Part 13 (2/2)
When he has finished with this, if I am still in a receptive mood, he may condescend to explain to me that self-interest and enlightened reason supply the true and underlying motives for all conduct; and that this is the only conception of life which is susceptible of intelligent explanation.
As a matter of fact, although this ill.u.s.tration is entirely fanciful, I was given a book to read, the other day, a modern book on morals, in which this was the gist of the argument throughout--enlightened self-interest, or selfishness, as the only sound and sufficient motive for everything we do. The friend who gave it to me had accepted it as scientific and authoritative and was thoroughly in accord with its conclusions. I may add that this particular ”friend,” as far as I have been able to observe, is the quintessence of selfishness.
My purpose, in imagining these ill.u.s.trations, was to render obvious and palpable the limitations of the intellect, when it attempts to translate feelings into terms of reason, or when it attempts to subst.i.tute scientific calculations for spontaneous emotions. The essence of one is feeling; the essence of the other is logic; and the idea of replacing the former by the latter is about as incongruous as an attempt to paint the perfume of a violet with an adding machine.
In the heart and soul and even in the esthetic nature of every individual is that mysterious element, which goes back to the beginning of creation. In many of the finest and most important acts of man, it may supply either the determining cause, or the princ.i.p.al effect. It cannot be explained in terms of material self-interest, or enlightened reason, because its essence is neither material nor reasonable. It has in it a touch of the ideal and divine, which was implanted in man, or has evolved in man, in accordance with the all-wise intention.
When we have succeeded in arriving at a clear realization of this fundamental truth, and imagine we have put man's intellect back in the place where it properly belongs, we must pause a moment to make equally clear that we must not under-estimate the wonder and importance of that same intellect, in the life of every individual and the life of mankind in general.
In this age of science, the attention and interest of the universe have been largely focussed on the marvellous achievements of the human intellect. Discoveries, inventions, advanced methods and great strides of progress in countless directions are the boast and pride of modern times. There is no disputing this, nor is there any doubt but that a great wave of scientific accomplishment, which was somewhat slow in developing, has, within the last two generations, suddenly a.s.sumed the most stupendous and bewildering proportions. The railroad and the automobile; the telephone and electric light; the airplane, phonograph, moving picture; anti-septic surgery and the germ theory of disease; the dreadnought, the submarine and wireless telegraphy;--these are but a few striking examples of the hundreds and thousands of achievements which the intellect has been able to accomplish in a comparatively short s.p.a.ce of time.
No wonder that we hear and read on all sides such constant and confident reference to the ”advancement of science,” the ”progress of humanity,”
and the bewildering resourcefulness of man's brain.
All those achievements are objective and impersonal; they concern the comforts and welfare, of each and every one of us, to a greater or less extent, but in a purely material and general way.
When we turn to the personal life of the individual and consider his acts and motives, subjectively, we find that the role played by the intellect is almost equally important.
As we have seen in our previous discussions, the intellect has a say in nearly everything we do or think of doing. It enquires into the cause, and considers the effect, and pa.s.ses judgment, for or against, in accordance with the dictates of its reason. If a certain instinct within us, which may be purely animal, has a need for food or water, the intellect recognizes and approves the need; but if the food and water set before us is poisonous or unfit, it is the intellect which determines that and overrules the instinct. If another instinct, or impulse, prompts us to set fire to a house, or jump out of a window, the intellect decides that such an act would be unreasonable and forbids us to do so.
It frequently happens that two or more of our instincts, inclinations, desires, are opposed to each other. I want to eat my apple now; I want to keep it to eat at the ball-game; and I want to trade it for Tim's lignum-vitae top. In such a case, it is the intellect which considers the advantages and disadvantages of each and announces its decision. If it is a healthy intellect, in good control, it will enforce its decision, too; but even if it isn't, and an unruly impulse proves too strong to be denied, that won't prevent the intellect from pointing out the mistake that is being made and keeping it in memory for future reference.
It is not necessary to go over all this ground again. We have already examined it with sufficient care in connection with the first answer which we gave to the up-to-date youth who wanted to know why he shouldn't follow his every inclination. The various examples which we cited to ill.u.s.trate the significance of reason and experience are enough to establish the point we are now making.
As far as the material things of this world are concerned, and the material needs of the individual, the intellect is generally and properly acknowledged as the sovereign master. The rule of reason in private life; and the rule of science in civilization have become more and more the accepted standards of the world in which we live.
