Sources of Joy and Factors of Happiness: Lessons XXII–XXIV

Sources of Joy and Factors of Happiness A Study for the Advanced Senior Class, M. I. A. 1921-22 By George H. Brimhall, President Emeritus, Brigham Young University Lesson XXII. — Patriotism Introduction. — Webster defines patriotism as love of country; de- votion to the welfare of one's coun- try ; it relates to the virtues and ac- tions of a patriot; the passion in- spiring one to serve one's coun- try. Patriotism, then, is love, and love is a source of joy and a fac- tor of happiness to the extent that its object is good, true, or beauti- ful. In its broadest sense patriotism is love of and loyalty to the group and its environments. We speak of family patriotism. This sentiment holds close to the individual, the home, and the family group. We may speak of community patriot- ism as town, city, or state patriot- ism. There is also a sentiment known as school patriotism. Church patriotism is generally re- ferred to as Church loyalty or re- ligious fidelity. In its most specific sense patriot- ism is love of country or national loyalty. Sometime ago there appeared in one of our leading dailies, on the editorial page, a statement to the effect "that as long as there are nations there would be war." This, of course, in effect, meant that war is a concomitant of patriotism, because patriotism is a passion that impels men to fight for their coun- try or nation, and if it be true that war is the effect of patriotism, then patriotism becomes a source of more sorrow than joy and of more misery than happiness. Na- tionalism and patriotism are com- plements of each other, but war is no more a natural outgrowth of patriotism than family feuds are the natural outgrowth of families. To say then that the obliteration of all national boundaries and in- terests is the only path to peace is akin to saying that the abolishment of family feuds is dependent up- on the extinction of families. Internationalism does not mean the lessening of national interest, it means the pooling of national in- terests in such a way that its divi- dends of joy and happiness shall be larger than they could possibly be without a free agency coopera- tion that would eliminate the de- structive aspect of competition. The raising of the white flag of universal peace is not to be accom- panied by a lowering of the Stars and Stripes. Its folds will be all the more dear to us as a treasury of our traditions, its colors will be all the more inspiring as emblems of our love of society, and its stars

530 IMPROVEMENT ERA will be all the brighter as symbols of our faith and hope. Our love of mankind will not eclipse our love of country, it will make it more intense, just as love of country intensifies family love, just as parental love makes strong- er connubial affection. The in- tensity of patriotism is not diluted by the extension of its application. Narrow-mindedness of view and one-sidedness of interest may hide behind patriotism and perpetuate errors and even evil under the guise of love of country, but true patriotism never runs so wide the mark of universal ethics as to say, "my country right or wrong," be- cause it is always better for any- thing to perish than to persist in iniquity, for persistency in iniquity is simply a painful putting off of doomsday. The joy-giving patriotism is maintained under the slogan, "My country when right, and when wrong to be made right." Thrills are either exhilarating or depressing; stimulating or ennerv- ating. Thrills of patriotism are of the positive type, they arouse hope, they stimulate courage, they sus- tain action; hence the war cry, the bugle blast, the band music, and the army songs. All these things which have been so effectively used in avalanches of destruction could be made impelling forces in constructive conquests. A battle cry of construction might read something like the fol- lowing : Build, Ye Builders, Build Build an aeroplane for progress, Build for peace a hearthstone fortress; Build for confidence a throne, Build it of square-dealing stone. Build, ye builders, build. O, build, ye builders, build. Build for union, build for freedom, Build the common people's kingdom. Build for future, build for now, Build to speed the pen and plow. Build, ye builders, build. O, build, ye builders, build. Build for strength and build for beauty, Build for order, law, and duty; Build for grown-up girl and boy, Build for universal joy. Build, ye builders, build. O, build, ye builders, build. Patriotism awakens hope, in- spires courage, and sustains action. It leads to self-forgetfulness and swallows up selfishness in the in- terest of the group. Patriotism in Literature. "A glorious death is his who for his country falls." — Homer. "And for our country 'tis a bliss to die." — Pope. "Happy the death of him who pays the debt of nature for his country's sake." — Cicero. "Had I a dozen sons, each in my love alike and none less dear than thine, and, my good Marcius, I had rather eleven die nobly for their country than one voluptuously surfeit out of action." — Shakespeare. "I only reget that I have but one life to lose for my country." — Nathan Hale. "There ought to be a system of man- ners in every nation which a well-formed mind would be disposed to relish. To make us love our country, our country ought to be lovely." — Burke. "Millions for defense, but not one cent for tribute."