Make-believe

“ The theatre, and plays, and make-believe every day?”
[100] “It’s the only thing that’s real. You’d know that if you were an artist. It means what’s true—that’s what it means. Do you mean to tell me there’s anything real in all the putting on here in this house—the way you hide what you mean and what you believe and what you want? Here’s where the make-believe is: just a mean make-believe that nothing comes of. ”

“ To say that religion works by suggestion is only to say that it works through the imagination. There is good make-believe as well as bad; and one must necessarily imagine and make-believe in order to will. ”

“ Let us pretend in order to make the pretence into a reality.’ God looks at you as if you were a little Christ: Christ stands beside you to turn you into one. I daresay this idea of a divine make-believe sounds rather strange at first. ”

“ Though I no longer believe, I shall do the actions of believers—and, if my god be false, I shall believe so firmly in him that I shall make him true!—Yes, the lowest, the most senseless superstitions, I venerate them, I exalt—I glory in them! ”

“ It teaches that a man defines himself by his make-believe as well as by his sincere impulses. ”

“ But to this there is one fatal objection—that such an elaborate process of make-believe is practically impossible. A fantastic morality, if it were possible at all, must be a feeble morality. Surely an authentic example will be greatly more valuable. ”

“ In a child's nature the faculty of imagination and the force of example are important considerations in the development of the spiritual feelings and the formation of fine ideals. The world of [Pg 271] make-believe, of purest fantasy, is just as interesting and just as significant as the every day actualities of life. It makes not the slightest difference to a little boy, or girl, whether the stories you read them, or the acts of hero and heroine, are reasonable or not. ”

“ The difference between him and the other boys at such a time was that they knew it was make-believe, while to him make-believe and true were exactly the same thing. This sometimes troubled them, as when they had to make-believe that they had had their dinners. ”

“ Refuse to believe, and you shall indeed be right, for you shall irretrievably perish. But believe, and again you shall be right, for you shall save yourself. You make one or the other of two possible universes true by your trust or mistrust,—both universes having been only maybes, in this particular, before you contributed your act. ”

“ This world is good, we must say, since it is what we make it,—and we shall make it good. How can we exclude from the cognition of a truth a faith which is involved in the creation of the truth? M has its character indeterminate, susceptible of forming part of a thorough-going pessimism on the one hand, or of a meliorism, a moral (as distinguished from a sensual) optimism on the other. ”

“ Obviously, if you make a religion yourself, it’s your business to believe it. There is an analogy between clothes and creeds: you wear with a different air those your father has bought for you and those you have earned for yourself. ”

“ Finally, they are both characterized by a strong infusion of make-believe, a disposition to substitute productions of the imagination for everyday realities. In this respect, again, they form a contrast to that serious concern with fact and practical truth which the necessary aims of life impose on us. ”

“ This is positive and constructive work. You cannot state your case without using popular illustrations, and in clearing the ground for justice and mercy, some little great man gets shown up as a make-believe. ”

“ Just at the edge of the threshold Cornelia's voice called him back.
"Carl," she protested, "you are looking rather sick. I hope you are going straight home."
"No, I'm not going straight home," said Stanton bluntly. "But here's hoping that the 'longest way round' will prove even yet the very shortest possible route to the particular home that, as yet, doesn't even exist. I'm going hunting, Cornelia, hunting for Molly Make-Believe; and what's more, I'm going to find her if it takes me all the rest of my natural life!" ”

“ But the great world has been doing little else but playing at make-believe all its lifetime. ”

“ No concrete test of what is really true has ever been agreed upon. Some make the criterion external to the moment of perception, putting it either in revelation, the consensus gentium, the instincts of the heart, or the systematized experience of the race. ”

“ To take a trivial illustration: just as a man who in a company of gentlemen made no advances, asked a warrant for every concession, and believed no one’s word without proof, would cut himself off by such churlishness from all the social rewards that a more trusting spirit would earn,—so here, one who should shut himself up in snarling logicality and try to make the gods extort his recognition willy-nilly, or not get it at all, might cut himself off forever from his only opportunity of making the gods’ acquaintance. ”

“ These latter persons are tied to their senses, restricted to their natural experience; and many of them, moreover, feel a sort of intellectual loyalty to what they call 'hard facts,' which is positively shocked by the easy excursions into the unseen that other people make at the bare call of sentiment. Minds of either class may, however, be intensely religious. They may equally desire atonement and reconciliation, and crave acquiescence and communion with the total soul of things. ”

“ Our faculties of belief were not primarily given us to make orthodoxies and heresies withal; they were given us to live by. And to trust our religious demands means first of all to live in the light of them, and to act as if the invisible world which they suggest were real. ”

“ We are taught to compare a faith boasting of itself without works and a faith evidenced by works, by looking on both together, to try how this comparison will work upon our minds. Yea, a man may say, Thou hast faith, and I have works. Show me thy faith without thy works, and I will show thee my faith by my works, v. 18. Suppose a true believer thus pleading with a boasting hypocrite, "Thou makest a profession, and sayest thou hast faith; I make no such boasts, but leave my works to speak for me. ”

“ He seems the A-1 example of how true it is that well-known tailors' ad, "Clothes make the man." Also it inspires me to invent a quotation to hang beside the famous one of Shakespeare's, I think it is "Do it now!" which you see so often, mine being "Do it yourself!" Well, you will if you are the able one on a committee. Everybody which has served on one knows that every committee is composed of the one which does all the work and three to six others which uses most of their vitality and imagination in thinking up excuses and offering them. ”

