Self Love and the Desire for God's Glory

But whatever love we may be permitted to exercise for ourselves or our fellow-men, the obligation still remains of loving God, as the Scripture expresses it, with "all our soul and heart and mind and strength." It seems to be generally agreed, that nothing short of the power of our whole being will satisfy the obligations and claims of divine love. And here it becomes necessary to consider briefly the relation, which self-love or the desire of our own happiness sustains to the desire of God's glory, and the consistency of the one with the other. This is a topic of no small importance; and perhaps it may be added, that it can hardly be supposed to be easily understood, without the aid of some degree of personal experience.

The doctrine on this subject, which seems to us to be a correct one, is this.

People Should Seek Their Own Highest Good

It is generally conceded both by theologians and mental philosophers, that a principle of self-love or a desire of personal happiness is implanted in man. As an implanted or connatural principle, it cannot, in its subordinated and legitimate exercise, be otherwise than right. In other words, when, in the pursuit of our own happiness, we have a suitable regard to the claims of all other beings, especially the Supreme Being, we cannot be otherwise than approved and guiltless in the view of conscience and of our Maker.

The command, that we should love our neighbor as ourselves, evidently implies, that the love of ourselves, in the sense of seeking our own happiness so far as is consistent with the happiness and rights of others, is admissible. Hence men are properly directed and encouraged to seek their own happiness. It is proper even to direct and encourage them to seek religion for the sake, (not for the exclusive sake, but still for the sake,) of their own happiness. In seeking religion, in other words, in seeking the restoration of the mind to God, there can be no doubt, that one legitimate motive may be the desire of our own highest good. It is certain that this is one of the motives, calculated ultimately to lead men in a religious course, which is not unfrequently addressed to them in the Holy Scriptures. "There is not," says Dr. Wardlaw, "any part of the Divine Word, by which we are required, in any circumstances, to divest ourselves of this essential principle in our constitution. That Word, on the contrary, is full of appeals to it, under every diversity of form. Such are all its threatenings, all its promises, all its invitations."

— edited from The Interior or Hidden Life (1844) Part 2, Chapter 5.

Regulation Not Destruction

It is a more difficult thing and requires more reflection and more religious principle to regulate the appetites and propensities, than it does to destroy them. And while the work of a holy regulation is to be regarded as a more difficult work than that of destruction, we may add, that it is undoubtedly more acceptable to God; although it is probably less calculated to attract notice and to secure celebrity. God expects us to do what he requires us to do; and to attempt to do more, or do otherwise than He requires, can result only from a mistaken judgment or from perverse intentions.

— The Interior or Hidden Life (1844) Part 2, Chapter 4.

Human Tendencies to be Sanctified Not Destroyed

It is certainly not too much to say, that we are accountable to God, strictly and fully accountable, for the exercise of the social feelings, for the exercise of the principle of curiosity or the desire of knowledge, and of other propensive principles, as well as for the indulgence of the appetites, or the exercise of any other inward act or tendency, of which we are susceptible. And accordingly it cannot properly be said, in the full sense of the terms, that we live in Christ, or that "Christ liveth in us," while any of these principles retain an unsanctified influence. They do not require to be destroyed; but it is obvious, that they must be made holy.

It will be perceived, that these views are not entirely accordant with the sentiments, which have sometimes been entertained by individuals, and even by large bodies of Christians. Many pious persons, at different periods in the history of the church, have maintained, that the various propensities and affections should not merely be crucified in the true scripture sense, viz. by being reduced from an irregular to a subordinate and holy action, but should be exterminated. In accordance with this opinion, obviously erroneous as it is, many persons of both sexes, some of them distinguished for their learning and their rank in life, have avoided, by a permanent principle of action, every thing, that could please the appetites or gratify the demands of our social nature. Influenced by mistaken notions of what Christianity really requires, they have literally made their abode in the dens and caves of the earth; and may be said, with too much foundation in fact, to have rejected the society of man for the companionship of wild beasts. Ecclesiastical history is interspersed with instances of this kind, from the days of the anchorets who macerated their bodies and uttered their solitary prayers in the deserts of Egypt, down to the present time. It is related, for instance, of Catherine of Cardonne, a pious Spanish lady of the 16th century, moving in the first ranks of society, and well accomplished in the endowments of intellect and education, that she retired to a solitary cavern in a remote mountainous region, and spent many years in the strictest seclusion, with no adequate clothing, and with no food but what the uncultivated earth afforded. No one can read the story of the extreme privations, to which she subjected herself, for the purpose of a more intimate communion with God, without a mixed emotion of regret for the errors of her judgment, and of profound respect for the self-sacrificing piety of her heart. There have been many instances of this kind.

