humanity

Don't lose faith in humanity; think of all the people in the United States who have never played you a single nasty trick.

"What sort of man or woman shall I be; what kind of life shall I propose and hew out ?" The answer one frames to this question is his personal ideal, and will exercise a potent influence upon the development of his character and the direction of his conduct. Toward it the growing soul strives, day after day, year after year; its outlines, first existing only in the imagination of the heart, gradually, almost imperceptibly impress themselves on the soul and body, and manifest themselves in the outer life; "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he." The personal ideal distinguishes man from lower creatures; and its perfection and power mark the high and full development of humanity. Very early it becomes the directing influence in self-culture,-which is by far the most important part of education; all truly higher education is self-education; the mission of all training from without is to stimulate and aid and guide one to take charge of his own culture and career. Conscious education is always directed by some sort of an ideal: the school, the home, national education are laboring to mold men and women into certain general forms of excellence and virtue; the personal ideal is the image that one forms of his own possible self. The personal ideal must have power over our lives, else it is not an ideal at all, but only an idea. One must not merely dream of strength, of wisdom, of skill and power, of honor and righteousness, of nobility and generosity, - he must resolve to attain them. He must see himself pursuing and achieving, and be inspired and energized by the vision. Such a vision of power is the personal ideal.

There is but one law for all, namely, that law which governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, justice, equity-the law of nature, and of nations.

It is not, what a lawyer tells me I may do; but what humanity, reason, and justice, tell me I ought to do.

A few great minds are enough to endow humanity with monstrous power, but a few great hearts are not enough to make us worthy of using it.

The weakness of humanity is our blindness, a cultural blind spot which some call ignorance, in which a selfish and immature ego claims the world as ours and prevents us from seeing ourselves as a part of the world. Kinship with all life is a biological (evolutionary) fact, but our culture ways of doing, perceiving and relating, blind us to this reality.

What is the use of this fuss about morality when the issue only involves a horse? The first and most difficult teaching of civilisation concerns man's behaviour to his inferiors. Make humanity gentle or reasonable toward animals, and strife or injustice between human beings would speedily terminate.

Humanity will ever seek but never attain perfection. Let us at least survive and go on trying.

Jesus lived His life in complete dependence upon God, as we all ought to live our lives. But such dependence does not destroy human personality. Man is never so fully and so truly personal as when he is living in complete dependence upon God. This is how personality comes into its own. This is humanity at its most personal.

The Church is her true self only when she exists for humanity. As a fresh start, she should give away all her endowments to the poor and needy. The clergy should live solely on the freewill offerings of their congregations, or possibly engage in some secular calling.