The Law of Life

The Law of Life By A. C. Lambert, B. Y. U. And the young man came to the teacher asking, "What is the use of being good?" And the teacher replied, "Have you not read that 'Righteousness exalteth a nation?' And that 'The Lord, our God, is a jealous God, and visiteth his anger upon them that do evil?' And the young man said, "Yes, it is so written. But this nation lived very long ago and the ways of their God are strange to me. I do not ques- tion God, but neither do I understand some of the sayings. I think I know more of life than of God. So let us talk of life. Why should I be good when the way of goodness seems to render life so artificial and so barren? Here am I in the full vigor of youth. On every hand are avenues of delight but many of them labeled with your conventional 'Thou shalt not.' Why should I forego the power and ad- vantage which wealth brings when by skillful management and adequate at- tention to my own interests I may gain wealth and use it as I please? Honesty as a policy? Perhaps, but why should I not get mine whenever the getting is good? It is the law of survival that he who can shall take, and he who has shall keep. Altruism, justice, and charity are but high-sounding words and of little practical application. To love my competitor as myself is a gos- pel of foolishness. Working for others is a doctrine of waste. "Or, why may I not take the pleas- ures of life where I find them? Na- ture has made me full of desires, and the world has the means of their satis- faction. To deny these pleasures is to deny the nature of my own being. Surely the nature of life ought to be an adequate measure of the ways of life, and to fail to live as life demands is to deny life. To 'be good' denies me life." And the teacher answered, "I wish that you could possess early the treas- ure that is beyond the price of wealth — the power to know yourself. But neither wealth nor wishing can give it. And without it you can not see com- pletely the answer to your question. But let >us attempt an answer, and in terms of life itself. You speak well to say that the nature of life ought to be an adequate measure of the goods of life. But you fail to bring forward the complete nature of life. Let us see. "You do not grasp the heated iron because you have learned that it scars your flesh. Neither do you jump from a high precipice, even though the flight promises to be exhilarating, because you know that destruction lies at the bottom. Your intelligence examines the conditions of life and teaches you the way of survival. The conditions of life itself furnish the measure of life's conduct. That is a good principle. It is the key to 'being good.' For goodness, or morality, or the way of right living, is the voice of experience and intelligence in the ways of life. Let me state it so you can think with me. Here I am in the midst of life. I have experiences. I think about them. I discover that some experiences have more value for me than others. Some acts bring greater satisfactions, some less; some acts become good and some become bad. In this manner I learn a fundamental truth of life — that morality, or "being good," is not of necessity something externally imposed upon me by someone who wants to take all the fun out of life, but it is a condition inherent in the very nature of life itself; it grows out of life and is that which gives life meaning and

April. 19 29 THE LAW OF LIFE 491 significance. I can not escape morality since I can not escape the eternal neces- sity of searching for the better thing. If I choose a lesser good when a greater is possible, I deny the very nature of my being, and I lose life. The dis- covery of such loss brings me suffering and unhappiness. If I choose the greater good, I find added life and en- during happiness. Life itself forces me to the good, for goodness is |the way with which intelligence and expe- rience oppose the ways of ignorance and impulse. The most basic reason for 'being good' is that we can not escape it." And the young man asked, "But why should one be good in any par- ticular way br fashion? Why be good in the approved ways? Perhaps we can find ways that are better than the old ways." And the teacher said, "This is a more difficult step perhaps because you can not live life in advance, neither can you live the life of other people except indirectly. You are forced to accept the testimony of those members of the race who have traveled the road of life and who have seen more fully what are the complete conditions of life which give an adequate measure of living. It is true that we must always leave the way open for the better ways. Not all good has been discovered and crystallized into codes, but it seems to be equally true that human nature ex- hibits certain constants, certain funda- mental threads of life that may be traced through all times, and it is upon these abiding verities that we must weave the pattern of our lives. Cer- tain facts persist. Of some things you may be sure. You will go on living and thinking and choosing and remem- bering. Your acts will continue to give greater or lesser satisfaction; results of acts will be what they will be and not any amount of hoping will change the results. You will continue to live in a world where other people live and think and act and seek fulfillment of desires. You may think that you can live for yourself and by yourself and make your own life. But in reality all that you can say is that you live with yourself but always among other selves. And from yourself you can never escape. And from what others do and what they think about what you do and from the things which they do as a result of what you do there can be no escape. The tomorrows do come and the memories of the yes- terdays do remain. And the measure of the tomorrows and the measure of the memories is that which you do in a world with other people. "Now the voice of righteousness or of any given code of morals is the ac- cumulated wisdom of people who have lived life through under a given set of conditions, who have lived through the todays and the tomorrows which have always followed. They have seen life functioning in the complex inter-re- lationships necessary to group life, and over long periods of time. The 'Shahs' and the 'Shalt Not's' which come down to youth is the voice of the race passing on its experiences and its wis- dom. 'He is wise who seeks not to mould his life according to his long- ings, but who accepts the rules of the game and follows the paths blazed by the seers and doers before him. Only those individuals and those nations have achieved success that have been willing to learn and follow the ideals which life itself imposes, the eternal laws which religious men call the will of God.' "Honesty and truthfulness are the warp and woof of confidence, and without confidence social life would be impossible. And without the group life your life as an individual would be infinitely barren. To be consistently selfish you must render active allegiance to ',the basic virtues. Without the virtues of charity and justice and serv- ice we all live less abundantly. "Unregulated pleasures of the flesh do not deliver continuing happiness. It is the voice of race experience verified times without number that the limits

492 IMPROVEMENT ERA April. 1929 of enjoyment on the level of the animal nature of men are soon reached and satiety replaces pleasure. That which once seemed so full of possibilities for life soon loses its power to deliver happy life and becomes as gall and wormwood. The fire unregulated soon burns itself out and only dead ashes remain from which the living flame may not be rekindled. And follow- ing unregulated pleasures memory creeps in to mock and to curse. "Experience is the greatest of all teachers. Life is the fundamental rev- elation of life. Young man, capitalize upon the experiences of those who have preceded you along the way of life and who have learned most truly that the conditions of life itself set the measure of full and happy living. They have learned that he who would find life's finest gifts must often deny himself its gaudiest. Life as it is lived sets the measure of conduct, but it must be life as it is lived in its en- tirety." The teacher ceased, and the young man asked, "Then the good of being good is that it is the way of life, the way of life in its fulness?" And the teacher said, "Yes. Right- eousness is the Law of Life." And the young man went his way, thinking. It Does Not Pay! "Remember the Sabbath Day to keep it Holy." It does not pay To break the Sabbath Day! The apparent gain is loss. You've missed the precious gold And seized the dross. It does not pay To break the Sabbath Day ! The work you feel In duty bound to do Can all be done within the time God has appointed you. Six days for labour — Seventh — for God and worldly rest. Do this — obey the "Fourth Command"- Trust — and be blest. Lcthbridge, Canada David Horton Elton Be the parcel, not the wrapper; be a woman, not a flapper. Stand up to your fate, for you can, Just lift up your eyes, to the blue of the skies, Be ready to marry a man! Susa Young Gates