Love, Transformation, and Service Theme Analysis

In The Road to Character, David Brooks outlines a process for developing one’s character, but he is careful to mention that this road can’t be traveled solely through one’s own efforts. In the story of the ancient theologian Augustine, for instance, Augustine could only overcome his sins by becoming humbly dependent on God’s grace. Through this transformative process, he first accepted God’s love, then was so grateful for it that he forgot his own desires and dedicated himself to returning this love. In another example, love was a grounding force for writer George Eliot. Before meeting George Lewes, she was narcissistic, and her ideals were too lofty for her to achieve concrete moral good. Love provided Eliot a commitment that quieted her self-centered passion and gave her a concrete opportunity to do good in the world. After her marriage, she was inspired to write morally powerful novels. Brooks suggests that in stories like Augustine’s and Eliot’s, love “impels people to service,” overcoming self-interest and drawing them into something greater than themselves. In this way, Brooks argues that love, by requiring a person to forget the self, uniquely suits them to serve others.

God’s grace—or love—made Augustine forget himself and conquer his desires so that, in turn, he could reflect God’s love in his own actions. Augustine didn’t have to earn God’s grace as one has to earn a reward. He concluded that “the way to inner joy is not through agency and action, it’s through surrender and receptivity to God.” He gave up his previous habit of climbing upward in society, suggesting that once a person gives up the notion that they can earn love through success, they can accept that God already loves them apart from their efforts. After accepting that he was loved, Augustine desired to reciprocate the love. Brooks explains that “once [a person] accepts the fact that [they] are accepted, there is a great desire to go meet this love and reciprocate the gift.” Before he had accepted God’s grace, Augustine had always returned to his own desires, but now he renounced them altogether and focused on returning God’s gift. This process of reciprocal love produced “an inner transformation” in Augustine that reordered what he loved. Before accepting God’s love, Augustine was organizing his life around his wants such that “other people [were] objects for the satisfaction of [his desires].” He was constantly “shedding sacrificial commitments in favor of status and success,” even ending his marriage for this reason at one point. In accepting God’s grace, however, Augustine accepted “unmerited love.” Therefore, in returning God’s unconditional love, Augustine’s own love became unconditional, committal, and unconcerned with personal gain. He found that he wasn’t resisting his old desires for fame, money, and sex because he no longer desired those things.

Not only did love make George Eliot forget her own ego, but it also stabilized her and enabled her to serve others through her writing. When she was a young woman, she had lofty moral ideals but lacked the “steady capacity to initiate action and drive her own life.” She fell for countless men, but in these romances she “loved her own love.” Her youthful attachments were narcissistic and therefore weren’t strong enough to direct her attention away from herself. However, when she eloped with George Lewes, her passion became concrete and outwardly directed. Her love for him was “the renunciation of all other possibilities for the sake of one choice.” This commitment to one person channeled her passions in one direction and put an end to her restless self-love. Once they were married, George Lewes encouraged Eliot to write. He suggested she write realistic novels with characters involved in everyday problems. She went on to become a famous novelist, showing that love led her into a more productive way of life that benefited others.

Through the stories of both Augustine and Eliot, Brooks explains that love impels a person to service. First, love is not just a feeling, but results in daily acts of care. For George Eliot, marriage itself became an opportunity for doing concrete good. In her novels, she expressed how people “thrive when they work within the rooted spot.” Most of her novels follow characters who struggle to ward off the evils of miscommunication in their marriages and families. Love, by humbling and stabilizing George Eliot, taught her how to perform actual good in the world—good that’s also reflected in her characters’ values. Similarly, love was the missing piece of the puzzle for Augustine’s transformation. Although he knew that he should follow God, he did not actually do so until he accepted God’s love. Brooks explains that “only love impels action.” Knowledge, in other words, was not enough to transform Augustine. He needed love, which made him forget himself, feel immense gratitude, and focus his energies on something larger than himself. Brooks explains that “the ultimate conquest of the self is not won by self-discipline, or an awful battle within the self. It is won by going out of the self.” Both Augustine and Eliot attempted to battle with their own desires, but ultimately, love was the only thing that made them overcome themselves. Therefore, the will to serve is not obtained through self-confrontation but through love, because love causes one to forget themselves.

Love transformed both George Eliot and Augustine and equipped each for service, but in different ways. Augustine’s dependence on God’s love humbled him but then exalted him as he raised himself to the lofty heights of returning the love of God. Eliot’s love also humbled her, causing her to forget her restless narcissism, but it then grounded her to concrete and human opportunities for doing good. Although Augustine was raised upwards in spiritual faith and Eliot was grounded in concrete virtue, both were completed through love stories. Love engaged each in a commitment so they could serve something larger than themselves.