Omnibenevolence

“ Can the reality of human free-agency, of moral responsibility and universal moral aspiration, of unlimited spiritual hope for every soul, — can this be made out, can it even be held, consistently with the theory of an Immanent God? ”

“ But as soon as every man is apprised of the Divine Presence within his own mind,—is apprised that the perfect law of duty corresponds with the laws of chemistry, of vegetation, of astronomy, as face to face in a glass; that the basis of duty, the order of society, the power of character, the wealth of culture, the perfection of taste, all draw their essence from this moral sentiment, then we have a religion that exalts, that commands all the social and all the private action. ”

“ Have you been taught the character of the Father? Yes.
Will you improve upon the gifts bestowed upon you? Let me ask you, as a favour, to bless yourselves and friends by conquering and controlling yourselves—a principle that you should cultivate; then you may control others. But unless you control the passions that pertain to fallen nature—make all your faculties subservient to the principles God has revealed, you will never arrive at that state of happiness, glory, joy, peace, and eternal felicity that you are anticipating. Then learn to govern yourselves. ”

“ Compare their lives and teachings, and you will find the same simplicity, the same self-sacrifice, the same humility, love, and peace both lived and preached by them. They taught the same eternal Principles, the realization of which destroys all evil. Those who have been hailed and worshiped as the saviors of mankind are manifestations of the Great impersonal Law, and being such, were free from passion and prejudice, and having no opinions, and no special letter of doctrine to preach and defend, they never sought to convert and to proselytize. ”

“ The dignity and responsibilities growing out of the fundamental truth before partially unfolded, that God, under the gospel, having given us general principles and laws touching benevolence, has left the amount and frequency or our contributions to our own decision. The position we occupy under the new dispensation is full of interest and solemnity. As it is one of peculiar dignity, it is one of peculiar peril. God has now raised us to the true platform of intelligent and moral beings; given our reason and consciences free scope to exercise their own energetic and controlling powers. ”

“ Every one will then be at liberty to form his spiritual regimen to his own taste, till in the end the invincible ascendant of reason shall teach him that the Supreme Being, the Eternal Being, is no other than Nature uncreated and uncreatable; and that the only Providence is the association of mankind in freedom and equality!— This sovereign providence affords comfort to the afflicted, rewards the good, and punishes the wicked. ”

“ This would be for the good of each and every individual moral agent in the universe. How, then, is it possible for such an exercise of the divine power to be for the good of all the parts, and yet not for the good of the whole? ”

“ Those endowed with extreme benevolence set the world in order; those possessed of extreme maliciousness turn the world into disorder. Purity, intelligence, spirituality and subtlety constitute the vital spirit of right which pervades heaven and earth, and the persons gifted with benevolence are its natural fruit. ”

“ This is a good and glorious principle, and we are uniting ourselves together, and continually striving to form a nucleus of power, and getting round us that support that will endure forever; and we will stand shoulder to shoulder, and break in pieces and subdue that which would strive to overcome us, and then plant the principles of righteousness over all the earth. ”

“ Self-purified, health will be yours; faith-protected, success will be yours; self-governed, power will be yours, and all that you do will prosper, for, ceasing to be a disjointed unit, self-enslaved, you will be in harmony with the Great Law, working no longer against, but with, the Universal Life, the Eternal Good. ”

“ Now I suggest that we put all this positively to ourselves, for every one of us knows that we are treading near some of the moral realities of weakness and need in our day and nation. Why should restraint, obedience, the authority of duty and God be let into our lives? In order that out of all these things self-control may come. And why should there be this submission and control of our lives by duty, and truth and God? ”

“ O ye beloved of the Lord! The Kingdom of God is founded upon equity and justice, and also upon mercy, compassion, and kindness to every living soul. Strive ye then with all your heart to treat compassionately all humankind—except for those who have some selfish, private motive, or some disease of the soul. Kindness cannot be shown the tyrant, the deceiver, or the thief, because, far from awakening them to the error of their ways, it maketh them to continue in their perversity as before. ”

“ But we dare not let go the truth that the holiness, the justice, the goodness, the righteousness, which the Eternal Moral Law imposes on us as a supreme command, are identical in essential substance in our minds and in His. Indeed, the more we keep before us the true character of that law, the more clearly do we see that the Moral Law is not His command but His nature. ”

“ 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. ”

“ No, But if you would, through a principle of covetousness, seek to sap the foundation of another's happiness, by trying to wrench from him those sacred rights which pertain to his interest in the eternal world, how much greater will be your condemnation? Nothing but truth, integrity, virtue, honor, and every pure principle, will stand in the great day of God Almighty. ”

“ The world we live in seems to have been principally designed for the use and comfort of mankind, who, by the divine appointment, have dominion over the inferior creatures; in the exercise of which it is certainly their duty to imitate the Supreme Lord of the universe, by being merciful to the utmost of their power. ”

“ Whatsoever streams of power and commodity flow to me, shall of me acquire healing virtue, and become fountains of safety. Cannot I too descend a Redeemer into nature? Whosoever hereafter shall name my name, shall not record a malefactor, but a benefactor in the earth. If there be power in good intention, in fidelity, and in toil, the north wind shall be purer, the stars in heaven shall glow with a kindlier beam, that I have lived. ”

“ So the principle of benevolence, which is but one, illumines all the particles that make up mankind. Well, then, the perfection of the human heart can be calculated to a nicety, So, if we follow the impulses of our perfect heart in whatever we undertake, we shall perform our special duties, and filial piety and fidelity will come to us spontaneously. ”