“ Is it not almost to BELIEVE in one's own virtues? But this "believing in one's own virtues"--is it not practically the same as what was formerly called one's "good conscience," that long, respectable pigtail of an idea, which our grandfathers used to hang behind their heads, and often enough also behind their understandings? ”

“ Who are the credulous men—those who believe in a divine power and personage, out of whose life has flown into humanity those pure principles and elevating and purifying motives—or those who believe that a lie has wrought those marvels? ”

“ If we want integrity of character, steadiness, reliability, courage, thoroughness, all the harder qualities that serve as a backbone, we, at least, make others want them also, and strive for them by the power of example that is not set as deliberate good example, for that is as tame as a precept, but the example of the life that is lived, and the truths that are honestly believed in. ”

“ It is to them so eternally true, so matchless in beauty, so convincing in itself, that adherents of all other creeds have but to hear it pronounced and they must believe. So, then, the question, How [Pg 11] do you know that your faith is true? is as vain and foolish as the cry of the wind in an empty house. ”

“ I understand now that what is highly esteemed by people is abomination in the sight of God, why woe is foretold to the rich and famous, and why beggars and those who are humble are the blessed. Now I understand this and believe in this, and my understanding of this has changed my view of all that is good and noble or bad and base in life. ”

“ Metaphysics, morality, religion, science—all these things are merely different forms of falsehood, by means of them we are led to believe in life. 'Life must inspire confidence;' the task which this imposes upon us is enormous. ”

“ His unconventionality would probably have some grounds to show for its conclusions; but for us, not insight, but the prestige of the opinions, is what makes the spark shoot from them and light up our sleeping magazines of faith. Our reason is quite satisfied, in nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of every thousand of us, if it can find a few arguments that will do to recite in case our credulity is criticised by some one else. ”

“ You who do not believe, but still pretend to do so, for the sake of form and conventional custom, do you realize what you are? You consider yourself virtuous and respectable, no doubt; but facts are facts, and you, in your pretence at faith, are [Pg 41] nothing but a Liar. ”

“ When I say ‘willing nature,’ I do not mean only such deliberate volitions as may have set up habits of belief that we cannot now escape from,—I mean all such factors of belief as fear and hope, prejudice and passion, imitation and partisanship, the circumpressure of our caste and set. As a matter of fact we find ourselves believing, we hardly know how or why. ”

“ But I am afraid that in many cases their wider understanding of people and things allows them to handle the truth in a manner to convert it to their own needs; in a measure leading you to believe an omission in themselves a virtue by comparison, while another's virtue may be distorted to appear as folly or even sin. ”

“ But is it not strange the heart should be less ready to believe what seems worth believing? Something must be true: why not the worthy—oftener at least than the unworthy? Why should it be easier to believe hard things of God, for instance, than lovely things?—or that one man copied from another, than that he should have made the thing himself? Some would yet say I contrived all this semblance of composition in order to lay the surer claim to that to which I had none—nor would take the trouble to follow the thing through its development! ”

“ But never mind what people say: make your appeal to the saviour of men about whatever troubles you. Cry to the faithful creator, his Father. To be a faithful creator needs a might of truth and loving-kindness of which our narrow hearts can ill conceive. ”

“ But if I proceed to assure people, on the evidence of my personal observation of him, that he was immaculate and absolutely perfect, was the pure Moral Image of God, that he deserves to be made the Exclusive Model of imitation, and is the standard by which every other man's morality is to be corrected,—I make myself ridiculous; my panegyrics lose all weight, and I produce far less conviction than when I praised within human limitations. ”

“ If we want faith comfort wont do. If we want beauty falsehood wont do. You are all talking about making your way. Making your way to what? It all depends on that. To what? A man may make his way. He may cut a tremendous figure. He may outpace everyone and invite envy and admiration. ”

“ Then again, everything that God made was good—and this dust man is more evil than good; and as God, who is conceded as being all good, made all, and pronounced all He made good, this dust or material man, being evil, was never made, but, through a misapprehension, we think man to be material, and believe him to be the real man. To illustrate what I mean, say some one told you a falsehood and you believed it to be the truth; then the lie would seem true to you. ”

“ He bade Thee show some marvel that men might be persuaded and believe. But Thou wouldest not; men were to believe from perception of Thy grace and truth or not at all. We have had to correct Thy work and hedge Thee about with mystery, or there would be few to believe. ”

“ Who is wise and understanding among you? let him shew by his good life his works in meekness of wisdom. But if ye have bitter jealousy and faction in your heart, glory not and lie not against the truth. This wisdom is not a wisdom that cometh down from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish. For where jealousy and faction are, there is confusion and every vile deed. But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be intreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without variance, without hypocrisy. ”

“ It was a condescension to men's weakness and obstinacy when He said, 'If ye believe not Me, believe the works.' But the works were signs, symbols, manifestations on the lower material platform of what lie would be and do for men in the higher, and they were the outcome of His own loving heart and ever-flowing compassion, and only secondarily were they taken, and have they ever been taken, when Christian faith has been robust and intelligent, as being evidences of His Messiahship and Divinity. ”

“ But that power of aspiration that once surged full and hot in the cults of faith, fashion, sentiment, exploit, and honor, now at its best comes to such a head as it may in the concerted adulation of matter-of-fact. ”

“ This is the lesson of these two clauses—misdirected confidence in creatures strips a man of much beauty of character, and true faith in God adorns a soul with a leafy vesture of loveliness. Now, I have no doubt that there start up in your minds at once two objections to that statement: first, that a great many godless men do present fair and attractive features of character; and secondly, that a great many Christian men do not. ”