| Things to Live For |
Chapter 3 |
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But there are also unwholesome people, whose influence is not toward the things that are beautiful and good. Their unwholesomeness may be physical, or it may be in their mental or spiritual condition. A common form is what in general we call morbid ness. Whatever its cause, it is the result of over sensitiveness. Morbid people are easily disturbed in their feelings. They yield readily to depression of spirits. The smallest cause makes them gloomy. Their imagination plays a mischievous part in creating unhappiness for them. They imagine slights when none were intended or even dreamed of. They are apt to be very exacting toward their friends, continually demanding renewed assertions of faithfulness and constancy, and often expressing fears and doubts, and raising questions. Thus they make friendship hard even for those who love them best.
These morbid people see all life and all the world through tinted glasses, tinted with the unhealthy hue of their own mental condition. They see their neighbor’s faults, but not the excellences of his character. They have an eye for the blemishes and the unlovely peculiarities of others, and for the disagreeable things of life. They fret and chafe at the smallest discomforts in their lit, and fail to get happiness and pleasure from their many and great blessings. They are unhappy even in the most favorable circumstances, and discontented even in the kindliest conditions. The trouble is not in outside things, but in themselves. They are like a fever patient who tosses restlessly on his bed and complains of the heat of the room, while all the while the fever is in himself, not in his room. It is the unwholesomeness of men’s own spirit that makes the world and all life about them so full of discomfort for them.
There are many forms and phases of unwholesomeness in life. Some people are unwholesome in their religion. They find no happiness in it. It does not make them joy givers. They are somber, gloomy Christians. They are wanting in the grace of cheerfulness and in heartiness. They are severe in their judgment of others, sometimes uncharitable and censorious. Their own religion is a burden to the, and they would make religion a burden to all who profess it. It vexes them to see a rejoicing Christian; for they suppose that joyousness is a sign of triviality of heart, and of the want of a due consciousness of life’s gravity and seriousness. They think of religion as always severe, stern, solemn, sad.
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