On doing good....................

 

According to the common notions, and common practice of mankind, "doing good" implies, whatever removes pain or imparts pleasure. But this is evidently a mistaken view of the subject; for pain is frequently a great blessing, and pleasure is frequently a serious evil. The amputation of a limb, though attended with severe agony, may be the means of saving the patient's life; and that which yields the sweetest gratification to the palate, may speedily terminate in disease and death. The discipline which is administered to a child may issue in his future and permanent advantage; while the indulgence of his wishes may subject him to a perpetuity of suffering.

-Andrew Thompson, from his Preface to Cotton Mather's Essays To Do Good

Goodness.......................

Human goodness is widely distributed, and I have no respect for religious people who cannot see this. . . . Religion, as I explain it there, is a principled opposition to the will to power.  Faith is about the forms of gracious coexistence that abjure the use of power. 

-Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, The Great Partnership: Science, Religion, and the Search for Meaning

the close at hand..................

 It means that a good person tries to look at everyone with a patient and discerning regard, tries to resist self-centeredness and overcome prejudice, in order to see another person more deeply and with greater discernment.  The good person tries to cast a selfless attention and to see what the other person sees.  This kind of attention leads to the greatness of small acts: welcoming a newcomer to your workplace, detecting anxiety in somebody's voice and asking what's wrong, knowing how to host a part so that everyone feels included.  Most of the time, morality is about the skill of being considerate of others in the complex situations of life.  It's about being a genius at the close at hand.

-David Brooks, How To Know a Person:  The Art of Seeing Others Deeply and Being Deeply Seen

Historically, a tough assignment...............

 Thousands of years of recorded history present a persistent story of poverty and tyranny, with an occasional experiment in personal freedom and opportunity being fulfillingly productive. If we are to foster the good society and its responsive, efficient economy, intellectual competence must be married to high character. Otherwise, we will defeat ourselves by generating increasingly efficient gulags.

-as cut-and-pasted from here