— Charles C. Pinckney. "Breathes there a man with soul so dead, Who never to himself hath said, This is my own, my native land! Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned,

SOURCES OF JOY AND FACTORS OF HAPPINESS 531 As home his footsteps he hath turned, From wandering on a foreign strand? If such there breathe, go mark him well! For him no minstrel raptures swell; High though his titles, proud his name, Boundless his wealth as wish cj:n claim. Despite those titles, power and pelf, The wretch, concentered all in self, Living, shall forfeit fair renown And, doubly dying, shall go down To the vile dust from whence he sprung, Unwept, unhonored, and unsung." — Scott. "He who loves not his country, can love nothing." — Byron. "Far dearer the grove or the prison, Illumined by one patriot name, Than the trophies of all who have risen, On Liberty's ruins to fame." — Moore. "Let our object be our country, our whole country, and nothing but our country." — Daniel Webster. "We join ourselves to no party that does not carry the flag and keep step to the music of the Union." — Rufus Choate. "The mystic chords of memory, stretch- ing from every battlefield and patriot grove to every living heart and hearth- stone, all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they i ill be, by the better angels of our nature." — Abrar ham Lincoln. Patriotism in Religion. — That religious fervor and patriotism are passions of close kinship is vividly depicted in the following lines from Macaulay: "And how can man die better than fac- ing fearful odds, For the ashes of his fathers and the tem- ples of his gods!" The deluded Hindo pantheism is just about as comparable with the concentrated Christian faith as is the lax patriotism of the Orient- al Indian comparable with the pa- triotism of the American. It would seem that the saying, "As the religion, so the patriot- ism," is not wide of the truth. "Mormonism" was launched by a divine rejection of all churches. The same God that disowned all ecclesiastical organizations on the earth declared the constitution of the United States to be of inspired origin and himself the inspirer of the founders of this government; therefore, the Latter-day Saint is committed to the doctrine that the Church is the product of revela- tion, and the government the prod- uct of inspiration, both establish- ed by the Lord God of Israel. Doc- trine and Covenants, section 101: 77-80. Moreover, American liberty is not only an inheritance from ancestral patriots to be loved, protected, and perpetuated, but it is a gift from God to be reverent- ially made a part of their lives and handed down to their posterity as one of the gifts of eternity. Book of Mormon, II Nephi 10:10- 12. The loyalty with which the Church and its members have re- sponded to the calls of our coun- try has given ample evidence of the affinity between Latter-day Saint faith and American patriotism. The Savior of the world gave evi- dence of patriotic interest. He came to his own, he wept over Jerusalem, and the house of Is- rael is repeatedly referred to by the Lord as his chosen people. God's interest is as wide as the universe, but that does not prevent his having centers of special inter- est. Jesus loved all women, but at the last his solicitude centered on his mother, when he most tend- erly committed her to the care of John, the beloved. True religion provides for pa-

