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Deep down, everything boils down to the following simple question; Do we really want justice and the realization in this world of higher principles, or else do we want to serve selfish, short-sighted interests, which, when all is said and done, are also prejudicial to those very same that pursue them?
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In the actual state of social relationships, the forms of politeness are necessary as a substitute to benevolence.
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Devoting ourselves too much to an exclusive search of a material happiness, of ephemeral goods, one fails to appreciate the true realities of life and one let the spirit decline and dry up.
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Apart from selfish reasons, such as fear of punishments, fear of blame, of dishonor, etc, there remains only two motives that can stop men from acting badly; the natural sense of commiseration for one's fellow men - compassion, and the influence of education, by association of ideas - habit.
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So many really divine individuals humanity has not already produced! Heros in the moral sense, who never got tired to practice renouncement and charity; bright intelligence who opened to the mind new ways and horizons; poets and wonderful artists, who created for him the image of an ideal world, the reflect of perfection. These are as many proofs of the presence of the absolute in the midst of humanity, for him that does not discover the immediate proof of that in himself.
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If pity was always equally alive and acting in all individuals and in all circumstances, we could do away with moral. Unfortunately, it is not compassion, but rather it's contrary, selfishness, that act most strongly in us.
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If we accomplish a good deed, a charity in the hope of [getting] future rewards, or with a more or less confessed ulterior motive to profit from personal advantages, we are probably doing a useful thing, but which is devoided of any truly moral character.
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For those who do not need to work to provide for their maintenance, it is a question of conferring to their lives a content worthy of themselves. Now, this purpose can be attained only if we do not act solely with a view to our own benefits, but with a view to the benefit of all. Christ said: 'Where is your treasure, there also will be your heart.'
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Moral improvement require an evolution leading to a higher consciousness, which is the true torch of life; it is what we have failed too much to appreciate, and that which would be fatal to fail to appreciate any longer; For if we do not take it upon ourselves to remedy in time to the moral colapse that already threaten, the whole civilization will risks to disappear.
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Injustice having always hold sway on earth, there are some who imagine that the existing social order may subsist forever. Whether this order could last until now, this was mainly due to the conviction of people, that it was of divine institution. But this belief is vanishing, and with it the only moral support of the actual order will collapse, leaving only brutal forces opposed to each others clashing, with no peaceful way out.
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It must be all the same to the citizens of a country that their governing (those in power) speak such language or such other; likewise that it must be all the same to them that these adhere to such or such religion, so long as a full liberty is equally guaranteed for everyone.
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There is indeed no contradiction between science and religion, the fields of which are different, and which, far from mutually fighting and persecute, must, on the contrary, complete each other.
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Up to here, in general, we have mainly stuffed the brain of the young people with a indigestible multitude of various notions, without thinking about enough of the prime necessity to form their character.
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The incorporation of every individual in a collective mechanism of production, would mean the renunciation for man himself of its independence and his dignity as a rational being. The results of such a state of things would be: regression and deterioration in every fields of life. For the true progress consist in the accomplishment of higher ends, and these would be directly made impossible in a coercive social mechanism. Let us think to the fate that, in these conditions, new truths would have in store.
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In this world everything that is won to the ideal, is an eternal good.
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On the account that one person advocate and want something, it does not follow that others have to want it too; only the postulates of reason and certitude are identical, invariables, and can always be of use to everyone as a fulcrum with a view to a free agreement.
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Education has a tremendous power on man. Can't we see to which astonishing disciple the people of Sparta have submitted for centuries, and this with a view to very petty purposes: purely outer greatness, the military predominance of Sparta. This example proves that man can everything on themselves when they want it; therefore it would only be a question of making them will the good.
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Whether we had a good moral intuition more developed, we would be as much morally disgusted by the rapacity of those who try to benefit from, and monopolize, having no consideration for others, than we physically are by a sickening smell.
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It depends on ourselves to be to each others, either a blessing or a torment.
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What is the use for a man to have at his disposal a large field of action, if within himself he remains confine to the narrow limits of his individuality.
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Possessions of this world have not been for the exclusive use by such or such category of individuals.
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If the confusion of spirits, obsession of consciousness, abandonment of religious and moral principles was to become widespread, the consequences could be become such that we would finally see crop up in the very heart of the civilization, a new and appalling barbarism capable to engulf all the acquisitions of the past.
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The supreme blossoming of character lies in renunciation and abnegation of self.
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There is a radical dualism between the empirical nature of man and its moral nature.
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The peculiar value that such and such activity can have for a man rather really depends on the spirit in which it was deployed than its importance or its scope. Thus the most humble work can be accomplished by a great genius, whereas the highest functions, such as to rule over a whole people, can be practiced in a petty spirit of personal glorification, as it is frequently seen.
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Yet would we die as some have done: Beating a way for the rising sun.
Arna Bontemps
African Spir
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Born:
November 15, 1837
Died:
March 26, 1890
(aged 52)
Bio:
Afrikan Aleksandrovich Špir was a Russian Neo-Kantian philosopher of Greek-German descent who wrote primarily in German. His book Denken und Wirklichkeit exerted a "lasting impact" on the writings of Friedrich Nietzsche.
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