There are few, if any, human beings in the world who radiate only evil, or, on the other hand, only good. Man is a human being, not divine. Humanity implies a lower stage than divinity, and whether what we call evil be but manifestations of the imperfect and incomplete, or deliberate wrong choice for which one is personally responsible, we are all compelled to admit that there are few people with whom we meet who radiate toward us and all others only that which is good. Sometimes these "not good" radiancies have no immoral intent in them, though they produce bad results.
For instance, it is a well-known fact that many a man is driven to drunkenness by an unhappy home life, yet probably no member of the household has the deliberate intention of producing such a result. It may be that he is equally to blame for the conditions in his home, for all are imperfect, yet if the appetite for drink has been formed, or environment supplies great temptation, the complaints, taunts, or anger of his unhappy family do not increase his powers of resistance, but rather weaken them. There are men, also, who frankly confess to a reckless impulse to do wrong whenever they come under any very depressing influence. It may be true that some peculiarity of temperament renders them liable to be thrown out of mental balance. There may be inherent weakness, or hereditary tendency, which renders them unusually susceptible to depressing radiancies, but the results are just as deplorable.
Doubtless many a woman, too, warped and twisted out of normal conditions by disappointment, ill-treatment, and mental suffering, becomes a tongue-lasher, goes to the bad, or commits suicide, when different influences and environment would have saved her from such consequences. There may not seem to be any immorality in the nagging of a husband, or a wife, or a parent, yet the persistent nagging of some person, whose intent was only good, has produced direful effects in various ways.
These and a thousand other tendencies of the human being point to our present imperfection or subjugation to error, out of which we must rise.
I know a poet. His words have thrilled millions to a nobler and better life. His pen has never incited to a mean or ignoble thought or action; it has always written high and noble truth—peace, good will to men, the dignity of labor, the joy of helping, the blessing of purity, the never-failing help of God—and yet in his personal life he sometimes radiates the degradation of drunkenness and the awfulness of impurity.
I know a writer. He is one of the most brilliant men of his State. His knowledge is profound. He devotes more time, unselfishly, to the good of his adopted city and State than any other man I know. His work is untiring in its fervid zeal for the preservation of historic landmarks that without his efforts would possibly have disappeared; and also for a museum for the accumulation of evidences of past civilization. Yet he radiates a vindictive jealousy and fierce hatred of those whom he does not like that makes even his friends afraid of him and fearful lest they incur his anger.
Shelley, Byron, Poe, Bret Harte, Leigh Hunt, Landor—and thousands of others, including the Psalmist David, the Hebrew king whom God loved—radiated grand, sublime, divine truths, yet they also radiated weakness and moral wrong.
What should be our mental attitude toward those who give such conflicting radiancies? Shall we ignore the evil and see only the good? How can we? How dare we?
Shall we ignore the good and see only the evil?
Again I ask, How can we? How dare we?