“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.—That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed…”
— Thomas Jefferson, Declaration of Independence, 1776
“Association is destined to reorganize society on the basis of harmony, for the happiness and elevation of the whole.”
— Albert Brisbane, 1843
Metaphysical meaning of joy (rw)joy--The happiness of God expressed through His perfect idea--man. Joy and gladness are strength-giving, especially if the mind is fixed on the things of Spirit. Affirm: "The joy of the Lord is my strength."
Happiness has long been one of the most contested ideas in modern thought. It appeared simple, almost self-evident, and yet every major intellectual tradition fractured it in a different direction. In the early nineteenth century, reform thinkers like Albert Brisbane argued that the principle of Association would reorganize society toward the “happiness and elevation of the whole,” suggesting that well-being was not merely individual but structural, something produced through properly arranged social relations. In contrast, later critical thinkers such as Slavoj Žižek complicated the very desire for happiness itself, suggesting that what human beings often wanted was not happiness in a direct sense, but participation in something meaningful, even if it involved struggle, contradiction, or dissatisfaction.
Between these poles, older philosophical and spiritual traditions offered another layer. Epicurus treated pleasure not as indulgence but as a sign of balance, an indicator that life was aligned with nature rather than excess or distortion. Swedenborg, in a different key, suggested that disorder and self-deception were not simply obstacles to happiness but already their own form of suffering, where separation from divine order produced its own kind of inner consequence. In the political language of modernity, this tension was already embedded: Locke’s triad of life, liberty, and property became Jefferson’s “pursuit of happiness,” subtly shifting from something secured through right order to something endlessly chased, and therefore perpetually deferred.
Modern psychology complicated this further. Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs suggested that well-being was not a luxury or a bourgeois fantasy, but a layered human necessity that unfolded from survival to belonging to self-actualization. In that sense, happiness was not something reserved for the privileged, but something that emerged when basic needs, social connection, and purpose were held together in balance. It was less a static emotional state than a form of integration. This was why it could be said that happiness was not an escape from struggle, but a condition in which struggle became meaningful rather than disintegrating. It was something to do, someone to love, something to strive for, and something to be loyal to.
It was precisely this tension that early Harmonial and Fourierist Spiritualist writers attempted to resolve. In the pages of The Univercoelum and Spiritual Philosopher, an early Spiritualist periodical emerging in the late 1840s within the broader reform ferment of New York and the Northeast, questions of mind, society, and cosmic law were often treated as parts of a single unfolding system rather than separate domains. The journal stood at the intersection of Fourierist associationism, Transcendentalist reform currents, and the emerging Spiritualist movement associated with figures like Andrew Jackson Davis, and it helped articulate what came to be called Harmonial Philosophy—the idea that the universe was governed by laws of correspondence, attraction, and moral-spiritual equilibrium.
Within this intellectual atmosphere, authors writing in its pages often treated happiness not as a subjective feeling but as the natural outcome of alignment with universal law, particularly through the principle of “passional attraction,” which suggested that human desires were not inherently corrupt but structurally meaningful when properly organized within society. One such essay on happiness was signed only “J. B. W.” Despite its clarity of vision and philosophical coherence, the identity behind those initials remains uncertain. It does not appear in surviving Spiritualist or Fourierist directories, and no definitive biographical record has been found to connect the signature to a known figure in the movement. The author therefore remains a minor, almost spectral presence in the archive—visible through ideas but not through a recoverable life.
In this framework, happiness was neither a private pursuit nor a bourgeois privilege, but the lived expression of a correctly ordered world—where inner life, social form, and natural law moved in the same direction.
HAPPINESS.
But one object should engross the attention of the philanthropist—the production of universal human happiness. To rescue mankind from the depths of vice and degradation; to guide into their proper channels the misdirected faculties of the mind; to disseminate those pure and holy principles which elevate and refine the spiritual nature of man: this should become the delightful task of every lover of his species. To the accomplishment of this end, every lofty and generous spirit, longing for the emancipation of his fellow beings from the thraldom of ignorance and superstition, should direct all his energies with an unwavering zeal and untiring patience.
The first step to be taken for the improvement of the social world is to secure a clear and correct understanding of the cause and nature of those evils which render it a scene of desolation. In order to eradicate a disease, it is indispensable that the physician understand its cause and nature. A correct comprehension of the evils prevailing in the social world will suggest their proper remedies.
What then, let us inquire, are the laws which govern the human mind in respect to happiness? I answer, they may be resolved into one universal immutable law—the principle of Association. For a readier conception of this position, we will briefly consider the operations of this law as manifested throughout the whole fabric of Nature.
Chemistry teaches that there is a certain relationship existing between different substances, which under proper circumstances causes them to meet and unite; such substances are said to have an affinity or affection for each other. Thus oxygen and silicon, when left free, will harmoniously combine and form that substance which enters largely into the composition of the earth’s crust. Substances whose inherent dispositions and interior natures are similar, when brought in contact, will harmoniously associate, and, as it were, combine in a quiet and friendly manner.
