leaving the old self

the ordinary idea to become a christian is this: we take as a starting point our ordinary self with its various desires and interests. we then admit that something else – call it ‘morality’ or ‘decent behavior’ or ‘the good of society’ – has claims on this self: claims which interfere with its own desires. what we mean by ‘being good’ is giving in to these claims.

some of the things the ordinary self wanted to do ...
well, they turn out to be what we call ‘wrong’.
and, we must give them up.

other things, which the self did not want to do ...
well, they actually turn out to be what we call ‘right’.
and, we shall have to do them.

but we are hoping all the time that when all the demands have been met, the poor natural self will still have some chance, and some time, to get on with its own life and do what it likes. in fact, we are very like an honest man paying his taxes. He pays them all right, but he does hope that there will be enough left over for him to live on - because we are still taking our natural self as the starting point.

as long as we are thinking that way, one or other of two results is likely to follow. either we give up trying to be good, or else we become very unhappy indeed. for, make no mistake -- if you are really going to try to meet all the demands made on the natural self, it will not have enough left over to live on. the more you obey your conscience, the more your conscience will demand of you. and your natural self, which is thus being starved and hampered and worried at every turn, trying to be good, or else become one of those people who, as they say, ‘live for others’ but always in a discontented, grumbling way – always wondering why the others do not notice it more and always making a martyr of yourself. and once you have become that you will be a far greater pest anyone who has to live with you than you would have been if you had remained frankly selfish.

the christian way is different: harder, and easier. god asks for our all.
really, He doesn't want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work, he wants you. me. us.

half-measures are no good. It's as if He says, "I don’t want to cut off a branch here and a branch there, I want to have the whole tree down. I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked – the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you Myself: my own will shall become yours.’

it is like that here, for me, in arizona, right this very second.

the terrible thing, the almost impossible thing, is to hand over your whole self – all your wishes and precautions – to christ.
but ... it is far easier than what we are all trying to do instead.

really what we are trying to do is to remain what we call ‘ourselves’, to keep personal happiness as our great aim in life, and yet at the same time be ‘good’. We are all trying to let our mind and heart go their own way – centred on money or pleasure or ambition – and hoping, in spite of this to behave honestly and chastely and humbly.

how funny that that is exactly what christ warned us we could not do.
as He said, 'a thistle cannot produce figs'.

therefore, if I am a field that contains nothing but grass-seed, I cannot produce wheat. cutting the grass may keep it short: but I shall still produce grass and no wheat. if I trulywant to produce wheat, the change must go deeper than the surface.

i must be ploughed up and re-sown.

attemping thoreau-esque hypothesizing

i am in a sea of ambivalence, wavering between respect and admonition for this State, our current state.

Must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? Is compromise on moral issues a necessary part of living with other people?



i believe the State never intentionally confronts a man's sense, intellectual or moral, but only his body, his senses. it is not armed with superior wit or honesty, but with superior physical strength. i was not born to be forced, i will breathe after my own fashion. Yet I am obliged to obey a higher law than I. i am to become like themselves. i do not know how i feel about the democractic system of government, yet i do know i am inclined to invoke some ultimate supremacy of individual will and 'human nature'.

government is at best but an expedient; but most governments are usually, and all governments are sometimes, inexpedient. the objections which have been brought against a standing army, and they are many and weighty, and deserve to prevail, may also at last be brought against a standing government. the standing army is only an arm of the standing government. the government itself, which is only the mode which the people have chosen to execute their will, is equally liable to be abused and perverted before the people can act through it.

this American government—what is it but a tradition, though a recent one, endeavoring to transmit itself unimpaired to posterity, but each instant losing some of its integrity? it has not the vitality and force of a single living man; for a single man can bend it to his will... it is a sort of wooden gun to the people themselves. yet this government never of itself furthered any enterprise, but by the alacrity with which it got out of its way. it does not keep the country free. it does not settle the West. and it does not educate. the character inherent in the American people has done all that has been accomplished; and it would have done somewhat more, if the government had not sometimes got in its way -- for government is an expedient by which men would fain succeed in letting one another alone; and, as has been said, when it is most expedient, the governed are most let alone by it.

to speak practically and as a citizen, unlike those who call themselves no-government men, I ask for, not at once no government, but at once a better government. let everyone make known what kind of government would command his respect, and that will be one step toward obtaining it.

after all, the practical reason why, when the power is once in the hands of the people, a majority are permitted, and for a long period continue, to rule, is not because they are most likely to be in the right, nor because this seems fairest to the minority, but because they are physically the strongest ... but a government in which the majority rule in all cases cannot be based on justice, even as far as men understand it. can there not be a government in which majorities do not virtually decide right and wrong, but conscience?—in which majorities decide only those questions to which the rule of expediency is applicable? must the citizen ever for a moment, or in the least degree, resign his conscience to the legislator? ............. why has every man a conscience, then? ......... i think that we should be men first, and subjects afterward. i conclude that it is not desirable to cultivate a respect for the law, so much as for the right. the only obligation which I have a right to assume is to do at any time what I think right. it is truly enough said that a corporation has no conscience; but a corporation of conscientious men is a corporation with a conscience.

Law never made men a whit more just; and, by means of their respect for it, even the well-disposed are daily made the agents of injustice.

....he who gives himself entirely to his fellow-men appears to them useless and selfish; but he who gives himself partially to them is pronounced a benefactor and philanthropist. how does it become a man to behave toward this American government today? i answer, that he cannot without disgrace be associated with it. i truly cannot for an instant recognize that political organization as my government which is the slave's government also.

really... when the subject has refused allegiance, and the officer has resigned his office, then the revolution is accomplished. but even suppose blood should flow... is there not a sort of blood shed when the conscience is wounded? through this wound a man's real manhood and immortality flow out, and he bleeds to an everlasting death. i feel as if i see this blood flowing now.