by Bishop J.C. Ryle
Reader,
You see the question which forms the title of this paper. Now listen to a simple story.
An infidel was once addressing a crowd of people in the open air. He was trying to persuade them that there was no God, and no devil, no heaven, and no hell, resurrection, no judgment, and no life to come. He advised them to throw away their Bibles, and not to mind what parsons said. He recommended them to think as he did, and to be like him. He talked boldly. The crowd listened eagerly. It was the blind leading the blind. Both were falling into the ditch.
In the middle of his address a poor old woman suddenly pushed her way through the crowd, to the place where he was standing. She stood before him. She looked him full in the face. “Sir,” she said, in a loud voice, “Are you happy?” The infidel looked scornfully at her, and gave her no answer. “Sir,” she said again, “I ask you to answer my question. Are you happy? You want us to throw away our Bibles. You tell us not to believe what parsons say about religion. You advise us to think as you do, and be like you. Now before we take your advice, we have a right to know what good we shall get by it. Do your fine new notions give you much comfort? Do you yourself really feel happy?”
The infidel stopped, and attempted to answer the old woman’s question. He stammered, and shuffled, and fidgeted, and endeavoured to explain his meaning. He tried hard to turn the subject. He said, he “had not come there to preach about happiness.” But it was of no use. The old woman stuck to her point. She insisted on her question being answered, and the crowd took her part. She pressed him hard with her inquiry, and would take no excuse. And at last the infidel was obliged to leave the ground, and sneak off in confusion. He could not reply to the question. His conscience would not let him: he dared not say that he was happy.
Reader, the old woman showed great wisdom in asking the question that she did. The argument she used may seem very simple, but in reality it is one of the most powerful that can be employed. It is a weapon that has more effect on some minds than the most elaborate reasoning of Butler, or Paley, or Chalmers. Whenever a man begins to take up new views of religion, and pretends to despise old Bible Christianity, thrust home at his conscience the old woman’s question. Ask him whether his new views make him feel comfortable within. Ask him whether he can say, with honesty and sincerity, that he is happy. The grand test of a man’s faith and religion is, “Does it make him happy?”
Let me now affectionately invite every reader to consider the subject of this paper. Let me warn you to remember that the salvation of your soul, and nothing less, is closely bound up with the subject. The heart cannot be right in the sight of God which knows nothing of happiness. That man or woman cannot be in a safe state of soul who feels nothing of peace within.
There are three things which I purpose to do, in order to clear up the subject of this paper. I ask your special attention to each one of them. And I pray the Spirit of God to apply all to your soul.
I. Let me point out some things which are absolutely essential to all happiness.
II. Let me expose some common mistakes about the way to be happy.
III. Let me show you the real way to be truly happy.
I. First of all I have to point out some things which are absolutely essential to all true happiness.
Happiness is what all mankind want to obtain: the desire of it is deeply planted in the human heart. All men naturally dislike pain, sorrow, and discomfort. All men naturally like ease, comfort, and gladness. All men naturally hunger and thirst after happiness. Just as the sick man longs for health, and the prisoner of war for liberty, — just as the parched traveller in hot countries longs to see the cooling fountain, or the ice-bound polar voyager the sun rising above the horizon,—just in the same way does poor mortal man long to be happy. But, alas, how few consider what they really mean when they talk of happiness! How vague and indistinct and undefined the ideas of most men are upon the subject! They think some are happy, who in reality are miserable: they think some are gloomy and sad, who in reality are truly happy. They dream of a happiness which in reality would never satisfy their nature’s wants. Let me try this day to throw a little light on the subject.
True happiness is not perfect freedom from sorrow and discomfort. Let that never be forgotten. If it were so, there would be no such thing as happiness in the world. Such happiness is for angels who have never fallen, and not for man. The happiness I am inquiring about is such as a poor, dying, sinful creature may hope to attain. Our whole nature is defiled by sin. Evil abounds in the world. Sickness, and death, and change are daily doing their sad work on every side. In such a state of things, the highest happiness man can attain to on earth must necessarily be a mixed thing. If we expect to find any literally perfect happiness on this side of the grave, we expect what we shall not find.
True happiness does not consist in laughter and smiles. The face is very often a poor index of the inward man. There are thousands who laugh loud and are merry as a grasshopper in company, but are wretched and miserable in private, and almost afraid to be alone. There are hundreds who are grave and serious in their demeanour, whose hearts are full of solid peace. A poet of our own has truly told us, that smiles are worth but little:—
“A man may smile and smile and be a villain.”
And the eternal Word of God teaches us, that “even in laughter the heart is sorrowful.” (Prov. xiv. 13.) Tell me not merely of smiling and laughing faces: I want to hear of something more than that, when I ask whether a man is happy. A truly happy man no doubt will often show his happiness in his countenance; but a man may have a very merry face, and yet not be happy at all.
