“CONDUCT AND CHARACTER.”

Shannon News, 21 September 1926, Page 2

“CONDUCT AND CHARACTER.”

W.E.A. LECTURE, At the last weekly meeting of the Levin branch of the W.E.A., Mr Bell presided. , The lecturer, (Rev. J. D. McArthur) stated that necessarily any discussion on conduct and character must take cognisance of the doctrine of freewill. Much has been said regarding the effects of environment or circumstances on character —and much remains to be said. In considering these things, one must bear in mind that environment does not refer to external conditions only. While probably such phenomena as tides, planets, mountainous or flat country have little or no 'effect upon a man’s character; possible the finding of a gold reef in one’s back yard would. Riches- or poverty, health or illhealth, have a far greater import. Two men living to ail outward appearance exactly the same kind of life, may in reality be in two different worlds. What, stimulates the one may depress the other, so that one must be careful before passing judgment on the conduct or character of either. . We .have to consider the effects not only of environment, but also of habit, Aristotle insisted that in the formation of good character, the main thing is the establishment of good habits. The virtuous man is one who lives continuously in the Universe constituted by duty. To live continuously in that universe is a habit and also it is insight. Habit as .applied to character is not on a level with habits such as our manner of walking or wearing clothes. It is a habit of willing. In order to choose the right we must know it s,o that right choice depends on true insight;. Freedom of the Will. —It has been argued that there is no real freedom—that .men are ruled.by circumstances. It has been argued that freedom really means that We act without motives. This surely is the very reverse of acting freely. Freedom is really essential to morals. We know that we ought to act in one way rather than in another—that one thing is bad or evil, another is good and right. Kant urged that there would be po meaning in an ‘ought,” unless it were accompanied by a “can.” Certain things a man can do, either now or gradually; certain other things he cannot do at any time-—no moral content attaches to these. To live definitely in a certain universe means that conduct is definite and predictable. , Compared with a plant or stone an animal has a certain freedom. It conducts itself spontaneously as Deway states, it is impelled to action by its wants and appetites as they come into consciousness. It is irritated into acting. It has freedom certainly, but it is a very restricted freedom when compared with a man’s. When a man acts irrationally we say that he is not himself, that he is enslaved by his passions, and is therefore nottruly free. Freedom is the only soil in which the soul of man can grow and in which he can rise to full stature. This has, been abundantly illustrated in art. During those years in which, through ecclesiastical restrictions,’ the human mind was fettered, art .perished. The spirit which calls forth high endeavour was atrophied and the artist became a mere hack endlessly repeating his soulless 'madonnas and emaciated and sickly saints. With tire recovery of freedom came the joy and splendour of that period which we term the Renaissance.. \

Universe. —What do we mean by a moral universe? In the science of logic we speak o,f a universe of discourse, meaning the sphere of reference within which a particular statement is made. We speak of the “gods” referring to mythology; of griffins and unicorns and fairies, and our references are true only as they apply to those fields. We speak of the Universe of Desire and we mean that the particular desire is confined to a particular realm and loses its significance as soon as we pass out from - that field, into another. We have'then such a change as is illustrated by the. old story of the cat which was turned into a princess, but which became a cat again immediately it saw a mouse. So we may pass from one universe to another—any sudden change, the news of the death of a friend; the. recollection of a promise, a suggestion of a moral principle, may cany us from one to another. There are higher and lower universes, and the problem is to determine which is the higher. This is not as easy as it seems. If a man acts so that he •enjoyis the pleasure of a passing hour, obviously biisj universe is smaller than that of the man who. has a year’s objective. If we make tire Universe of desire broad and high we can maintain our point of view consistently through life. CHARACTER. The simple and original meaning of the word is “an engraving,” and has come to mean something carved or inscribed in a man’s nature. Success or failure is often ascribed to external circumstances, but Longfellow aptly answers such sophistry in the words : Not in the clamour of the crowded street, not in the shouts and plaudits of the throng, but in ourselves are triumph and defeat.” The training of character in young people is really a double problem. Good habits and' right interests must be formed and those we know to be wrong excluded. This may be done at first by a system of rewards and punishments, hut later a better method is to replace or displace a bad tendency with a desirable one. ' . ~ Sincerity.—The wiord probably is derived from two Latin words: Sine, without; and ceira, wax—-without wax, and was a term used in builder’s contracts. Marble was sometimes chipped and the places filled in with a white wax which was so akin to the stone that even skilled men failed to detect it. But wind and rain and frost exposed the deception, vve note from this that every man s

work is or ought to be truly an expression of himself. Sincere workman, worthy work; insincere, untrustworthy work. The True Self.—There is no limited universe in which a man may live permanently. As we grow older we become crusted over with habits and so find it hard to step out of the rut. If our habitual universe is not as perfect as it opght to be we experience an occasional prick of conscience, we. are made to feel that there is a higher in which we ought to live. We claim that the unseen is eternal, and that character is more than mere life.- Through all the changes of youth and age, sickness or health, it remains. We ask: “‘Who is he?” and usually are told some--1 thing about his education, his bank balance, etc. So seldom about his character. To quote Longfellow once again:— ' ) All common things, each day’s events, , , That with the hour begin and end, Our pleasures and our discontents, Are rounds by which we may ascend. We have not Wings, we cannot soar, But we have feet to scale, and climb By slow degrees, by more and more, The cloudy summits of our time. Reynolds was on one occasion complimented on his fine- picture: The Infant Hercules,” and the apparent ease with which it was done. He replied: “There are ten pictures under it, some of them better, some of them'worse.”