“Our meeting of the Seekers of February 14th was very interesting. We talked about goodness. First we tried to define good, and finally reached the conclusion that goodness means being in a harmonious relation with all our fellow-beings. We should try to make our life like some beautiful picture or other work of art, making it a complete and harmonious whole. All our friends and acquaintances, everything we see, hear, do or know, help to make this picture; and if we try, we can consciously make it what we want. We are masters of our lives, and if we remember this, it will influence all our thoughts and deeds. We also spoke of happiness, and decided that each one has a different kind of happiness, depending on what he wants most. We also spoke of self-sacrifice. There is really no such thing as self-sacrifice, because when we give up one thing it is always because we think another finer, and because we want the other more. We cannot have every detail in our picture as clear as the main idea, and we must give up something to bring out this idea.”
We all thought this paper excellent. I told Ruth briefly what we had said before she came; and then we spoke at length of the importance of living our belief, of working for the cause, of giving ourselves to the large self.
I said: “Every great man has always done just that, whether he was writer, philosopher, artist, statesman or scientist; he has always devoted himself to a work which aimed toward the great union.”
Florence said: “You mean not like the philosophers, simply to dream of the good, but like the artist, to work it out? Didn’t you say that, when we spoke of choosing the artistic life?”
“No,” I answered, “not quite. The philosopher and dreamer also work for the supreme good, by showing what it is like, and pointing the way which men afterward go.”
“That is what I always thought,” said Florence.
“Yes,” I answered, “the philosopher is the teacher of teachers. But I chose the artistic way of viewing life, because it combines the philosophic and the scientific way, the vision and the work.”
Virginia now said: “But sometimes men who work for completeness, and whose motives are all good, do harm, anyway.”
“What do you mean?”
“Jesus, for instance,” she said. “He has done so much harm throughout the ages, which he never meant to do.”