“ Shall a man serve the world, strive to increase the kingdom of God in the world? Yes, indeed, he shall. How shall he do it? By cultivating himself, and instantly he is thrown back upon his own life. "For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified." ”

“ Or, are they that we should think wisely, act justly, and practice truth, industry, self-denial, and universal benevolence,—from the sincere, heartfelt, ever active love of our fellow creatures,—and willing obedience to all the commands of our God? Are the means to secure the fulfilment of all these most momentous duties, such as are usually adopted in our schools?—or, shall we not find them in very numerous instances nearly destitute of any but means rather of counteraction than promotion? ”

“ Those who admit an omnipotent as well as perfectly just and benevolent maker and ruler of such a world as this, can say little against Christianity but what can, with at least equal force, be retorted against themselves. ”

“ This is called the “age of benevolence,” and some persons appear to have gone mad with the love of benevolence, at least they are mad with every body who will not be as benevolent as themselves; and, by abuse, scurrility and persecution prove how benevolent they are. They can talk of nothing but “benevolence.” This is the “Shibboleth” of the age, and of all sects and parties. A world of charms and enchantments dwells in this single word. And justice, judgment, truth, righteousness, yea, and humanity itself, are often sacrificed on the altar of this popular deity. ”

“ If we survey the moral world, it will be found, that the same division may be made of men, with regard to their virtue. There are some whose principles are so firmly fixed, whose conviction is so constantly present to their minds, and who have raised in themselves such ardent wishes for the approbation of God, and the happiness with which he has promised to reward obedience and perseverance, that they rise above all other cares and considerations, and uniformly examine every action and desire, by comparing it with the divine commands. ”

“ All the good of which humanity is capable, is comprised in Obedience. ”

“ This, then, is the view which we think should be entertained with respect to the natural evils of this life: they are intended by the infinitely wise and good Ruler of the world to detach us from the fleeting things of time and sense, by the gradual formation of a habit of moral goodness, arising from a resistance against the influence of such things and firm adherence to the will of God, and to form our character for a state of fixed eternal blessedness. ”

“ When we are governed by this motive, which the men of the world would deride as the figment of an enthusiastic imagination, our benevolence becomes one of the established laws of our moral system, which admits of no suspension or diversion, without occasioning a shock to our sense of right and wrong. ”

“ I answer, there is a twofold Kingly Power. The one is the Kingly Power of Righteousness, and this is the power of the Almighty God, ruling the whole Creation in Peace, and keeping it together. And this is the Power of Universal Love, leading people unto all truth, teaching everyone to do as he would be done unto.... But the other Kingly Power is the power of Unrighteousness.... This Kingly Power is the Power of Self 134 Love, ruling in one or in many men over others, and enslaving those who in the Creation are their equals; nay, who are in the strictness of equity rather their masters. ”

“ Let men, therefore, practice self-denial; let them conquer their animal inclinations; let them refuse to be enslaved by luxury and pleasure; let them practice virtue, and grow daily into high and ever higher virtue, until at last they grow into the Divine, and enter into both the practice and the comprehension of humility, meekness, forgiveness, compassion, and love, which practice and comprehension constitute Divinity. ”

“ Beyond this fact of truth and real force, the word denotes good-nature and benevolence: manhood first, and then gentleness. The popular notion certainly adds a condition of ease and fortune; but that is a natural result of personal force and love, that they should possess and dispense the goods of the world. ”

“ We were told that universal benevolence was what first cemented society; we were taught to consider all the wants of mankind as our own; to regard the human face divine with affection and esteem; he wound us up to be mere machines of pity, and rendered us incapable of withstanding the slightest impulse made either by real or fictitious distress. ”

“ The main business of life, therefore, is to discover the direction of these forces and the laws of their operation, and as far as possible to conform both character and conduct, through obedience to such laws, into a triumphant partnership with such a master force—a kind of conquering self-surrender to a power not ourselves and yet which we may not know apart from ourselves, which makes not supremely for righteousness (righteousness is a word not often discovered in New Thought literature) but for harmony, happiness and success. ”

“ But if virtue be defined obedience to the will of God, a course of action proceeding from the love of God, or from benevolence, &c. free-will is not at all necessary; since these affections and actions may be brought about mechanically. ”

“ The great need of the soul, then, is the need of this permanent principle, called righteousness, on which it may stand securely and restfully amid the tempest of earthly existence, no more bewildered, and whereon it may build the mansion of a beautiful, peaceful, and perfect life. ”

“ Herein must we make our foundation, and not in penance. The soul cannot have two foundations: either the one or the other must be overthrown. Let the thing which is not the chief, be used as a means. If I find my chief principle in bodily penance, I build the city of my soul upon the sand, so that each little breeze throws it to the earth, and no building can be erected on it. But if I build upon the virtues, founded upon the Living Stone, Christ sweet Jesus, there is no building so great that it will not stand firmly, nor wind so contrary that it can ever blow it down. ”

“ When we see this single, indivisible agent manifesting himself in such a manner as to give us the idea of unlimited power, we ascribe omnipotence to him, as an attribute. When we see a manifestation indicating infinite wisdom, we ascribe omniscience to him as an attribute. In the same manner in reference to the manifestations which indicate justice, goodness, mercy, truth, holiness, faithfulness, righteousness, kindness, &c., all of which we ascribe to him upon such indications. ”