Self-worship

“ Unless you will consent to cast out from your hearts the ‘hiatus’ of indecision and of self-love, you can never hope to escape from the noisome pit of self-worship,—the well of man’s nature and of fleshly lusts. ”

“ Revenge is the naked idol of the worship of a semi-barbarous age: and Self-deceit is the veiled image of unknown evil, before which luxury and satiety lie prostrate. ”

“ These facts make Us blush and sweat for shame. But these troubles have been brought about through Our partiality and self-will, giving rise to rascality and blunders leading to calamities. All have been Our own fault from the first to the last. ”

“ To doubt—to tremble with anxiety—to vacillate hither and thither between this course and the other as to which may be the better—to complain within one's own breast that this or that thing has been an injustice—to hesitate within one's self, not quite knowing which way honor may require us to go—to be indignant even at fancied wrongs—to rise in wrath against another, and then, before the hour has passed, to turn that wrath against one's self—that is not to be a coward. ”

“ For indeed—I know what people are—if everything which is mean, dirty, and evil to-day, were to be declared by you to-morrow upright, pure, and good—all these snouts, without any effort of their own, would to-morrow be upright, pure, and good. One thing only would be necessary—the cowardice to annihilate self within themselves. ”

“ There, after all, is the rub. A want of hardy self-respect, an unwillingness to face with dignity the actual facts and necessities of our situation in life,—this, after all, is the worst and most dangerous feature of the case. ”

“ Deceit, then, whether it take the form of a fictitiously high estimation of oneself or the reverse, is the seed that produces an ill crop of Suffering. And we, if we would escape from Suffering and gain peace of mind, must rid ourselves of this self-deceit by all means in our power. It is above all things necessary that we possess an honest and up right heart. ”

“ If, then, at any time it was fatal and blâmable to manifest despair like yours, and to teach men such doctrines as the absolute necessity of their wretchedness, the vanity of life, the insignificance of their race, and the evil of their nature, much more is it so in the present day. Such conduct can only result in depriving us of courage, and that feeling of self-esteem which is the foundation of an honest, useful, and glorious life ”

“ For if our regard for the sufferings of others is proportioned to our regard for our own sufferings, inasmuch as our self-love is the foundation and measure of our powers of sympathy, a man’s disregard for the sufferings of others—in other words his cruelty—is likely to be the exact reflection of his disregard for suffering in his own person, or, in other words, of his physical courage. ”

“ Are they afraid to go to such extremes? Ah, why then go in that direction at all, if only by such extremes the desired result can be obtained? It is humiliating to degrade one's-self; but is it not still more humiliating to degrade one's-self in vain? ”

“ The objective ones speak.—“Nothing comes more easily to us, than to be wise, patient, superior. We are soaked in the oil of indulgence and of sympathy, we are absurdly just, we forgive everything. Precisely on that account we should be severe with ourselves; for that very reason we ought from time to time to go in for a little emotion, a little emotional vice. It may seem bitter to us; and between ourselves we may even laugh at the figure which it makes us cut But what does it matter? We have no other kind of self-control left. This is our asceticism, our manner of performing penance.” ”

“ Against remorse.—I do not like this form of cowardice in regard to one's own actions, one must not leave one's self in the lurch under the pressure of sudden shame or distress. Extreme pride is much more fitting here. ”

“ He does hot die of self-loathing! how then could he imagine the horror of disgust with which a glimpse of him such as he is would blast the soul of the woman?' Yet has he—what is it?—the virtue? the pride? or the cruel insolence?—to shrink with rudest abhorrence from one who is, in nature and history and ruin, his fitting and proper mate! To see only how a man will be content to be himself the thing which he scorns another for being, might well be enough to send any one crying to the God there may be, to come between him and himself. ”

“ It must be confessed, that self-love may dispose us to decide too hastily in our own favour: but who is hurt by the mistake? If we are incited by this vain opinion to attempt more than we can perform, ours is the labour, and ours is the disgrace. ”

