Moral effort

“ In deciding the rules of our conduct, therefore, we are ever to bear in mind that the development of the nobler principles, and the subjugation of inferior propensities to them, is to be the main object of effort both for ourselves and for others. And in conformity with this, in all our plans we are to place religious and moral interests as first in estimation, our social and intellectual interests next, and our physical gratifications as subordinate to all. ”

“ It is, in fact, the pleasure of exercising power. I do not mean arbitrary, personal authority, but the power to produce, by successful but quiet contrivance, extensive and happy results;—the pleasure of calmly considering every difficulty, and without irritation or anger, devising the proper moral means to remedy the moral evil: and then the interest and pleasure of witnessing its effects. ”

“ As I consider virtue and vice to consist in action, and not in opinion, and as this action has its seat in the will, and not in the conscience, I shall confine my inquiries chiefly to the influence of physical causes upon that moral power of the mind, which is connected with volition, although many of these causes act likewise upon the conscience, as I shall show hereafter. The state of the moral faculty is visible in actions, which affect the well-being of society. ”

“ It is not enough to ask what is most attractive, what line of life will ensure the greatest material gain or worldly honour? Rather should we ask, Where shall I be safest from moral danger, and, above all, in what position of life, open to me, can I do the most good? ”

“ The exercises may be very simple—dropping for a time an intensely interesting book at the most thrilling page of the story; jumping out of bed at the first moment of waking; walking home when one is perfectly able to do so, but when the temptation is to take a car; talking to some disagreeable person and trying to make the conversation pleasant. These daily exercises in moral discipline will have a wondrous tonic effect on man’s whole moral nature. ”

“ While the result of the contest is so honourable [207] and advantageous to us and to posterity, it is to be lamented that those moral and religious duties so essential to the order of society and the permanent happiness of mankind, have been too much neglected. To recover them into practice, the life and conduct of every good man should be a constant example. ”

“ For the complete development of the individual life implies that every function should be fulfilled, and that its fulfilment should interfere with the performance of no other function. "The performance of every function is, in a sense, a moral obligation." ”

“ Another circumstance connected with this subject is, that the moral sentiments and feelings above all others, are improved and strengthened by exercise; and are weakened, and often destroyed by disregard or opposition.—Every instance of moral exercise or moral discipline, invigorates the executive powers of conscience, and renders the moral perceptions of the person more acute and tender. Every successful struggle against a temptation, implants in the mind of a child a noble consciousness of dignity, and confers a large amount of moral strength, and a firmer determination to resist others. ”

“ There is but little scandal, after all, if we come to think of it, in supposing that action which we call moral may be a developed form of action to which the name can not be applied; but there is great edification in the thought, now brought home to our understandings, that, by every truly moral act, we help to build up and improve the life of the world and make ourselves coworkers with the principle of life everywhere. ”

“ And if it be true that the exercise of the social and moral faculties secures the highest degrees of enjoyment, those disparities in mental powers which give exercise to the virtues of compassion, self-denial, fortitude, and benevolence in serving the weak, and the corresponding exercises of gratitude, reverence, humility, and devotion in those who are thus benefited, then we can see the wisdom and benevolence of this gradation of mental capacity. ”

“ It is upon that discipline chiefly that those qualities which I have called the moral qualities of the personal order, and which have their root in truthfulness and courage, depend for their evolution. ”

“ LVIII. No other forces are to be recognized than those which reside in matter, and all moral teaching and moral excellence ought to be made to consist in the accumulation and increase of riches by every possible means, and in the enjoyment of pleasure. ”

“ Amid the whirl of myriads of fortuities, the means are selected and combined for constructing as many independent machineries of moral discipline as there are moral agents in the world; and each apparatus is at once complete in itself, and complete as part of a universal movement. ”

“ A mental construction having as its basis purity and duty. When the moral nature is cultivated and developed it controls every action of man, radiating from the individual to society and from society back again to the individual. ”

“ And the moral nature is cultivated in laboring for the good of others, in trying to save for a better life the poor, the weak, the distressed. All that is required is that we do this work wisely, not unwisely, under the guidance of reason, not feelings. ”

“ In this manner it is that men, born in the social state, acquire the habits of moral acting, and certain affections connected with it, before they are capable of reflecting upon the grounds which recommend the acts either to praise or blame. ”

“ Your mind has been trained or disciplined so as to be a useful instrument in the future. You have been provided with moral principles, by observance of which your conduct in life may be useful and perfectly honourable. In a short time you will find out for yourselves that your gains heretofore are insufficient as to quantity and imperfect as to quality. ”

“ Process (2) , which may be called a reconciliation of reason with itself, because it is the appropriation by reason as a personal principle in the individual of the work which reason, acting through the media of other persons, has already achieved in the establishment of conventional morality, is the condition of the third stage in which the moral progress of the individual consists; viz. the growth of a personal interest in the realisation of an idea of what should be, in doing what is believed to contribute to the absolutely desirable, or to human perfection, because it is believed to do so. ”

“ In each of these great religions, virtue was that line of conduct which would be pursued by a prudent egoist. Neither of these, however, has much influence on the practical morality of our own time. For energetic people, the moral code of our time is that of "success"—the code which my generation learnt in childhood from Smiles' Self-help and which modern young men learn from efficiency experts. ”

