THE

MILLENNIAL HARBINGER,

NEW SERIES

VOLUME III.--NUMBER III.

B E T H A N Y, VA. MARCH, 1839.

      * * * * THE goodness of God, or, in other words, his disposition to communicate happiness to others, prompted him not only to create beings with the capacity to receive happiness, but also to furnish the means through which that happiness was to be given. What innumerable classes, orders, and species of beings has not the Divine goodness thus originated, each capable of enjoying its own measure of bliss! The minute insect which dances in the sunbeam, may be as perfectly happy as the sagacious elephant in the freedom of his native forests. The capacity of the latter may be greater; but the enjoyment of the former, being equal to its capacity, is no less. No want is felt by either, nor can either form the wish or conceive the existence of higher felicity.

      In proportion as the natures of beings are exalted, their capacity for enjoyment is increased, and the character of their enjoyments varied and elevated. Hence man is admitted to a moral and intellectual happiness more exquisite than that of sense, which he enjoys in common with inferior tribes. So varied and so vast, indeed, is man's capacity for happiness, that it seems almost infinite. The higher he ascends the more the prospect widens, and the more distant becomes the horizon which at first seemed to limit his desires. Earth and [106] heaven, a visible an invisible universe, a natural and a spiritual world lay open before him their treasured joys; and should we suppose even all their resources exhausted, being created in the image of God, he can, like his Divine Father, find an unfailing fountain of happiness in giving happiness to others.

R. R.      

[The Millennial Harbinger, March 1839, pp. 106-107.]

      Robert Richardson's "Happiness--A Fragment" was first published in The Millennial Harbinger, New Series, Vol. III, No. III, March 1839, pp. 106-107. The electronic version of the essay has been transcribed from the College Press (1980) reprint of The Millennial Harbinger, ed. Alexander Campbell (Bethany, VA: A. Campbell, 1839).

      Pagination has been represented by placing the page number in brackets following the last complete word on the printed page.

      Addenda and corrigenda are earnestly solicited.

Ernie Stefanik
373 Wilson Street
Derry, PA 15627-9770
412.694.8602
stefanik@westol.com

Created 27 September 1997.