believe we are very good. The trouble is, we are too selfish, too unyielding in our arrangements for life's best good. Because we can not find Happiness in our own way, we will not accept it in any way, and so make ourselves miserable. I have known many very excellent people very unhappy from a kind of stubborn adherence to their settled convictions of just what they must have, how they must live, and what they must do to be happy. They lose sight of the fact that God rules above them, and a thousand influences work around them, partly, at least, beyond their control. They have not determined to accept life cheerfully in whatever form it may come, and seek for good—the "soul's calm sunshine and heartfelt joy"—under all circumstances, believing that all things work together for good to those who truly seek a divine life.
He who seeks a divine life and its pleasantness and peace in the right spirit, humble, earnest, loving, and cheerful, full of faith and hope, will realize that all things work together for his good. He may engage in life's duties and pleasures in the fullest confidence of this. Even his trials and disappointments will discipline his mind for noblest joys in store. They will work out good for his soul, which he will bear with him in life, and through the gate of death, as his crown and treasure above.
Thus far in the pursuit of this subject I have not considered Happiness as possible to a cold, selfish, worldly heart. One's aims must be good, or he can not expect inward peace. The Bible promises no peace to the wicked while he remains wicked. I am not authorized to promise any except to the righteous. Our hopes of Happiness for this world and the future must be founded in inward righteousness.
Now it really seems to me that nothing is more wanted among young women than a sound philosophy of life, one that they can live by and be happy in. Their duties and trials are to be great. Their influences are to strike into the hearts of the whole world. The generations to come are to be born of them. It is folly for them to expect to be happy by mere impulse. They must seek the Happiness of principle. They must make Happiness an object, and seek it with the use of all right means.
One consideration more is worthy of a moment's notice. It relates to health, both bodily and spiritual. One essential of health is cheerfulness of spirits. The weaknesses and diseases among females is most fearful. Only here and there is a healthy woman. And we attribute it in part to the great unrest and unspoken melancholy brooding in the great woman-soul of the world. Few, perhaps, fully realize the fearful truth of this remark. Many a beautiful woman is pining under a gloom she seldom expresses, and not more than half understands. Woman's confined life and nerve-distracting habits predispose her to revery, meditation, and morbid habits of mind and feeling. These shade her soul with gloom which slowly but surely sinks the tone of her health and shatters her constitution. Many a young woman plants the seeds of consumption in some early sorrow, and many more sink the tone of their health to a low degree by desponding reveries and half-despairing longings for something they have but half conceived in their own minds, and put forth no efforts to obtain. It is a burning shame to our nation and age that our women are so impotent and sickly. We believe the best medicine for them would be one that would set them all into a hearty laugh, taken once an hour through the day. They need more sprightly activity, more exhilaration of mind and body, more sunshine and bird-song, more exuberant freshness of life and Happiness. Every gloomy thought is a tax on health. Every desponding hour extracts a year's vitality from the system. A melancholy spirit is like a humor in the blood, breeding a perpetual disease. Doubts and fears are like chills and fevers, which shake and shatter the vital economy to its center. No unhappy woman can enjoy perfect health. The most vigorous constitutions will quail and sink under the weight of a desponding mind. Health! what is all the world without it? Who would sacrifice it for every earthly good? Then let young women beware how they tamper with it by giving way to or cherishing gloomy moods of mind. Seek to be peaceful, cheerful, happy, if you would be well.
Their despondency of mind is equally destructive of spiritual health. It unbalances all the mental powers, gives a morbid activity to some, and a kind of reversed action to others. No gloomy spirit is beautiful or harmonious. We may pity it, but we can not admire it—scarcely love it. In God's sight its sadness is an imperfection—in many instances it is sinfulness. The piety of such a mind is of a questionable character, and its virtue is liable to be tinctured with selfishness or other evils. Its judgment is improved. God loves a cheerful spirit, a happy soul. It is not only a duty we owe to ourselves, but to God, to be happy. Our efforts to subdue every desponding tendency in our minds should be as great and as constant as to master our selfish passions or animal desires. I fully believe we have the power to be happy if we will, or, at least, the most of us have. Some unfortunate minds are constitutionally down in the mouth. Poor things! They suffer a great hereditary evil. They are too hopeless, from a defect in the structure of their minds; but these are few and far between. The rule is, that we may be happy if we will. None of the common allotments and evils in life are absolute barriers in our way. A resolute will and steady purpose, with a proper time, will overcome all. Then buckle on the armor of life, oh, young woman, and rouse your spirit to its best efforts to lead a cheerful and useful life. Let no misfortune weigh you down, but rise above all, and great will be your reward.