532 IMPROVEMENT ERA triotism, and true patriotism pro- tects religion. Problems and Questions 1. How many centuries has the family patriotism of Jacob's household influ- enced the history of the world? 2. What high official council establish- ed by Jesus in the flesh, in Palestine, or- ganized by him in this dispensation, is in a way a means of perpetuating the family patriotism of the house of Jacob? 3. Give proof that this recognition is to be carried over into eternity. I Nephi 12:9-10; Mormon 3:18-19. 4. Wherein is the national patriotism of a Latter-day Saint firmly anchored to his religion? 5. Show the fallacy of the argument that the extinction of nationalism is necessary to the establishment of a world-wide peace. 6. Which is the higher form of peace, the one where people will not go to war, or where they can not go to war? Give reasons for your answers. 7. Count up the ways in which patriot- ism has contributed to your happiness. 8. What joys has a person with a coun- try that one without a country cannot have? 9. What to your mind is the choicest literary gem given in this lesson? 10. Which is the most patriotic expres- sion in our national hymn, and which in our national anthem? 11. Which do you consider the highest patriotism, to die for your country or to live for it? Lesson XXIII. — Broadmindedness Freedom is the apex of enjoy- ment, and the only way to it is by the trail of truth. The circle of vision from any point on this trail marks the breadth of one's mind, be it broad or narrow. At the foot of the great moun- tain range of liberty the climber has but two ways to look, upward to the nearby peaks and down to his feet. But far off he cannot see, and seeing not himself he questions the possibility of others seeing. Self-centered, he is ar- rogant; narrowminded, he is intol- erant; he pits his opinion against a whole army of facts simply be- cause they do not fit the mould of his individual ideality. He has no tolerance for anything that dis- turbs his shaded rest; he is typi- fied by Gray's "Moping Owl;" he is innocent but not advancing. The birth cry of every advancing idea is a new shout for freedom. Expansion of ideas, though plod- ding in its process, produces pleas- ures unknown and unknowable to a narrowminded contentedness. To be narrow minded means to idolize fossilized ideals; to be broadminded means to idealize ever-advancing ideals; it means the passing pleasantly out of the old and the joyous coming in of the new. Broadmindedness makes not only for freedom itself, but it makes for those virtues by which freedom gained is retained. Broadmindedness Makes for Power. While it may be disputed that knowledge is power, there is no ground for argument that knowledge is not a means of ap- plying power. Broadmindedness Makes for Wisdom. The ancient philosopher was not altogether in error when he said that "ignorance was man's greatest enemy," but ignorance is the absence of knowledge. Unwis- dom, or the erroneous application of knowledge, is man's greatest en-

SOURCES OF JOY AND FACTORS OF HAPPINESS 533 emy, and wisdom, of all the virtues, is man's greatest friend. Broadmindedness Makes for Jus- tice. — Judge and jury, to admin- ister justice, must see both sides of the. case. They must have a point of view above the dust of bias and the clouds of prejudice. Broadmindedness Makes for Mercy. — Broadmindedness makes for mercy, not only in its effect up- on the act, but in the intention be- hind the act, and in the effect of the act upon the actor. Vain were the pleas of mercy be- fore a tribunal of justice whose vis- ion of the case did not extend be- yond the act, and its immediate cause and effect. Her claims could have no weight upon the scales that could not weigh the intelli- gence and the intent of the actor and the effect of the act upon the actor himself. Broadmindedness Makes for Peace. — When the unprofitable- ness of war is universally compre- hended the millennial morn will dawn. Individuals and groups of big ideas are not ruled bv little im- pulses. The shortsightedness of the man who killed the goose to get the golden egg has its parallel in every war of conquest. There can be no such a thing as peaceless prosperity. War profiteering is a form of narrowminded, soul-crushing calamity; it makes despicable the individual and drags down the standards of the group. Peace is more than a pathway to happiness, it is a highway. Broadmindedness is lifting the race to an outlook from which it can see that, though wisdom and war travel the same road, they are always going in opposite direc- tions, a fact equally true, whether it be an encounter between indi- viduals, a family feud, or a mili- tary clash between the forces of al- lied groups of nations. Broadmindedness in Homes Makes for Domestic Tranquility. — In homes it makes for the compre- hension of the fact that young peo- ple cannot see things through Twentieth century haze, as their parents saw them in the Puritanic atmosphere of half a century ago, any more than they can read through their grandfather's spec- tacles, and that they must work out their problems of life, which are not those of the ox team or, at best, the spring carriage, but those of the automobile and the aero- plane. They are not those of the three "R's" and the spelling match, but problems of the vocational schools and the college; they are not problems of the cabin and the lean-to, but of the bungalow and the apartment house. They are not the problems of going from the farm to the city, but of taking the city to the farm. Broadmindedness and Study. — Extension courses, special resi- dence courses, and best of all, regu- lar college courses, make for broadmindedness. Broadmindedness and Religion. — The one thing more than any other that has brought religion in- to disrepute has been its lack of broadmindedness, and to the ex- tent that it has failed in this re-