There is some reason to think, that many of the class of persons, to whom we have reference in these remarks, placed more reliance on works than on faith. This was a great error, though a candid consideration of their lives will probably justify us in regarding it as an unintentional one. The mighty efficacy of faith, in its relation to the renovation of the human mind, seems not to have been well understood by them. And being left destitute, in a considerable degree, of the aids and consolations which so abundantly flow from that source, they pressed the principle of consecration, which, independently of faith, becomes the imperfect and unsatisfactory principle of mere works, to its extreme limits. They deprived themselves of the necessary sleep; wore garments, that inflicted constant suffering; mingled ashes with their bread; and submitted to other acts and observances of a penitential nature, either to render themselves, in their present characters, more acceptable to God, or to propitiate the divine mercy for the commission of past sins.

With feelings of entire sympathy with the sincerity, which has characterized the conduct of many humble and suffering recluses, we still feel bound to say, that we do not understand the Scriptures as requiring the crucifixion of the appetites and propensities to be carried to this extent. The Scriptures require us to become Christians; but they do not require us to cease to be men. They require us, to put off the "old man," which is fictitious, a perversion of good, and a "liar from the beginning;" but they do not, and could not require us to put off the "new man," which is the same, if not physically and intellectually, yet in all the attributes of the heart, with the primitive or holy man, the man as he existed in Adam before his fall, and as he became re-existent in the stainless Savior. But Christ, who is set before us as our example, ate and drank without sin; he recognized and discharged the duty of social intercourse without sin; and he performed the various other duties, which are appropriate to human nature, in equal freedom from anything that is wrong and unholy.

— The Interior or Hidden Life (1844) Part 2, Chapter 4.

True Rectitude

"And herein do I exercise myself, to have always a conscience void of offense toward God and toward men." Acts xxiv. 16.

What constitutes the true nobility?
Not wealth, nor name, nor outward pomp, nor power,
Fools have them all; and vicious men may be
The idols and the pageants of an hour.
But 'tis  to have a good and honest heart,
Above all meanness and above all crime,
And act the right and honorable part
In every circumstance of place and time.
He, who is thus, from God his patent takes,
His Maker formed him the true nobleman;
Whate'er is low and vicious he forsakes,
And acts on rectitude's unchanging plan.
Things change around him; changes touch not him,
The star, that guides his path, fails not, nor waxes dim.

— American Cottage Life (1850).

The Blessed Name of Christ

"If ye be reproached for the name of Christ, happy are ye; for the Spirit of glory and of God resteth upon you. On their part he is evil spoken of, but on your part he is glorified."  I Peter iv. 14.

Whate'er our griefs in life, whate'er in death,
If doomed perchance to feel the martyr's flame,
Still, with our last and agonizing breath,
In joy will we repeat Christ's precious name:
Oh! there's a magic in that glorious word;
No other has such power; the mighty voice,
From senatorial lips and patriots heard,
Can ne'er like this enkindle, rouse, rejoice.
For Christ's dear name the saints, without a groan,
In times of old met death upon their knees;
For Christ's dear name the lonely Piedmontese
Down headlong o'er the crimson rocks were thrown.
That blessed name gives hope and strength and zeal
That sets at nought alike the flood, the fire, the steel.

— American Cottage Life (1850).

Our Choice or God's?

It  is a sign that our wills are not wholly lost in the will of God, when we are much in the habit of using words which imply election or choice; such as, I want this, or I want that; I hope it will be so and so, or I hope it will be otherwise. When our wills are lost in the will of God, all our specific choices and preferences are merged in God's preference and choice. The soul truly loves the arrangements of God, whatever they may be. In regard to whatever is now, and whatever shall be hereafter, its language is, "Thy will be done."

— Religious Maxims (1846) CXV.