CONSCIENTIOUSNESS.
Is there any conscientiousness in the world? How far conscientiousness
should extend. Tendency and power of habit Evils of doing incessantly
what we know to be wrong. Why we do this. Errors of early education.
False standard of right and wrong. Bad method of family discipline.
Palsy of the moral sensibilities. Particular direction in regard to the
education of the conscience. Results which may be expected.
There is such a want of conscientiousness among mankind, even among
those who are professedly good people, that one might almost be
pardoned for concluding that there is either no conscience in the
world, or that the heavenly monitor is at least no where fully obeyed.
For is there not too much foundation for such a conclusion?
While truth compels us to admit that Christianity has already done much
to awaken the consciences of men, we shall gain nothing by shutting our
eyes to the vast influence it has yet to exert, before mankind will
become what they ought to be.
Most people are conscientious in _some_ things. They may have been so
trained, for instance, that they are quite tender in regard to the
feelings of others, and even those of animals. There are many who, with
Cowper, "would not enter on their list of friends the man who
needlessly sets foot upon a worm," who are yet very far from possessing
much real conscientiousness. Their feeling is better entitled to the
name of _sympathy_.
I grant that many of these persons possess something more than mere
tenderness or sympathy. Not a few of them are truly conscientious in
what may be called the larger concerns of life--especially in external
religion. They not only feel the force of conscience, but they obey her
voice in some things. They would not fail to attend to all the outward
rites of religion in the most faithful manner, on any account whatever;
and if a failure should occur, would find their consciences reproaching
them in the severest manner, for their departures from a known standard
of duty.
These persons regard, with a considerable degree of conscientiousness,
the law of the land and the law of public opinion, or at least the law
of fashion. In respect to any thing which would subject them to the
severity of public remark, or which would even be regarded by the
coarse, public eye, as glaringly inconsistent with their religious
character, they are never wanting in sensibility. Their consciences
reproach them, when they have done or said any thing which may cause
them to be ill spoken of.
Thus far, it cannot be denied that there is a great deal of
conscientiousness in the world. But beyond limits something like these,
it is much more rare than many suppose. To say that it does not exist
beyond such narrow limits, would be unjust; but it must be admitted
that, taking the world at large, its existence is so rare, as hardly to
entitle it to the name of a living, moving, breathing principle of
action.
I do not suppose that young women are less conscientious than young
men; nor that the young of either sex are less conscientious than their
seniors. It would be a novel if not unheard of thing, to find the youth
without conscience, merging, in due time, into the conscientious
octogenarian. The contrary is the more common course.
And yet how few are the young women who make it a matter of conscience
to perform every thing they do--the smaller no less than the larger
matters of life--in such a way as to meet the approbation of an
internal monitor. Do they not generally bow to the tribunal of a
fashionable world? Do they generally care sufficiently, in the every
day actions, words, thoughts and feelings of their lives, what God's
vicegerent in the soul says about their conduct?--or if they _do_ care,
is it because it is right or wrong in the sight of God--or of _man_?
A due regard to the authority of conscience would lead people, as it
seems to me, to yield obedience to her dictates on every occasion. They
who disregard her voice in one thing, are likely to do so in others.
Who does not know the power of habit? Who will deny that the individual
who habitually disregards the voice speaking within, on a particular
subject will be likely, ere long, to extend the same habit of disregard
to something else; and thus on to the end of the chapter, if any end
there be to it?
No one, it is believed, will doubt that I have rightly described the
tendency of habit in large matters. He who would allow himself to steal
from day to day, unmindful of the voice within which bids him beware,
would not only, ere long, if unmolested, come to a point at which
conscience would cease to reproach him, but would be likely to venture
upon other kinds of wrong. I have seen those who would habitually steal
small things, and yet would not tell a lie for the world. But I have
known the habit of stealing continue till lying also gradually came to
be a habit, and was scarcely thought of as offensive in the sight of
God, or as positively wrong in the nature of things, any more than
picking up a basket of pebbles. From lying, the natural transition is
to profanity--and so on, till conscience, chased up and down like the
last lonely deer of a forest, at length exhausted, faints and dies.
Few, I say, will deny the tendency and power of habit, in regard to the
larger matters of life. But is it sufficiently known that every act
which can possibly be regarded as fraudulent in the smallest degree,
has the same tendency?