“ Suddenly, or perhaps gradually, the change comes; self-feeling drops into an abyss. "I am the most miserable of persons, the vilest sinner, hated and rightly by God and man, cause of suffering and misery. ”

“ Even to those nearest and dearest to our affections, there is always a sense of shame attendant on the confessions of our weakness, more so than of our actual vices. But what a merciful judge is Self! ”

“ I cannot ask you to believe that I appreciate your heroic impulse of self-sacrifice—your purpose to atone for wrong by inflicting irreparable wrong on yourself. It is natural that you should think of me only as an instrument of revenge with no more feeling than some keen-edged weapon would have. ”

“ Where the body is enfeebled by the depressing influences of vitiated air and bodily defilement, the mind, almost of necessity, takes the same low, unhealthy tone. Self-respect is lost; a stupid, inert, languid feeling overpowers the system; the character becomes depraved; and too often—eager to snatch even a momentary enjoyment, to feel the blood bounding in the veins,—the miserable victim flies to the demon of strong drink for relief; hence misery, infamy, shame, crime, and wretchedness. ”

“ Taking two extreme types, he draws a picture of the proud, arrogant, self-assertive, domineering person, with the feeling of masterful superiority, and angry resentment of criticism and control, and who knows no shame and is indifferent to moral approval and disapproval. In this personality the instincts of self-assertion and anger are the dominating innate dispositions of the self-regarding sentiment. ”

“ He covered page after page with wild words of sorrow and wilder words of pain. There is a luxury in self-reproach. When we blame ourselves, we feel that no one else has a right to blame us. It is the confession, not the priest, that gives us absolution. ”

“ Restrain yourself, therefore, from all iniquity, and do that which is good." "What, sir," say I, "are the evil deeds from which we must restrain ourselves?" "Hear," says he: "from adultery and fornication, from unlawful revelling, from wicked luxury, from indulgence in many kinds of food and the extravagance of riches, and from boastfulness, and haughtiness, and insolence, and lies, and backbiting, and hypocrisy, from the remembrance of wrong, and from all slander. These are the deeds that are most wicked in the life of men. ”

“ Or to be told,—Sin is no more clever, politic, or successful here, than hereafter. The wrong-doing which looks to you so prudent is folly. You, man of the world as you may think yourself, are simply, as often as you do wrong, blind, ignorant, suicidal. You are your own curse; your acts are their own curse. The injury to your own character and spirit, the injury to your fellow-creatures, which will again re-act on you,—these are the curses of God, which you will feel some day too heavy to be borne. ”

“ To punish ourselves for others' faults, is superlative folly. The mental arrow shot from another's bow is practically harmless, unless our own thought barbs it, It is our pride that makes another's criticism rankle, our self-will that makes another's deed offensive, our egotism that feels hurt by another's self-assertion. Well may we feel wounded by our own faults; but we can hardly afford to be miserable for the faults of others. ”

“ He prefers the apparently self-contradictory attitude (but human nature is illogical) of meditating with remorse upon his own virtues. What in others is complacency, becomes with him, ostensibly at least, self-reproach. ”

“ Your frustrations are only rather more flagrant than the rule; and you've been saved many forms of self-dissatisfaction and misery which appertain to such a multiplication of responsible relations to different people as I, for instance, have got into. Your fortitude, good spirits and unsentimentality have been simply unexampled in the midst of your physical woes ”

“ For one in these distempers may have only some part affected; but the corruption of our nature is as extensive as our nature. It is the corruption of every faculty and every power. It is blindness in our understandings; it is self-love and perverseness in our wills, intemperance in our ♦appetites. It is anger, lust, pride and revenge in our passions; it is falseness, hypocrisy, malice and hatred in our hearts. Now all this, and far more than this, makes the miserable corruption of human nature. ”

“ What should one do with the misery of the world in a scheme of the agreeable for one’s self? ”

“ If each one of us has this mighty problem of life to solve for himself, if each of us has his own cares, responsibilities, failures, doubts, fears, bereavements, we surely are playing a coward’s part when we syndicate our sorrows to others. ”

