THE MEANING OF LIFE

It is a truism to say that we all live two lives;

but it may not be useless to examine what they

are, and to see something of their relation to

each other.  There is the life which appears

outside, which is seen and judged by others,

and which occupies the chief, active part of

our being; but there is also the other life, quite

distinct from this, which seems to be for ever

sitting back within ourselves and never appear-

ing, judging every thought, and word, and

action of the other, and mercilessly and infal-

libly telling us whether it is really good or bad,

right or wrong, commendable or the reverse,

whatever others may say, or whatever we our-

selves may try to think.  We may affect to

ignore it, but though it accepts the rebuff, it

will not easily be ignored.  We may call it all

manner of names, but its very silence compels

us to recognize our abuse to be no more than

calumny.  We may turn our whole attention

to the outside, active life, to that which occu-

pies our time, which brings us in contact with

others, and which, we tell ourselves, is all that

matters; still the silent gnawing at our hearts,

speechless but eloquent, beaten down but ever

persevering, lets us know beyond possibility of

doubt that we are playing false, that we are

not so convinced as we pretend, not so happy

with ourselves as our words would signify, that

we are turning to what we like, not to what

we know to be the best, that we cannot deceive

our real selves, though for a time we may de-

ceive others, and even that outer self which

we try to think is all that we are.  Really, at

heart we are not deceived, and we know it;

for to deceive ourselves into thinking that we

are deceived is no deception.

Let us look at this fact a little more close at

hand.  Scarcely anything comes across my

path, scarcely anything is seen with my eyes,

or in any other way is borne in upon my mind,

but I am conscious that at once, and almost

at the same instant, I look on it from two points

of view   I see it, perhaps, to be a thing beauti-

ful in itself, or sweet and attractive to me, or

something that will serve my purpose; or on

the other hand, it appears to me as something

ugly, repulsive, injurious.  But almost at the

same moment, behind this first and clear appre-

hension, there is another onlooker within me,

less impetuous but more discriminating, who

begins to ask: "Is that thing wholly beautiful,

or does it only appear so to me?  Is it really

attractive, or does it only suit my palate here

and now?  Is it truly of use,  or does it only

serve my purpose for the moment?  Or, again,

Is it absolutely ugly, repulsive, injurious, or is

this appearance only due to something dis-

cordant in myself?  Is it more than an external

coating, covering a wealth of real beauty, and

loveliness, and blessing?"

Nor is it only at the first appearance of an

object that this double self speaks.  At every

step we take an echo of the footfall is heard

within.  We tell ourselves that a thing is good

or bad; at once the voice's question is whether

our judgment is sincere, whether it is not made

to serve our purpose, declared good because

we wish it so. We choose between one thing

and another;  the voice, heard only by our-

selves, asks whether our choice is just, and is

not rather the concrete expression of a desire

long since entertained.  We decide on a certain

course of action; sometimes the voice dins in

our ears that we are wrong and we know it,

sometimes it merely reminds us that we have

decided too quickly in a matter too momentous;

sometimes, when we have made up our minds

to have our way, there is heard no more than a

distant wailing that haunts us like the lamenta-

tion of a ghost.

It is in vain for us to try to silence this inner

voice.  It is beyond our reach; we cannot gag

it, we cannot shut it out for any length of time.

We may argue with it and with ourselves, we

may prove to verbal conviction that to listen

to it is mawkish, scrupulous, paralyzing to all

effort, undermining every action; in our hearts

we know very well that the voice is right when

it merely answers, without consenting to argue,

that it is not true.  We may affect not to hear

it, we may effect to pity those who do, or to

be interested in the psychological phenomenon

they represent; we know that our affectation

is that and no more, that our pity has been

learnt at home, in practice upon ourselves,

before it has shown itself abroad.  We may

proclaim against the tyranny, we may call it

superstition, we may stigmatize it as the fruit

of generations of priestcraft, we may call it

every ugly name we like, and treat it with

every kind of contempt or condescension; all

the time it tells us, and we know it to be true,

that in saying all this we are disloyal to our-

selves and to mankind, that it is the safeguard

of the noblest that is in us, that it is our one

guarantee—to ourselves if not to others—that

we are men, and living in a manner worthy of

our manhood, that to stifle this voice, to use

violence against it and throttle it, to be heart-

less and silently to defy it, is to inflict upon

ourselves the murder of the best being that is

in us.

No matter how we try, no matter how well

we may play our part, we shall never succeed

in deceiving ourselves altogether; if we did,

we should have killed our very human nature.

For a time, it is true, it is possible to forget

and to ignore without adverting.  We may

for a season fill our lives with noise, with a

whirl of tumult and excitement, with a tem-

porary fascination, but after noise must come

silence, excitement must rest to recuperate,

every fascination has its awakening; then we

return to ourselves, and deception is impossible,

except, as we have said, that we may deceive

ourselves into thinking that we are deceived.

We appeal to our former convictions, we say

we have these same convictions still; but with

all our convictions we remain unconvinced.

The voice that is unceasing within us is more

true to us than we are to ourselves.  It bides

its time;  it renews  its wailing;  it  persists

though we bid it to stop, though we close up

our ears, though we abuse it, though we pervert

its words, though before others, by word and

action, we give it the lie; it persists, and in

spite of all, if we will allow it, it will save us.

Not only that, but will make of us the perfect

creature that God and nature have both

destined us to be.

And this, in our sober moments, when at

last we acknowledge ourselves beaten, or when

we are at peace and untroubled by any par-

ticular fascination, we see without any doubt.

We may have revelled in the whirl of what we

call life, whether it be the whirl of its joys or

of its business, or of its interests, but in our

hearts, when we are either free or compelled to

judge, we know that there is a reality greater

than all these.  We know that the man whose

life is wholly filled with these things, misses the

chief part of his manhood; he lives their life,

he does not live his own.  He may claim to be

free, and to be living according to his own

choice; but his freedom is subjected to them,

and his choice is made at their dictation.  The

real man within him is dwarfed in his growth,

and it is the knowledge of this, conscious and

emphasized with time, however resented and

denied, that gradually banishes the laughter

from his face, and fills his latter days with a

void, a certain sense of self-contempt, with

bitterness and failure.   He fills the void with

indulgence, but the indulgence rings of despair.

To anticipate and prevent this collapse, to

guard against this self-deception and its conse-

quences, is the aim and meaning of the spiritual

life.    The spiritual life aims at the making

of the man, not on the surface only, but

working outward from withm.  It would

have a man first and foremost live according

to the voice which in his heart he knows to be

most true.   It would have him learn to recog-

nize the voice and listen to its teaching.  It

would have him weigh his judgments by what

that voice suggests, and choose as that voice

dictates, not as his meaner self demands.   It

would have him be free, and would make him

free, not with that counterfeit freedom which

must obey the dictate of indulgence, but with

the freedom which can say "Yes"  or  "No"

at will.  It would have him be a man, not of

mere flesh and blood, which are entirely slavish

and dependent, but of spirit and soul, which

are masters of themselves and all the world.

(THE MEANING OF LIFE; Rev. A. Goodier, S.J.; 1919)