"The more generous we are, the more joyous we become. The more cooperative we are, the more valuable we become. The more enthusiastic we are, the more productive we become. The more serving we are, the more prosperous we become"
About this Quote
Ward builds this as a staircase of cause-and-effect, a neat ladder where every private virtue pays out in public reward. The anaphora ("The more...") isn’t just decorative; it functions like a metronome, training the reader to expect moral behavior to produce measurable returns. Joy, value, productivity, prosperity: the sequence quietly moves from inner feeling to market-friendly outcomes, smuggling self-help into the language of ethics.
The intent is plainly motivational, but the subtext is transactional. Generosity is pitched as a joy generator, cooperation as a value multiplier, enthusiasm as a productivity hack, service as a wealth strategy. That’s not accidental. Mid-to-late 20th-century American inspirational writing often translated character into capital, aligning civic virtues with corporate culture: be agreeable, be positive, be useful, and you will "become" something better. The repeated "become" matters; it frames identity as an upgrade path, as if the self were a project under continuous improvement.
What makes the quote work is its soothing certainty. There’s no messy middle where generosity is exploited or enthusiasm burns out. Ward offers a frictionless moral universe, a place where incentives are clean and outcomes track behavior like a well-tuned machine. That optimism is the selling point and the tell. It reflects a postwar belief in systems - workplaces, communities, churches - where individual attitude could harmonize with collective success.
Read today, it can sound like benevolence repackaged as personal branding. Still, the rhetoric has bite because it appeals to a desire many people share: to live decently without feeling naive, to believe that kindness isn’t just good, but smart.
The intent is plainly motivational, but the subtext is transactional. Generosity is pitched as a joy generator, cooperation as a value multiplier, enthusiasm as a productivity hack, service as a wealth strategy. That’s not accidental. Mid-to-late 20th-century American inspirational writing often translated character into capital, aligning civic virtues with corporate culture: be agreeable, be positive, be useful, and you will "become" something better. The repeated "become" matters; it frames identity as an upgrade path, as if the self were a project under continuous improvement.
What makes the quote work is its soothing certainty. There’s no messy middle where generosity is exploited or enthusiasm burns out. Ward offers a frictionless moral universe, a place where incentives are clean and outcomes track behavior like a well-tuned machine. That optimism is the selling point and the tell. It reflects a postwar belief in systems - workplaces, communities, churches - where individual attitude could harmonize with collective success.
Read today, it can sound like benevolence repackaged as personal branding. Still, the rhetoric has bite because it appeals to a desire many people share: to live decently without feeling naive, to believe that kindness isn’t just good, but smart.
Quote Details
| Topic | Kindness |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
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