“ What we have aimed to present as a moral method is essentially this: to take into our reckoning all the factors in the situation, to take into account the other persons involved, to put ourselves into their places by sympathy as well as conceptually, to face collisions and difficulties not merely in terms of fixed concepts of what is good or fair, and what the right of each party concerned may be, but with the conviction that we need new definitions of the ideal life, and of the social order, and thus reciprocally of personality. ”

“ They concerned the powers and possibilities of man in the crowning endowments of his nature, and in the highest ascent of their evident intention and adaptation. They touched the great problems of personal and social welfare in the most vital relations and decisive interests. So the old sages became moralists and their great themes were the themes of virtue and duty. Not very deeply, however, did they, for centuries, succeed in penetrating the rational principles of the moral life and the authority of the moral judgments. ”

“ Hitherto the life-blood has been gradually chilling in your veins, as you sat aloof within your circle of gentility, while the rest of the world was fighting out its battle with one kind of necessity or another. Henceforth you will at least have the sense of natural and healthy effort for a purpose, and of lending your strength—be it great or small—to the united struggle of mankind. ”

“ The question, then, is, whether this melancholy march of things should be allowed to proceed, or whether we should strive to do better. Our good sense, our moral sense, our progressive instincts, conspire with our interests in proclaiming that we ought to do better ”

“ Was all our time filled with the obvious duties which present themselves to our view--engaged in the harmless pleasures that at every step lie in our path, or employed in well-directed observation and moral improvement were those vacant moments, which men feel so burthensome, snatched eagerly for the acquirement of knowledge, or the reciprocation of benefits--the advantage to mankind would be, not alone the increased enjoyment of existence, but also, escape from temptation to evil, and security in the path of right. ”

“ Besides, independently of their intrinsic merits, whether intellectual or moral, the necessities of their daily life serve to impress them with respect for the great rules of morality, which in most cases were framed for their own protection. ”

“ The particular things called the moral attributes of man's conduct are conventionally found by contrasting this educated and trained way of acting with the exigencies and social needs or dangers of the time. ”

“ "Under the term 'skill' I mean to include the united force of experience, intellect, and passion, in their operation on manual labor, and under the term 'passion' to include the entire range of the moral feelings." ”

“ The essential element in the problem is that we are contemplating, not physical movement only, like spasms or waves, but personal deeds, as acts of moral agents.185 Of course, moral quality does not attach to the action of non-moral beings, as the striking of clocks or the barking of dogs, but to deeds of self-directing personality. ”

“ In fine, example is of service to us, not in pointing out the precise things to be done, but in exhibiting the beauty, loveliness, and majesty of moral goodness, the possibility of exalted moral attainments, and the varied scope for their exercise in human life. ”

“ In the first place, you will allow that from the noblest moral standpoint a man's highest aim should be to do good to his fellow-creatures? Yes, you allow that. And to do the greatest possible good to the greatest possible number? ”

“ We note how emphatically the field in which this wisdom is to be exercised is declared to be the moral conduct of life. 'Righteousness and judgment and equity' are 'wise dealing,' and the end of true wisdom is to practise these. ”

“ What I have to note is that, in any case, the change supposes the necessity of a corresponding morality in the growth of the instincts, the public spirit, the hatred of indolence, the temperance and self-command which would be requisite to work it efficiently. The organisation into which we are born presupposes certain moral instincts, and, moreover, necessarily implies a vast system of moral discipline. Our hopes and aspirations, our judgments of our neighbours and of ourselves, are at every moment guided and moulded by the great structure of which we form a part. ”

“ It must be our dearest wish, as it is our highest interest, that this task be well performed. And we should assiduously bring to bear upon them all the moral influences within our reach to make them do it well. ”

“ Moral perfection for himself, and, as the outcome to the world, not a new church or a theology or a missionary enterprise, but a winning of the forces of nature to the service of man, and a shaping of the social organism for the benefit of all. ”

“ This general maxim being laid down, it remains for the student to study history, to analyse experience, and by a close and careful investigation into human nature and human relations to elaborate a moral code which would bring about general happiness and well-being. ”

“ Through the fascinating power thus wielded over others a great influence may be exerted to elevate the moral tone of society by presenting pictures of domestic life that shall array the merits and demerits of virtues and vices, delineating those delicate threadings among the counter currents of passions and emotions that control the individual, which escape the observation in actual life. ”

“ And not only have they been called upon to furnish the helping hand, but in times of moral stress they have often had to give proof of a mature judgment, a courage, a will power, and a forebearance far beyond their years. ”

“ It is evident, that when we praise any actions, we regard only the motives that produced them, and consider the actions as signs or indications of certain principles in the mind and temper. The external performance has no merit. We must look within to find the moral quality. ”

“ The whole force therefore of external reward and punishment, whether physical or moral, and whether proceeding from God or from our fellow men, together with all that the capacities of human nature admit, of disinterested devotion to either, become available to enforce the utilitarian morality, in proportion as that morality is recognized; and the more powerfully, the more the appliances of education and general cultivation are bent to the purpose. ”

“ How far do we give, and work, for the ease of our own conscience, and how far do we believe in the possibility of the instant and utter restoration of the morally degraded, are questions which, to-day, force themselves upon us. We must be ready with a yea or a nay; we must take sides, for or against such possibilities as should exalt philanthropic effort into a burning passion. ”

“ Reverence, etc.--As for reverence, consideration for others, respect for persons and property, I can only urge the importance of a sedulous cultivation of these moral qualities--the distinguishing marks of a refined nature--until they become the daily habits of the child's life; and the more, because a self assertive, aggressive, self seeking temper is but too characteristic of the times we live in. ”