Of all deceptive things on earth nothing is so deceptive as mere gaiety and merriment. It is a hollow empty show, utterly devoid of substance and reality. Listen to the brilliant talker in society, and mark the applause which he receives from an admiring company: follow him to his own private room, and you will very likely find him plunged in melancholy despondency. Colonel Gardener confessed that even when he was thought most happy he often wished he was a dog. — Look at the smiling beauty in the ball-room, and you might suppose she knew not what it was to be unhappy: see her next day at her own home, and you may probably find her out of temper with herself and everybody else besides. — Oh, no: worldly merriment is not real happiness! There is a certain pleasure about it, I do not deny. There is an animal excitement about it, I make no question. There is a temporary elevation of spirits about it, I freely concede. But call it not by the sacred name of happiness. The most beautiful cut flowers stuck into the ground do not make a garden. When glass is called diamond, and tinsel is called gold, then, and not till then, your people who can laugh and smile will deserve to be called happy men.*
*Cervantes, author of Don Quixote, at a time when all Spain was laughing at his humorous work, was overwhelmed with a deep cloud of melancholy.
Molière, the first of French comic writers, carried into his domestic circle a sadness which the greatest worldly prosperity could never dispel.
Samuel Foote, the noted wit of the last century, died of a broken heart.
Theodore Hooke, the facetious novel writer, who could set everybody laughing, says of himself in his diary, “I am suffering under a constant depression of spirits, which no one who sees me in society dreams of.”
A woebegone stranger consulted a physician about his health. The physician advised him to keep up his spirits by going to hear the great comic actor of the day. “You should go and hear Matthews. He would make you well.” “Alas sir,” was the reply, “I am Matthews himself!” — (Pictorial Pages).
To be truly happy the highest wants of a man’s nature must be met and satisfied. The requirements of his curiously wrought constitution must all be filled up. There must be nothing about him that cries, “Give, give,” but cries in vain and gets no answer. The horse and the ox are happy as long as they are warmed and filled. And why? It is because they are satisfied. The little infant looks happy when it is clothed, and fed, and well, and in its mothers’s arms. And why? Because it is satisfied. And just so it is with man. His highest wants must be met and satisfied, before he can be truly happy. All must be filled up. There must be no void, no empty places, no unsupplied cravings. Till then he is never truly happy.
And what are man’s principal wants? Has he a body only? No: he has something more! He has a soul. — Has he sensual faculties only? Can he do nothing but hear, and see, and smell, and taste, and feel? No: he has a thinking mind and a conscience! Has he no consciousness of any world but that in which he lives and moves? He has. There is a still small voice within him which often makes itself heard: “This life is not all! There is a world unseen: there is a life beyond the grave.” Yes: it is true. We are fearfully and wonderfully made. All men know it: all men feel it, if they would only speak the truth. It is utter nonsense to pretend that food and raiment, and earthly good things alone can make men happy. There are soul-wants. There are conscience-wants. There can be no true happiness, until these wants are satisfied.
To be truly happy a man must have sources of gladness which are not dependent on anything in this world. There is nothing upon earth which is not stamped with the mark of instability and uncertainty. All the good things that money can buy are but for a moment: they either leave us or we are obliged to leave them. All the sweetest relationships in life are liable to come to an end: death may come any day and cut them off. The man whose happiness depends entirely on things here below, is like him who builds his house on sand, or leans his weight on a reed.
Tell me not of your happiness, if it daily hangs on the uncertainties of earth. Your home may be rich in comforts; your wife and children may be all you could desire; your means may be amply sufficient to meet all your wants: but oh, remember, if you have nothing more than this to look to, that you stand on the brink of a precipice! Your rivers of pleasure may any day be dried up. Your joy may be deep and earnest, but it is fearfully short-lived. It has no root. It is not true happiness.
To be really happy a man must be able to look on every side without uncomfortable feelings. He must be able to look back to the past without guilty fears; he must be able to look around him without discontent; he must be able to look forward without anxious dread. He must be able to sit down and think calmly about things past, present, and to come, and feel prepared. The man who has a weak side in his condition, — a side that he does not like looking at or considering, — that man is not really happy. Talk not to me of your happiness, if you are unable to look steadily either before or behind you. Your present position may be easy and pleasant. You may find many sources of joy and gladness in your profession, your dwelling-place, your family, and your friends. Your health may be good, your spirits may be cheerful; but stop and think quietly over your past life. Can you reflect calmly on all the omissions and commissions of by-gone years? How will they bear God’s inspection? How will you answer for them at the last day? And then look forward, and think on the years yet to come. Think of the certain end towards which you are hastening; think of death; think of judgment; think of the hour when you will meet God face to face. Are you ready for it? Are you prepared? Can you look forward to these things without alarm? Oh, be very sure if you cannot look comfortably at any season but the present, your boasted happiness is a poor unreal thing! It is but a whitened sepulchre. — fair and beautiful without, but bones and corruption within: it is a mere thing of a day, like Jonah’s gourd: it is not real happiness.
Reader, I ask you to fix in your mind the account of things essential to happiness, which I have attempted to give. Dismiss from your thoughts the many mistaken notions which pass current on this subject, like counterfeit coin. To be truly happy, the wants of your soul and conscience must be satisfied: to be truly happy, your joy must be founded on something more than this world can give you: to be truly happy, you must be able to look on every side, — above, below, behind, before, — and feel that all is right. This is real, sterling, genuine happiness: this is the happiness I have in view when I urge on your notice the question of this paper.
Pause, and consider well whether you know what the first principles of true happiness are. Until you know them, you are not capable of examining the solemn question, “ARE YOU HAPPY?”