Theos-Talk Archives (August 1997 Message tl00085)

>Ethics and compassion play off one another.  One cannot develop without
the
>other. People who try for compassion *alone* end up in an enantiodromia,
>meeting its very opposite: sentimentality.  Ethics are the bones,
compassion
>is the flesh.

You can have ethics without compassion (because they can have
difference motives--and actually MOST folks have an ethical code
without any real compassion).  But I don't think you can have 
compassion without ethical behavior, because caring for others is 
sufficient motivation for acting ethically in most cases.  So, I don't
see how they can "play off one another."  Perhaps you intended
to say that they "should" play off one another, but I don't really
go for that either--ethics should be the effect, and compassion the
cause.

Sentimentality is exactly what I meant by "sickly sweet ethics."
In the Crowleyian sense, its love without will.  Love without being
directed by will tends to mire down in sentiment and mushy 
goody-goodyness that sounds nice but goes nowhere. But will
without love has its own set of problems, which I find in all too
many occult and magical organizations.  The two should go
together.

The way I see it, compassion is the bones and ethics the flesh,
because ethical behavior should only be supported by an honest
concern for others--so long as it is supported by personal desire
to go to heaven or to get better karma or a better life next time,
or suchlike, it is wasted effort.

Jerry S.
Member, TI