There are a thousand things that people do, which cannot be set down as
absolutely criminal, in the view of human law, or human courts, and
which are not forbidden in any particular chapter or verse of the
divine law, which, notwithstanding, are forbidden by the spirit of both.
Human law, no less than divine law, requires us to love our neighbor as
ourselves. Is the law obeyed when we make the smallest approach to
taking that advantage of a neighbor, which we would not like to have
taken of us in similar circumstances?
Those who admit and seem to understand the power of habit in larger
matters, are yet prone to forget the tendency of an habitual disregard
of right and wrong in small matters. They are by no means ignorant,
that large rivers are made up of springs, and rills, and brooks; but
they do not seem to consider that the larger stream of
conscientiousness must also be fed by its thousand tributaries, or it
will never flow; or once flowing, will be likely soon to cease. In
other words, to be conscientious--truly so--in the larger and more
important concerns of life, we must be habitually, and I had almost
said religiously so, in smaller matters--in our most common and every
day concerns.
Would that nothing worse were true, than that people of all ranks and
professions, and of all ages and conditions, habitually, and with less
and less compunction or regret, do that which they know they ought not
to do, and leave undone that which they very well know ought to be
done. For they even seem to justify themselves in it.
"I know the right, and I approve it too;
I know the wrong, and yet the wrong pursue"--
is the language of many an individual--even of some from whom we could
hope better things; and not a few charge it upon the frailty of fallen
nature--as that nature now is--independent of, and in spite of their
own efforts! Strange infatuation!
One way of solving this great riddle in human life and conduct--this
incessant doing by mankind of that which they know they ought not to
do, and neglecting to do that which they know ought to be done--may be
found in the fact that so few are trained to regard, in every thing,
the sacred rights of conscience. They are referred to other and more
questionable standards of authority.
If you do so and so, you will never be a lady, says a mother who wishes
to dissuade her young daughter from doing something to which she is
inclined. If you behave so, every body will laugh at you, says another.
If you do not obey me, I shall punish you, says a third. If you don't
do that, I shall tell mother, says a young brother or sister. If you do
not do it, father will give you no sugar toys, when he comes home, the
child is again told. If you don't mind me, the bears will come and eat
you up, says the petulant nurse or maid-servant. Thus, in one way or
another, and at one time or another, every motive--love, fear,
selfishness, pleasure, &c.--is appealed to in the education of the
young, except that which should be _chiefly_ appealed to--viz.,
self-approbation, or the approbation of conscience.
This is not all. There is with many of these people no settled rule as
to which sort of actions are to be the subjects of praise or of blame.
A thing which must not be done to-day, on penalty of the loss of the
forthcoming sugar toys, is connived at, perhaps with a kiss, to-morrow.
All in the child's mind is confusion; she knows not what to do, were
she as docile and as obedient as an angel of light. There is a long
series of actions, words, thoughts and feelings, connected with right
and wrong, of which nothing is ever said, except to forbid them, by
stern and absolute authority. That one is good, and another bad, except
according to the whim or fancy of the parent or teacher, the child
never suspects.
Of this last class are almost all the actions of every-day life. The
child alluded to is scolded, at times, for default in matters which
pertain to rising, dressing, saying prayers, eating, drinking, playing,
speaking, running, teazing, or soiling its clothes or books, and a
thousand things too familiar to every one to render it necessary to
repeat.
Perhaps she eats too much, or eats greedily; or she inclines to be
slovenly, or indolent, or fretful. Now all these things are in general
merely forbidden or _rated_, or at most, shown to be contrary to the
will of the parents. They are seldom or never shown to be right or
wrong, in their own nature; nor is the child assured, upon the
authority of the parent, that there is a natural right or wrong to
them. Thus, what is not implanted, does not, of course, grow. All the
little actions and concerns of life, or almost all--and these, by their
number and frequent recurrence, make up almost the whole of a child's
existence--are, as it were, left wholly without the domain of
conscience; and the young woman grows up to maturity without a distinct
conviction that conscience has any thing to do with them.
