A man moves slowly or swiftly, he does his work weakly or strongly, according to the energy that is in him. But the direction of his life, this way or that way, follows the unseen influence of what he admires and believes most. Available the fifteenth of every month, short inspirational treasures by Gammon Irons. THE HAVEN OF CHARACTER Our life is made up, not of actions alone, but of thoughts and feelings and habitual affections. These taken all together constitute what we call our present character. In their tendencies and impulses and dominant desires they constitute our future character, towards which we are moving as a ship to her haven. What is it, then, for you and me, this intimate ideal, this distant self, this hidden form of personality which is our goal? I am sure that we do not often enough put the problem clearly before us in this shape. We all dream of the future, especially when we are young. A boy's will is the wind's will, and the thoughts of youth are long, long thoughts. The stuff of which our day-dreams are made is for the most part of very cheap material. We seldom weave into them the threads of our inmost spiritual life. We build castles in Spain, and forecast adventures in Bohemia. But the castle is without a real master. The hero of the adventure is vague and misty. We do not clearly recognize his face, or know what is in his heart. But in all these reveries we do not really think deeply of our selves. We do not stay to ask what manner of men and women we shall be, when we are living here or there, or doing thus or so. Yet it is an important question - very much more important, in fact, than the thousand and one trifling interrogatories about the future with which we amuse our idle hours. And the strange thing is that, though our ideal of future character is so often hidden from us, over-looked, forgotten, it is always there, and always potently, though unconsciously, shaping our course in life. “Every one," says Cervantes, "is the son of his own works." But his works do not come out of the air, by chance. They are wrought out in a secret, instinctive harmony with a conception of character which we inwardly acknowledge as possible and likely for us. When we choose between two lines of conduct, between a mean action and a noble one, we choose also between two persons, both bearing our name, the one representing what is best in us, the other embodying what is worst. When we vacillate and alternate between them, we veer, as the man in Robert Louis Stevenson's story veered, between Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. We say that we make up our minds to do a certain thing or not, to resist a certain temptation or to yield. It is true. We make up our minds in a deeper sense than we remember. In every case the ultimate decision is between two future selves, one with whom the virtue is harmonious, another with whom the vice is consistent. To one of these two figures, dimly concealed behind the action, we move forward. What we forget is that, when the forward step is taken, the shadow will be myself. Character is eternal destiny. Join us next time for The Question of Life – 15 March 2018.
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AuthorMusings from Gammon Irons. To desire and strive to be of some service to the world, to aim at doing something which shall really increase the happiness and welfare and virtue of mankind - this is a choice which is possible for us all; and surely a good haven to sail. Archives
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