The Influence of Sentiment.—Our sentiments, like our dispositions, are not
only a natural growth from the experiences upon which they are fed, but they in
turn have large influence in determining the direction of our further
development. Our sentiments furnish the soil which is either favorable or hostile
to the growth of new experiences. One in whom the sentiment of true patriotism
is deep-rooted will find it much harder to respond to a suggestion to betray his
country's honor on battlefield, in legislative hall, or in private life, than one
lacking in this sentiment. The boy who has a strong sentiment of love for his
mother will find this a restraining influence in the face of temptation to commit
deeds which would wound her feelings. A deep and abiding faith in God is fatal
to the growth of pessimism, distrust, and a self-centered life. One's sentiments
are a safe gauge of his character. Let us know a man's attitude or sentiments on
religion, morality, friendship, honesty, and the other great questions of life, and
little remains to be known. If he is right on these, he may well be trusted in other
things; if he is wrong on these, there is little to build upon.
Literature has drawn its best inspiration and choicest themes from the field of
our sentiments. The sentiment of friendship has given us our David and
Jonathan, our Damon and Pythias, and our Tennyson and Hallam. The sentiment
of love has inspired countless masterpieces; without its aid most of our fiction
would lose its plot, and most of our poetry its charm. Religious sentiment
inspired Milton to write the world's greatest epic, "Paradise Lost." The sentiment
of patriotism has furnished an inexhaustible theme for the writer and the orator.
Likewise if we go into the field of music and art, we find that the best efforts of
the masters are clustered around some human sentiment which has appealed to
them, and which they have immortalized by expressing it on canvas or in
marble, that it may appeal to others and cause the sentiment to grow in us.
Sentiments as Motives.—The sentiments furnish the deepest, the most constant,
and the most powerful motives which control our lives. Such sentiments as
patriotism, liberty, and religion have called a thousand armies to struggle and die
on ten thousand battlefields, and have given martyrs courage to suffer in the fires
of persecution. Sentiments of friendship and love have prompted countless deeds
of self-sacrifice and loving devotion. Sentiments of envy, pride, and jealousy
have changed the boundary lines of nations, and have prompted the committing
of ten thousand unnamable crimes. Slowly day by day from the cradle to the
grave we are weaving into our lives the threads of sentiment, which at last
become so many cables to bind us to good or evil.