“ But to decent, active, leisured folk it is, I maintain, humiliating; humiliating to become so much by comparison in one's own consciousness; and I suspect that the vague sense of self-disgust attendant on days thus spent is a sample of the self-disgust we feel very slightly (and ought to feel very strongly) whenever our wretched little self is allowed to occupy the whole stage of our perceptions. ”

“ But it was that very humility, that very self-distrust, combined so strangely with manful strength and sternness, which drew to him humble souls, self-distrustful souls, who, like him, were full of the “Divine discontent;” who lived—as perhaps all men should live—angry with themselves, ashamed of themselves, and more and more angry and ashamed as their own ideal grew, and with it their consciousness of defection from that ideal. ”

“ Take all evil out of thine own heart, then shalt thou see the folly of resisting it in another. Thou wilt be trodden on? Thou art trodden on already if thou thinkest thus. The injury that thou seest as coming from another comes only from thyself. The wrong thought, or word, or act of another has no power to hurt thee unless thou galvanize it into life by thy passionate resistance, and so receivest it into thyself. If any man slander me, that is his concern, not mine. ”

“ The self-esteem, if not watchful, is revengeful; and society sanctions promptly the fierce redress—that wild justice of revenge—which punishes without appeal to law, with its own right hand, the treacherous guest who has abused the unsuspecting confidence which welcomed him to a seat upon the sacred hearth. ”

“ I will consider myself as refuse, I will become intolerable to myself. And when I find myself shamed, degraded, trampled upon and loaded with insults by others, I will rejoice and exult, because of myself I cannot abuse or detest myself as much as I ought. I will call in help from all creatures, desiring to be confounded and punished by them all, because I have despised their Creator. This shall be my dearest treasure----to solicit insults and slights upon myself, to love above all others those who will help me in this, and to abhor all the consolation and honors of the present life. ”

“ The collection of evil habits and desires, which before had no identity beside the feeling of self-assertion, is now thought of as one, and gets a general character. It does this of course by its antagonism to the good. The common point in all bad self-assertions, their opposition to good, is recognized, and in all these realizations the self knows it is bad. ”

“ The tendency to refer everything, in some way or another, to one's self; the touchiness and suspicion aroused by nothing but petty jealousy as to one's own place; the imagined slights from others; the want of consideration given us,—all these and many more senseless irritations are in this over-attention to self. The worries about our own moral state take up so great a place with many of us as to leave no room for any other thought. ”

“ It is either the disease of weakness, or of unbalanced self-will, or the disease of inherited taint. We have fought against this conclusion because we still harbour the spirit of revenge; but as knowledge advances we shall, we must, accept it. ”

“ Everywhere, always, the weakness of his faculties proved the signal of distrust from his superiors, of contempt from his equals. He knew but one thing, to love, to pray, to humble himself—above all to humble himself. The less he felt himself, the less he made himself; the more he was despised, the more he despised himself. But wait! the hand of God appeared, and the ordinary movement of the see-saw was reproduced. ”

“ One’s consideration for others as well as one’s own self-respect should check the grumble. This self-suppression, and also the concealment of pain are two of the old noblesse oblige characteristics which are now little more than a tradition. ”

“ Wrong living, impotent aspirations; "What I would, that do I not; but what I hate, that do I," as Saint Paul says; self-loathing, self-despair; an unintelligible and intolerable burden to which one is mysteriously the heir.
Let me quote from some typical cases of discordant personality, with melancholy in the form of self-condemnation and sense of sin. ”

“ I am not the man that you boast yourself to be, but one of a very different character. I am a cowardly, untruthful wretch, a hypocrite to myself and others; my heart is the home of selfishness, deceit is on my tongue. ”

“ Which modes of choice 178 proceed naturally from a petulant sympathy with local and immediately visible interests or sorrows, not regarding their large consequences, nor capable of understanding more massive view or more deeply deliberate mercifulness;—but peevish and horror-struck, and often incapable of self-control, though not of self-sacrifice. There are more people who can forget themselves than govern themselves. ”