Thus throughout the realms of infinitude there is no particle so refined but what it somewhere meets, as it were, with companions whose congeniality of nature provides it with a friendly and harmonious association; and none so gross as to prohibit a similar reception. Consequently, by knowing the inherent qualities or inclinations of a particle of matter, the nature of others which is indispensable for their chemical union is manifest.
The human kind is endowed with the same immutable principle that governs the material universe. Therefore, by knowing the inherent affections or affinities of the mind, the external circumstances and influences congenial to its own nature, satisfactory to its aspirations, and consequently with which it can harmoniously associate, are evident.
From the secret depths and inmost recesses of the human soul are continually springing up the living waters of its unchanging affections, which, if allowed to pursue their natural channel, present a scene of indescribable beauty and harmony; but, on the contrary, if obstructed by adverse influences, the living landscape of the mind is converted into a loathsome wilderness.
It will be found to be unexceptionably true that as man is surrounded by circumstances and influences congenial with the innate affections of his mind, with which he can harmoniously associate—just in that proportion happiness will be its result. Happiness is harmony; and misery is the effect of unnatural and uncongenial influences operating upon the mind.
Surround a mineral with substances for which it has no affinity, and disunity will be manifest. Surround man with influences for which he has no affection, and misery, contention, and misdirection will ensue. Here lie the causes of the evils which afflict the human family; and it is here that the benevolent Reformer should direct all his energies.
If you would abolish the evil and wretchedness which pervade the community, if you would make man better and happier—remove the obstructing and adverse influences that prohibit his spiritual growth; teach him that those affections which an all-wise Creator has implanted in his breast are in themselves good, and, when unvitiated by improper teaching and guided into proper channels, are productive of righteousness and happiness.
The human mind has an affection for Liberty. It requires an atmosphere of freedom in which it can give vent to its interior meditations. It is capable of infinite expansion, and anything tending to limit its powers, or quench the outgushing of its natural aspirations, is manifestly wrong and injurious.
A violation of this requirement of the mind has become the source of much of the misery that has rolled in upon the human race like an inundation; for man, instead of enjoying the privileges of harmonious association with circumstances congenial to the purest and deepest affections of his nature, has become the wretched subject of mental servitude and unfeeling tyranny.
Oppression has prevailed instead of freedom. The iron heel of tyranny, in its blood-marked course, has trampled upon the necks of millions of human beings and crushed to earth all pure and holy aspirations, till man has not even dared to express a wish for a better destiny.
Thus the innate aspirations of man’s spiritual nature have been checked and circumscribed, but not destroyed. Deathless as their immortal fountain, the smothered and obstructed waters have from time to time overleaped their opposing barriers, and in one mighty flood swept away all that dared to withstand their progress.
You may see the vestiges of these inundations on the green plains of a thousand fields where Liberty and Truth have striven with Tyranny and Error. Forever onward is the march of this sweeping inundation, and accumulating power by progress, the disturbed waters will ultimately dash away all obstructions and flow on peacefully and harmoniously in their native beds.
The mind has an affection for Truth. As the magnetic needle follows undeviatingly the movements of the magnet, so is the mind constantly influenced by the irresistible and congenial attractions of Truth. This is the grand object sought for through the innumerable theories, discussions, and isms that pervade the world.
But the mind has not been left free for the investigation. Different nations have reared an “Infallible Standard” of Truth, thereby marking out the boundaries of thought, restricting the privileges of free inquiry, and vainly endeavoring to compel man to believe that which appeared to his reason uncongenial and absurd.
They have engraved upon their columns, “you must search no further,” and, under the penalty of torture and death for disobedience, the voice of reason has been unheard and the silent aspirations of the spirit suppressed.
Here, even at the present enlightened day, is the source of much of the disunion and uncharitableness that taints the religious world; and the unfriendly and unrighteous epithets of “Infidel,” “Unbeliever,” “Heretic,” etc., are applied to those who cannot receive the doctrines believed by a few to be infallible.
If, then, the beings of celestial mold—beings who watch with guardian gaze the wandering steps of man; who rejoice when he is content to steadily and progressively journey on to the Temple of Truth; who weep when he becomes the wretched subject of his own misdirection and folly—bitter must have been the tears they shed over such a standard and test, reared by the dominant ignorance and bigotry of a misguided race.
Thus the affections of the mind have not been gratified, and, as an unavoidable consequence, the social world has been a scene inharmonious and devoid of beauty. Besides this, improper and unnatural desires have been generated. By committing substances to the stomach which at first are disagreeable, an unhealthy appetite is gradually produced. The same is true with the mind; surrounded with corrupting influences, oppressed and degraded, the mind has inordinate desires—man in his affections is not man.
The first step to be taken in order to ameliorate the present moral and social condition of man is to surround him with those influences which are congenial with the undying aspirations of the spiritual nature. Among these are freedom of thought, speech, and investigation, and the pursuit of Truth. Nothing should be considered as infallible unless sanctioned as truth by an enlightened Wisdom.
When man can search for immortal Truth unawed by power and unswayed by prejudice, then the first step in his progress to a better and happier social condition will be taken. When this movement is accomplished, the sun of the millennial era will arise on the human race, and all other movements requisite for social and spiritual improvement will naturally and inevitably follow.
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