The Social Tendency

The social tendency, another strong Propensive principle, requires to be sanctified. Man does not and cannot regulate, as he ought to regulate, his intercourse with his fellow-men, without faith in God. 

He must have faith in something. And, so far as we can judge in the case, it is obviously a law of his nature, that he will attach to men all that faith, which he withdraws from God. Without faith in God, he will be likely in many cases to make his fellow-men the object of his idolatry; and will bestow upon them, unwisely and wickedly, that confidence and affection, which ought to be given somewhere else. 

Or it may be that without faith in God, he may make himself the object of his idolatry, and may thus in some cases not only withhold from God what is due to him, but may also withhold a proper degree of social interest in those around him. 

Whether we seek the society of others too much, or avoid it too much, we shall find in either case, that the evil influences of selfishness are at the bottom, and that we are violating a moral and religious duty. Faith, which in its applications and results makes us do what God would have us do, furnishes, in this case as in others, the only safe regulating principle.

— edited from The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 5.

 

Faith and The Desire for Life

The Appetites, which always attract especial attention as having usurped a dominion over man to which they are not entitled, are tendencies or desires, which are closely connected with the necessities of our physical system. We have seen in what manner they may be regulated and purified. 

The propensive principles, which are more closely connected with the necessities of the mental nature, and are generally regarded as sustaining a higher rank, are liable to be perverted, as well as the appetites; and need continually the purifying influences and the restraints of sanctifying grace. And if faith, by its action either direct or indirect, can purify and subordinate the lower principles, which are so often perverted and are known to be so violent in their perversion, there is no reason to suppose that it has less of regulating and sanctifying efficacy in its application to other and higher parts of our nature.
 

The desire of life, that is to say, the desire of the preservation and of the continuance of life, is not, in the proper sense of the terms, an Appetite; but it is obviously an implanted principle of our nature, which may properly be denominated a PROPENSITY. 

He, who has faith, may be said, just in proportion as he has it, to take his “life in his hands,” as the Scriptures express it, and to hold it at the divine pleasure. The anxieties, which afflict others, and which often render their lives a burden, do not, in a great degree, trouble those, who believe. Admitting, as they cannot well do otherwise, the correctness of the common remark, that in life we are in the midst of death, and admitting all that can be justly said of our constant exposure to various sufferings, they leave the issues of their earthly being in his hands, who gave it, without disquieting solicitude. The season of danger, even when the natural instincts take the alarm, is not a season of distrust and unholy fear; and when in the course of divine providence, the hour of dissolution comes, it comes rightly and well. “Is not the life,” says the Savior, “more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air; for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much better than they?”

— edited from The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 5

Faith is the Foundation of the Love of God

Love, which in being supreme makes God its centre, never exists, and it is not possible that it should ever exist except in connection with and as the consequent of a faith, which has the same centre, and exists in the same degree. 

Faith is the foundation. Faith is the deeper principle; although it must be admitted, that love is a state of mind, which, generally speaking, is more distinct in our consciousness, and is more obvious to common apprehension and remark. When, therefore, we have faith, we have all that is necessary for us, provided we have all the faith, which God requires us to have.

— The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 4.

God Alone is the Proper Center of Human Love

God alone is the proper centre of love. God alone, in consequence of the exalted nature of his perfections, is the object, to which our highest affections can properly attach themselves. If God is not loved supremely, something else is, because the nature of love is such as to require some highest object. And if God is the centre, (an expression, which implies, that our love is essentially, if not absolutely proportioned to its object,) then he is so in such a degree and manner, that all other beings are regarded and loved in their relation to him. Being not only the highest or supreme object, but being so beyond any and all comparison with other objects, he is properly the centre of centres. Consequently, receiving all our springs of action from him, as the great object of our affections, we shall regard objects, so far as we are capable of understanding their nature, just as he regards them; we shall love what he loves; hate what he hates; rejoice in what he rejoices in.

The moment we get into this great and true Centre, every thing else falls into the right position. We love ourselves, and we love other beings just as God would have us; for we can neither approve nor disapprove, neither love nor hate, except as we receive the spring of movement from the great source. In any other position of mind, the influence of self will be felt. But in this, as the mind operates in perfect coincidence with the will of God, a will which never deviates from perfect rectitude, it can give no countenance to selfishness, which is always at variance with rectitude. 