534 IMPROVEMENT ERA spect it has bred bigotry instead of brotherhood; fostered intolerance instead of encouragement; exhibit- ed ignorance and inhibited intelli- gence. Just to the extent that religion provides for broadmindedness it reaches up and brings down to man the righteousness of God; however, it must be kept in mind that a worthwhile broadminded- ness is something more than idea diluted with indifference, or the acceptance of everything as good instead of recognizing what good there is in everything. When the Lord rejected all the churches, it was not because there was no good in them, but because not one of them possessed a suf- ficient concentration of good for his acceptance; they were each and all lacking in some fundamentals, and as without sincerity, courage, and a continuity of effort — good- ness of character cannot be even relatively complete, so without di- vine authority provisions for a continuity of communication be- tween heaven and earth, and a progressiveness of man's free a- gency, religion cannot be even rela- tively perfect. For want of time and space this lesson cannot take into considera- tion the broadmindedness of more than one religion. The student will recognize in the following references provisions for broadmindedness: "We claim the privilege of worshiping Almighty God according to the dictates of our own conscience, and allow all men the same privilege, let them worship how, where, or what they may." — Eleventh Article of Faith. * * * "If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report, we seek after these things." Thirteenth Article of Faith. "Ye must grow in grace and in the knowledge of the tru';h." Doctrine and Covenants 50:40. * * * "Obtain a knowledge of his- tory, and of countries, and of kingdoms, of laws of God and man." Doctrine and Covenants, 93:53. * * * "Study and learn, and become acquainted with all good books, and with languages, tongues, and people." Doctrine and Covenants 90:15. * * * "Be instructed more perfectly in theory, in principle, in doc- trine, in the law of the gospel, in all things that pertain unto the Kingdom of God, that are expedient for you to un- derstand. * * * Of things both in heaven and in earth; things which have been, things which are, things which must shortly come to pass; things which are at home, things which are abroad." Doctrine and Covenants 88:78, 79. * * * "If a person gains more knowledge and intelligence in this life through his dili- gence and obedience than another, he will have so much the advantage in the world to come." Doctrine and Cove- nants 130:19. The Worlds Need of Broad- mindedness. — Afghanistan p u n- ishes professing Christians with death. Ninety-five per cent of the men and ninety per cent of the women have never learned the first letter of the alphabet. Fifty mil- lion are outcasts. China contains one quarter of the world's population, ninety-five per cent are illiterate. A great stretch of dangerous ter- ritory lies in the center of South America including the interior of Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, and Para- guay. One state in northern Brazil has but one teacher for a million people. Along the Amazon eight million people are served by twenty-nine humble teachers. Re-

SOURCES OF JOY AND FACTORS OF HAPPINESS 535 ligion and Business, Babson, pages 127-128. Questions and Problems Show the fallacy or truth of the follow- ing propositions: 1. Investigation is the chief lever of progress, but obedience without argument is often essential to advancement. 2. With opportunities for broadmind- edness, one may justly be held responsi- ble for his mistakes of narrowminded- ness. 3. Broadmindedness forbids punish- ment for the sake of punishing. 4. Broadmindedness doesn't expect identical ideas from different points of view. 5. How does broadmindedness contrib- ute to individual freedom? 6. How is the safety of society en- hanced by broadmindedness? 7. How does your religion provide for broadmindedness ? 8. Name the principal ways in which broadmindedness may be built up. 9. Show how broadmindedness elevates the taste and enhances the capacity of the individual to furnish entertainment. 