And "what is bred in the bone," according to a vulgar maxim, "stays
long in the flesh." As is the child, so is the adult. It is one of the
most difficult things in the world to make a person conscientious in
all things, who has not been trained to be so. Hence the great
difficulty in the way of making every-day Christians. Our religion is
thought by some to have nothing to do with these ever-recurring small
matters. And when we are told that we should do every thing to the
honor and glory of God, although we may assent to the proposition, it
is hard to put it in practice. There is a sort of moral palsy
prevailing in the community--and that, too, very extensively.
No fatal error of early education could have seized more firmly, or
palsied more effectually the moral sensibilities of the whole
community, than this. And therefore it is certain that this is at least
one principal reason why there is so little conscience in the world,
and why it is so often a starveling wherever it is found to exist.
I have heard an eminent teacher contend with much earnestness, that
there is a great multitude of the smaller actions of human life which
are destitute of character--wholly so. They are, he says, neither right
nor wrong. But if so, then is there no responsibility attached to them;
and, consequently, no conscientiousness required in connection with
their due performance. But what, in that case, is to become of the
injunction of a distinguished apostle, when he says, WHATEVER you do,
do all to the glory of God? If every thing we do should be done to the
glory of God, and not thus to do it, is to disobey a righteous precept,
then there is a right and wrong in every thing. Now which shall we
believe--the human teacher or the divine?
This origin of a common error, I have deemed it necessary for every
young woman to understand, that she may know how to apply the
correction, and where to begin. She should love and respect her
parents, even if they belong to the class which has been described. She
should consider the present imperfect state of human nature, and be
thankful for the thousand benefits she has received at their hands, and
the various means of improvement within her reach.
If she has drank deeply of the desire for improvement, and if she
wishes to know and to reform herself as fast as possible, let her begin
by cultivating, to the highest possible degree, a sense of right and
wrong, and an implicit and unwavering obedience to the right.
Before closing this chapter, however, I wish to present a few
illustrations of my meaning, when I say that every thing should be done
in a conscientious manner. Perhaps, indeed, I am already sufficiently
understood; but lest I should not be by all, I subjoin the following.
Suppose a young woman is in the habit of lying in bed late in the
morning. In view of her varied responsibilities and of the vast
importance of rising early, and with a strong desire for continual
improvement, she sets herself to change the habit.
Now to aid her in her task--for it is no light one--let her endeavor to
consider the whole matter. God gives us sleep, she will perhaps say to
herself, for the restoration of our bodies and minds; and all the time
really necessary for this is well employed. But I have found that I
feel better, and actually enjoy myself better, for the whole day
following, when, by accident or by any other means, I have slept an
hour less than I am accustomed to do. I usually sleep nine hours or
more, whereas I am quite sure eight are sufficient for every reasonable
purpose.
Moreover, if I sleep an hour too much, that hour is wasted. Have I a
right to waste it? It is God's gift; is it not slighting his gift, to
spend it in sleep? Is it not a sin? And to do so day after day and year
after year, is it not to make myself exceedingly guilty in his sight?
One hour, daily saved for the purpose of reading or study, after a
person has really slept enough, is equal, in sixteen years, to the
addition of a full year to one's life. Can it be that I waste, in
sleep, in fifteen or sixteen years, a whole year of time?
I must do so no longer. It injures my complexion; it injures my health;
it is an indolent practice: but above all, it is a sin against God.
I am resolved to redeem my time. And to aid me in this work, I am
determined, if I fail in any instance, to remember this decision, and
the grounds on which it was made.
She carries out her decision. She finds herself waking too late,
occasionally, it is true. However, she not only hurries out of bed the
instant she wakes, but recalls her former view of the sinfulness of her
conduct. She is no sooner dressed, than she asks pardon for her
transgression, and prays that she may transgress no more. This course
she continues; and thus her convictions of the sinfulness of her former
indolent habit and waste of time are deepened. At length, by her
persevering efforts and the assistance of God, she gains the victory,
and a new and better habit is completely established.
Just so should it be with any other bad habit. Every young woman should
consider it as a sin against God, and should begin the work of
reformation as a duty, not only to herself and to others, but also and
more especially to God. If it be nothing but the error of eating too
much--which, by the way, is not so small an error as many seem to
suppose--let her try to regard it in its true light, as a transgression
against the laws of God. Let it be so regarded, not merely once or
twice, but habitually. In this way it will soon become--as in the case
of early rising--a matter of conscience.