The life of God in the soul and the life of self in the soul are entirely inconsistent with each other. Where God exists, as the supreme object, self is, and must be cast out. Sensuality ceases. All our appetites, and all our propensities and affections of whatever degree will, in that case, be properly regulated. And the grace of sanctification or holiness will pervade the whole inner man.

—The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 4.

 

A Selfish Being

If a man’s love centres in himself as the highest or supreme object of his affections, which it must do, if it does not centre in some other being, he is of course a selfish being; and as such he cannot be regarded as a truly holy being. If he thinks for himself, acts for himself, lives for himself, as he must do if he himself be the highest object of love, it must be sufficiently obvious without any comment upon it, that he cannot be otherwise than selfish, and cannot be otherwise than unholy. 

All such love, which thus centres in ourselves, is wrong, and is not acceptable in the sight of God; because it is not proportioned to its object, and is inordinate.

It may be proper to add this remark here, that pure love or holy love is that love which is precisely appropriate to the object; being such, neither more nor less, as the object is precisely entitled to, so far as we are capable of understanding what the object is.

If our love centres in creatures inferior to God, and becomes supreme in them, it is necessarily selfish; as really so, though not so obviously so at first sight, as if it centered in ourselves. It is entirely obvious, that the motive for loving inferior beings in the highest degree, for loving them supremely, cannot be founded in their own characters. It is not a love, to which they are justly entitled. It is not right to love them in this manner. 

And if the motive of this love is not founded in their characters, and is, therefore, not based upon moral rectitude, it is founded, and must necessarily be so, in some selfish modification of our own feelings. The only active principle in man, which is antagonistical to rectitude, is selfishness in some of its modifications. Whenever a moral being deviates from the right, in any and all cases where he has a perception of what the right is, it will be found to be through the influence of self. In all such cases, if a being is loved otherwise than it ought to be, and is therefore loved wrongly, selfishness will always be found at the bottom. It will sometimes be very secret and almost hidden; but it will always be there.

— The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 4.

In What Does Human Love Center?

"No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon." —  Matthew 6:2.

Of the various objects, to which love is directed, it will always be found, that those objects will not all be loved alike; but some will be loved more, and some less. Of two objects or of many objects which essentially differ in their attractions, in other words, in their power of exciting love, it can never be said that the soul loves them both, or that it loves them all in an equal degree. The love of the object will be in proportion to the attracting power of the object, considered in relation to the soul.

Among these various objects there will be some one, on which the love of the soul will rest and satisfy itself in the highest degree; in a degree which may be expressed by the term supremely. The soul, in the exercise of its affections, must necessarily have a centre of love somewhere: viz., in the object which is most beloved. And that object will be the most beloved, and will constitute the centre of love, which possesses for the soul the highest attractions. The love of other things, which have less attractions for the soul, cannot fail to be subordinate. It is true, that the soul may take a degree of satisfaction in those objects, which are inferior or subordinate in its love. But it is in the supreme object of its affections, and in that central and supreme object alone, that it will rest and delight itself with supreme satisfaction. It is there, emphatically, that the heart is. There is the centre, and it is infinitely important that every man should know what that centre is in his own case. 

The centre of man’s love, (we do not say his love, but the centre of his love,) must be either in himself, or in other creatures, or in God. He may love all in different degrees; and he may love all in that manner at the same time; but he cannot have a centre or supremacy of love in all at the same time. He either loves God supremely, or he loves other beings, which are inferior to God, supremely; or he loves himself supremely. There does not seem to be any other supposition to be made in the case.

— The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 4.

Love Rests on Faith

Love is not a passion, which can properly be called accidental. In any and every being, that has the capacity of loving, this benevolent affection will arise, and increase, and decline according to its own laws of origin and progress. And if we have a right view of the subject, it is one of the laws of its origin, that love always rests upon faith as its basis. If we have faith in the creature, exclusive of faith in God, then our affections will centre in the creature. If we have faith in God, then our affections, either in whole or in part, will take a different direction; attaching themselves to God as their object, and being more or less strong, according to the degree of our faith.

Faith subdues that selfishness, which is the great evil of man’s nature, in part at least, by an indirect action; viz., by giving origin to love.  

The natural tendency of love to God is to regulate and restrain all unregulated and unrestrained love of that, which is not God. 

 — The Life of Faith, Part 2, Chapter 4.