10. How do the statistics, quoted in this lesson, from Babson, affect your appre- ciation, (a) of the United States, (b) of your Church? Lesson XXIV. — Manysidedness of Interest Manysidedness of Interest. — Manysidedness of interest differs from broadmindedness in that the former is a choice, or discriminate application of the latter. The fol- lowing story is illustrative: One side of a lecture hall was filled with Athenian students, well taught in the fine arts, including ethics and aesthetics; the other side was occupied by Spartan youths train- ed in the performance of duty. An old man entered the hall and look- ed about for a seat, every Spartan arose. Not a bench on the Athe- nian's side was made vacant. The aged man with veteran dignity said, "The Athenians know the law, the Spartans obey it." The Growth of Manysidedness of Interest. — Reduced to a mini- mum, man's manysidedness of in- terest is a triangle of food-getting, shelter-finding, and mating. Each new expansion of idea brings with it a new want and the supplying of the new want gives birth to an- other idea and thus goes on the forging of the endless chain of eternal progress. A bend forward, a reach forward, a step forward, and repeat, is the rythmic tread of everlasting advancement. Individual Manysidedness of In- terest.— Every individual who would be a center of progress must have some "excelsior" interest. He must possess some outstanding point of elevative individuality that makes of him an "It" of im- portance. There must be some one side of his existence that makes him somewhere, somehow, or some- time indispensable. He must be- come and must act so that it could not be said of him, "He would not be missed;" of him it must be said, "He cannot well be spared." The value of a major interest is enhanced by the presence of minor ones. Sub-interests, however, should not be permitted to over- shadow or interfere with the major one. A student, whose election of minors interferes with a high grade carrying of his major work prede- termines failure for himself. Conditions may interfere with

536 IMPROVEMENT ERA our election of interests by first choice, but if we choose the best within reach we shall always have the relative best. One must be interested in one- self. No one can be of helpful in- terest to another who has no in- terest in himself. Dear as mother- interest is, a neglect of self in cleanliness, in dress, or in culture, detracts from the attractiveness and directive force of her other qualities. Her potentiality for good is weakened by self-neglect, an unprofitable type of self-sacri- fice. A self-respected, self-pre- served, parent is a rich inheritance for any child, and a self-esteemed (not self -conceited), self -helpful offspring is the greatest wealth to the parent. There is evidently a self-interest that is unselfish. Self interest in itself, must be many-sided; physical fitness, intel- lectual alertness, moral straight- ness, and spiritual righteousness are interests indispensable not only to scout success, but to the worth- while life of us all. Interest in physical fitness de- mands something more than an in- terest in food, drink, exercise and rest. It must include interest in ventilation, cleanliness and cloth- ing. Mental alertness calls for some- thing more than merely keeping awake. Without an active interest in observing, listening, reading and thinking, the individual of this age will be left by the wayside, or run over by the onward moving multitude. To be morally straight demands more than refraining from wrong- doing. It requires a working in- terest, in doing good. It requires that one shall not only be temper- ate but that he must fight intem- perance. He must not only be square in his deals, but he must wage war on fake business and profiteering. Moral straightness calls for more than personal pur- ity; it insists upon a never-ending crusade against the social evil. The manysidednes8 of interest that includes spiritual righteous- ness goes further than the confess- ing of belief and the performing of ordinances. It carries the individ- ual over into the field where faith bears service fruit. It emphasizes the fact that the Church is made up of membership, and that each member as a part of the Church is responsible to the Church, and must constantly choose between be- ing a recognized spiritual slacker and doing his full share, in pro- viding for the poor, caring for the sick, educating the orphan and in sustaining the system of which he is a free-agency part. Spiritual righteousness as a part of one's manysidedness of interest is a working willingness to save before expecting salvation. Community Manysidedness of Interest. — Every community may have some one chief interest, some one feature of community life of which it may profitably make a specialty. It may become famed for something. California capital- izes its climate and becomes a world-wide resort for health-hunt- ers. She may have many minor interests, but climate is her bugle call morning, noon and night. Peach production puts Brigham