If an instinct or a desire is unreasonable, it should not be allowed to prevail; if a tradition or a convention of the past is unscientific, it should be discarded and ridiculed as something out-of-date. That is the conclusion which advanced intellects have reached through scientific methods of enlightenment; it is the message they have been communicating, the example which they have been setting, until the wide-spread results are becoming increasingly apparent among all cla.s.ses and in nearly all places, where modern science and civilization have penetrated.
It ought not to be very difficult for any one to recognize and understand why the methods of science and the rule of reason occupy such a dominant place in public estimation as they undoubtedly do to-day. The only natural question is why they have not always, in by-gone generations, occupied just as high a place. The answer to this question is very simple, though some people's attention may not have been called to it. The scientific method of investigation, as we know it to-day, is a comparatively recent product of the human intellect. There was no science of any such kind when Homer wrote the Iliad, or when the Christian religion was founded, or when Leonardo da Vinci painted the Mona Lisa and Shakespeare wrote his masterpieces. Even at the time our great American republic was put into operation, modern science was still in its swaddling clothes. It is only in the last two generations that it may be said to have reached its true form and begun turning out in rapid succession the mult.i.tude of discoveries and inventions which have had such an immense effect in the daily life of civilization.
It also takes a certain amount of time for great changes to permeate, and become absorbed by ma.s.ses of people, so that it should not seem strange if many of the indirect results have only begun to be noticeable within the past few years.
And now if we look about and pause to reflect on these triumphs of modern science, as they affect the life and ideas and feelings of the average individual, a very curious and somewhat startling question is liable to suggest itself.
Is it possible that right here may be the main and underlying cause of the so-called ”demoralization” of the present generation? Is it possible that the ”impossible notions” and the equally ”impossible conduct” of the up-to-date young people which grandmother finds so shocking are traceable to this source? Is it possible that faith, honor, loyalty and other ideals and aspirations of man's better nature, are being neglected and corrupted by the methods of modern science and the rule of reason?
The very idea of such a possibility, when it first dawned upon me, seemed like such a palpable absurdity that I put it aside, yet as I followed the other trains of thought which have been under discussion, this idea kept recurring with greater and greater persistency. If it happened to be true, the lesson to be derived from it might prove so important and helpful to struggling humanity, that it appears to me, now, ent.i.tled to careful consideration.
Let us begin with a general commentary and ask ourselves--How comes it, while scientific methods have achieved such amazing results in the material world, they have not succeeded equally well in improving the inner nature of man? How comes it that science, with all its investigations and accurately reasoned conclusions, cannot show the individuals of the present day how to make better paintings than Raphael or t.i.tian? Or better statues than Michael Angelo? Or better music than Chopin or Wagner? Or better literature than Moliere or Shakespeare?
It can show him how to make a hundred times better s.h.i.+p, or factory, or surgical operation; but when it comes to this other kind of thing, it appears to have made no improvement at all. Those artists we have named and hundreds of others in past centuries, who made immortal masterpieces, had no intellects enlightened by modern science, nor any of the benefits of modern education and progress. If we may judge at all by results (which is the modern, enlightened way), the only effect of science in teaching people how to get an inspiration and find a beautiful expression for it, has been a detriment rather than a help.
If you take a boy to-day, who has a natural bent for poetry, or painting, how much will you help him by filling his mind with scientific methods and theories, rules and exceptions, deductions and compilations, of the various elements which should logically determine the value of the finished product? By giving his intellect a thorough course in scientific training, which may occupy his time and absorb his energy for many years, is it not possible that you will turn out in the end a plodding hack, instead of the inspired artist who might have been?
Did anybody ever feel the poetic beauty of a rose with greater intensity for having examined its petals through a microscope, and learned to cla.s.sify it scientifically, both as to species and variety?
Did anybody ever learn by scientific rules of grammar and cla.s.sified tables of words, to speak a foreign language with the ease and charm of a child, who picks it up from a stupid governess in one-tenth the time?
The childlike, natural way to learn a language is to absorb it into the system, almost without effort, until it becomes a part of second nature--in much the same way that we absorb tunes. Without the slightest conscious effort, we are absorbing and retaining countless bars of music, all through our lives--yet can anybody imagine an enlightened intellect, undertaking to a.n.a.lyze and cla.s.sify with scientific method the use of sharps and flats in different kinds of bars, and attempting to learn them in that form?
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