If what philosophers say is true, that in all men action starts from one source, feeling, as in assent it is the feeling that a thing is so, and in denial the feeling that it is not so, yes, by Zeus, and in withholding judgement, the feeling that it is uncertain.
So also impulse towards a thing is originated by the feeling that it is fitting, and will to get a thing by the feeling that it is expedient for one, and it is impossible to judge one thing expedient and will to get another, and to judge one thing fitting and be impelled to another.
If all this be true, why are we angry with the multitude?
“They are thieves”, he says, “and robbers.”
What do you mean by thieves and robbers?
“They are gone astray and know not what is good and what is evil.”
From a very early age, it was sadly clear that I was not going to become an obedient worker, and one sure sign of this was my confusion about the nature of punishment. It baffled me when we said it was wrong to deliberately inflict harm, and then we turned around and did precisely that; what was even more troubling was the schadenfreude, the pleasure many people found in the suffering of wrongdoers.
While I certainly recognized how justice required me to return what had unrightly been taken, and by such a path to improve my own awareness of responsibility, I could not make sense of the deep hatred for the offender. While I saw why a heavy hand was sometimes necessary to encourage such correction, I was also sure that merely a fear of further pain would not help anyone at becoming better.
And then it occurred to me that justice was too often being confused with vengeance, and so the good for all was being replaced with the gratification of some at the expense of others. The key to making this appear acceptable was to claim that one act of aggression was simply a reaction to another; anger and violence felt justifiable when presented as reciprocal.
A man may well be acting poorly, yet this does not excuse me to act poorly in return. If I insist that my response gave me a feeling of satisfaction, I must understand why the transgressor was also aiming for a feeling of satisfaction, however misguided his means may have been. If his apprehension of the good was indeed mistaken, wouldn’t we both benefit by attending to the ignorance?
“There’s no fixing him, he refuses to change! He deserves to rot in prison or to die in agony!”
Perhaps he does, but I will not be the one to cast aside my own humanity because he happens to be confused about his own. Though it is natural to grapple with an initial instinct of anger, it is blameworthy for me to dwell upon it or to feed it.
Our virtues and vices proceed from our judgments, and so it is proper to look to the order of our thoughts when there is a disorder in our deeds. To consider my neighbors as fellow subjects, instead of reducing them to the status of disposable objects, demands that I do my best to bring our minds closer together—only then can our hearts come closer together.
Each any every one of our acts is out of a certain estimation, which determines our desires and aversions. Whenever I want something, or whenever I shun it, or whenever I am uncertain about what I should do, I am always working from a reckoning about the true and the false, the right and the wrong. Where the understanding is modified, the wish is modified, and where the wish is modified, the conduct will follow.
If I do not transform my comprehension, it is impossible for me to transform my behavior. Now why would I think it any different for the behavior of the man who mistreats me? Let me give him the very same assistance in reforming his character that I would hope to receive for myself.
No comments:
Post a Comment