The close of the day, however, is a specially important season for
cultivating the habit of conscientiousness. Sleep is the image of
death, as some have said; and if so, we may consider ourselves at
bed-time, as standing on the borders of the grave, where all things
should look serious.
The "cool of the day" is peculiarly adapted to reflection. Let every
one, at this time, recall the circumstances of the day, and consider
wherein things have been wrong. It was a sacred rule among the
Pythagoreans, every evening, to run thrice over, in their minds, the
events of the day; and shall Christians do less than heathen?
The Pythagoreans did more than cultivate a habit of recalling their
errors; they asked themselves what good they had done. So should we. We
should remember that it is not only sinful to do wrong, but that it is
also sinful to _omit to do right_. The young woman who fears she has
said something in regard to a fellow being in a certain place, or in
certain company, which she ought not to have said, as it may do that
person injury, should remember, that not to have said something, when a
favorable opportunity offered, which might have done a companion or
neighbor good, was also equally wrong. And above all, she should
remember, that both the _commission_ and the _omission_ were sins
against that God who gave her a tongue to do good with, and not to do
harm; and not only to do good with, but to do the greatest possible
amount of good.
In short, it should be the constant practice of every one who has the
love of eternal improvement strongly implanted in her bosom, to
consider every action performed, during the day, as sinful, when it has
not been done in the best possible manner, whether it may have been one
thing or another. As I have stated repeatedly elsewhere, there is
nothing worth doing at all, which should not be done to the honor and
glory of God; and she who would attain to the highest measure of
perfection, should regard nothing as done in this manner, which is not
done exactly as God her Saviour would have it done.
It is desirable not only to avoid benumbing or searing over the
conscience, but that we should cultivate it to the highest possible
tenderness. True, these tender consciences are rather _troublesome_;
but is it not better that they should torture us a little now, than a
great deal hereafter?
I have said that some good people--that is, those who are comparatively
good--fall short in this matter. A young woman is a teacher, perhaps,
in a Sabbath school. She knows, full well, the importance of attending
promptly at the appointed hour; and she makes it a point thus to
attend. At last she fails, on a single occasion--not from necessity,
but from negligence, or at least from want of due care--and her
conscience at once reproaches her for her conduct. But, ere long, the
offence is repeated. The reproaches of her conscience, though still
felt, have become less keen. The offence is repeated, again and again,
till conscience is almost seared over--and the omission of what had at
first given great pain, almost ceases to be troublesome. And thus the
conscience, having been blunted in one respect, is more liable to be so
in others. Alas for the individual, who is thus, from day to day,
growing worse, and yet from day to day becoming less sensible of it!
But there is a worse case than I have yet mentioned. A young woman has
risen rather late on Sunday morning; and having risen late, other
things are liable to be late. The hour for church is at length near;
the bell is even ringing. Something in the way of dress, not very
necessary except to comply with fashion, and yet on the whole
desirable, remains to be done during the remaining five minutes; but
what is more important still, the habit of secret prayer for five
minutes before going to church, is uncomplied with. One of these, the
closet or the dress, must be neglected for want of time. Does any one
doubt which it will be? Does any one doubt that the dress will receive
the desired attention, and that the closet will be neglected?
But does any one suppose that conscientiousness can live and flourish
where it is not only not cultivated, but habitually violated, in regard
to the most sacred matters? Secret prayer is one of the most sacred
duties; and they who habitually neglect or violate it, for the salve of
doing that which is of secondary importance--knowing it to be so--are
not only taking the sure course to eradicate all conscientiousness from
their bosoms, but are most manifestly preferring the world to God, and
the love and service of the world, to the love and service of its
glorious Creator and Redeemer.
Let me say, in concluding this chapter, that if the conscience is
cultivated from day to day, it will, in time, acquire a degree of
tenderness and accuracy to which most of the world are entire
strangers. There is, however, one thing more, Conscience will not only
become more tender and faithful, but her _domain_ will be much enlarged
by the study of the Bible; and in many cases is which this heavenly
monitor was once silent, she will now utter her warning voice.
Conscience is not unalterable, as some suppose she is susceptible of
elevation as long as we live; and happy is the individual who elevates
her to her rightful throne. Happy is the individual who sees things
most nearly as God sees them, and whose conscience condemns her in
every thing which is contrary to the divine will.