SOURCES OF JOY AND FACTORS OF HAPPINESS 537 City on the map of high distinc- tion. One of the cities of our state is wisely struggling to keep on the lead as a manufacturing town. Nestled at the foot of the Wasatch mountains is a small city famed as the home of artists, and pos- sessed of one of the finest art gal- leries in our state — two Utah cit- ies of the same size, each am- bitious to stand first in education. The probabilities are that they will both come into national prom- inence as seats of learning. Utah has a city destined to lead the world in one particular. Its very name points to the line in which it may signalize itself. It may never be more than equal with many others as a city beautiful, but as a city clean, her destiny is to be first. She is to be physically clean, socially clean, civically clean. Community manysidedness does not permit of a forgetfulness, of sub-interests essential to a high destiny of the excelsior interest. There is a town locally high famed for its cheese and ill famed for the disease breeding cow yard. For lack of manysidedness of interest one community has the high repu- tation of having the greatest acre yield of a certain crop, and it also has the low reputation of being a winter loafing center. The town hobby horde of that community is so shy of a schoolhouse that the people will vote down a school tax. No community has hope to receive the recognition of up-to- dateness that does not possess a many-sidedness of interest that in- cludes interest in the following six things; religion, citizenship, education, sanitation, employments and recreation. -."Mormonism's" Manysidedness of Interest. — As was shown in our last lesson, Latter-day Saint broad- mindedness circumscribes a knowl- edge of things as they have been, a knowledge of things as they are, and a knowledge of things as they are to become. We are now face to face with the fact that "Mor- monism's" manysidedness of inter- est reaches into the stupendous work of placing beyond the power of their enemies the people of the past, the people of the present, and the people of the future. The Church is active in the help of our ancestors, ourselves, and our pos- terity. It is not only an instru- ment for receiving and dispensing life to the world, it is an institu- tion for the accumulation and the distribution of that which saves people here and now, not only saves them from doubt as to im- mortality and eternal life, but saves them from destitution, dis- ease and enforced idleness. It not only fosters education for the mind, but it promotes irrigation for the earth's productiveness. It not only builds temples, but it aids the new settler in the erection of his frontier home; it not only teaches temperance, and encour- ages prayers for the sick, but it builds and maintains hospitals and gymnasiums. It not only trains its youth to worship at the family al- tar, but it inspires them to honor their flag as a gift from God. Its "excelsior" interest is the produc- ing of a superior leadership of life, and love, and liberty, and the

538 IMPROVEMENT ERA world is seeing it with its manysid- 5. What does interest in mental awake- edness of interest, "as a city set up- ne*s of**1"*6,' i , - r , .-,-. „ J 6. bhow the defectiveness of an inter- on a mil. est m morai straightness where a person is perfectly satisfied with being temper- Questions and Problems ate himself. 7. Why can a person not be religiously 1. Illustrate the difference between righteous and neglect his fastday offer- broad-mindedness and many-sidedness of ings? interest. 8. Name the six indispensable com- 2. Show that there is a self interest munity interests. that is unselfish. 9. In what particular does the many- 3. Explain what is meant by an "ex- sidedness of interest of our Church ex- celsior" interest as used in this lesson. eel? 4. How does this "excelsior" interest 10. Suggest a good way for creating an contribute to individual happiness? "excelsior" community interest. Spring Spring has set the fountains free, Lady mine. Music rings from every tree, Lady mine. Beauty rises on the wing, All the earth is blossoming, In the sunny lap of Spring, Lady mine. Spring is blooming in the bower, Lady mine. And thou art its fairest flower, Lady mine. Spring is blooming in my heart, Where Love's sleeping fountains start, 'Neath the sunlight which thou art, Lady mine. Spring is blooming o'er the world, Lady mine. All its flags of peace unfurled, Lady mine. Over every nation spread, Lifting many a drooping head, Where its light and love are shed, Lady mine. Theodore E. Curtis