The Ultimate Purpose of Human Life

[From Emerita Quito]

Purpose is that for which an action is done. One’s

purpose or reason for studying is to learn and earn a degree
necessary for employment. One builds a house to have a
permanent dwelling place; one gets married to procreate
and to establish a family.
All our actions, provided they are human acts, have a
purpose or end or objective. We eat to satisfy hunger; we
bathe in order to be clean; we stand up in order to do
something and so on. There is no human act without a
purpose.
Is there a general purpose of human acts? Is there one
common end or objective of human acts? One thing is
certain. We do not perform an act in order to inflict pain
upon ourselves. No one consciously seeks misery or
unhappiness. Reflecting upon what we do, we are led to a
common purpose or objective.
Every human act has happiness for a purpose or
objective. It happens sometimes that we undergo an
operation or have a tooth extracted for the purpose of
achieving health which is indispensable to happiness. We do
not undergo an operation or have at tooth extracted for the
purpose of experiencing pain and inconvenience. We agree
to an operation or tooth extraction in spite, not because, of
pain. In this case, a greater happiness is achieved by the
removal of the inconvenience brought about by them.
If all our human acts have happiness as purpose or end
or objective, would it also be the ultimate end or purpose of
human life itself? What do all men consciously strive for?
What do all men naturally tend to?
All men strive to be happy. The over-all purpose of
human life is happiness. Why does a person eat or drink or
make merry? Or why does he scale heights or go through
hardships to accomplish an end? Or why does he drink and
gamble and stake everything he has? If one examines all
these human acts, one inevitably arrives at happiness as a
common objective. No matter how diverse human acts are,
such as those of a lazy person or an ambitious one, or a
politician, an artist or a religious person, all these acts are
done in view of happiness. We may not agree as to what can
make us happy, but collectively, men act for the sake of
happiness.
People, however, may not be aware all the time that
they aim to be happy. This is because they do not have the
habit of examining their deeper purposes. But a reflection
on this point would easily yield the answer. All men live and
work for happiness. In some Constitutions, the pursuit of
happiness of individuals is enshrined.
A more important question is: if men have diverse
concepts of happiness, what will make men truly happy? Is
there only one concept of happiness that will satisfy man as
a human being?
While there are indeed diverse concepts of happiness
that individuals pursue, i.e., food, drink, sex, art, success,
still there is one concept of happiness that will satisfy man
as man. Food satisfies the body but only until it is satiated.
Likewise with drink and sex. Art satisfies the mind and soul,
but even art has its limit, beyond which it cannot satisfy
man’s craving for happiness. Success has to be constantly
nurtured; otherwise, success loses its glitter. Everything is
pursued for the sake of happiness; for no other reason do
men indulge in food or drink or sex or art were it not for the
elusive happiness they erroneously think is in these things.
Men, however, soon realize that these things do not only not
give lasting happiness but may even result in pain when
overindulged in.

A. Wealth
If the above do not make men happy, what about money?
Men do not seem to have enough of money. The millionaire
does not stop at millions but desires to make billions. Money
is hoarded or is used to buy goods that would produce more
money. Would money satisfy man’s craving for happiness?
Further thought on the matter would easily yield a negative
answer. Money is desired only because of its buying power,
or for the power that it wields. But what if there were not
things to buy due to some war or depression? Would there
still be a desire for money?

B. Power
Would power constitute happiness? Again, power has its
limitations. Power can even be cumbersome. In some cases,
powerful persons are annoyed at the perquisites of power.
Sycophants plague them with requests accompanied by
flattery.

C. Good Looks
Would good looks satisfy man’s craving for happiness? A
man ages, and hence, his good looks will not last forever.

D. Requirements of Lasting Happiness

What can satisfy man’s craving for happiness must be
total, permanent, lasting and eternal. If a man knew that an
enjoyable party would soon end, would his happiness be
complete? If a man realizes that old age and death are
inevitable, how can he find lasting satisfaction in this life?
True happiness must have no admixture of misery, pain or
unhappiness. Nothing in this world is permanent or lasting.
Neither money nor power nor popularity nor good looks.
Hence, what can make a person happy cannot be in this
world, for nothing in this world is eternal. The poet Robert
Browning wrote, “Man’s reach should exceed his grasp, or
what’s a heaven for?” If a man could possess everything he
desired on earth, indeed, what’s a heaven for?
What can make a man happy lies in the satisfaction of
his capacities of man as man. What are the qualities that
make man distinctly man? Not his body or senses since he
has these in common with brute animals. Not his capacity to
nourish himself, grow and reproduce, because plants can do
the same. What make man distinctly man are his faculties of
intellect and will, and hence man’s satisfaction lies in total
truth and total goodness.

E. Intellect and Will must be satisfied

 The intellect of man seeks truth and will not stop until it
possesses truth without error. The will of man is always
inclined toward the good. The good in this sense is the
pleasurable good, not the moral good. For instance, a
person is attracted to liquor because he looks upon it as a
pleasurable good. He drinks in spite of the hangover or the
threat of liver cancer. A person is attracted to illicit sex even
when he knows that it is a moral evil. This is because he
looks upon it as a good, i.e., a psychological good that will
give him pleasure.
What is the total or absolute truth and good? What is the
truth that can satisfy the craving of man’s intellect? What is
the good that will satisfy the craving of man’s will?

F. God is the satisfaction of man’s cravings

There is only one total truth, and that is God or the
Supreme Being. There is only one total good, and that is
God or the Supreme being.
The above statement is not a religious but a
philosophical one. It is not due to faith or any membership
in a religious sect. One arrives at these conclusions through
the use of one’s reasoning power.
Truth in the world continues to elude man. Through
the centuries men have thought that they held the truth,
only to realize later that it was an imperfect one. Total
satisfaction of men’s yearnings has not been had in this
world. Even the usual goods that men desire, like food,
drink, sex, money, power, good looks, eventually lose their
luster due to aging, boredom, and satiety. The wise man is
he who does not stake his entire life on any of the above
goods because he knows that what can satisfy man’s
craving can only be the lasting or eternal. God alone can
satisfy man’s will. St. Augustine expressed the sentiment
very aptly when he said, “Our hearts were made for thee, O
God, and they will be restless until they rest in thee.”
The skeptical man will, however, ask: how can God
satisfy my craving as a human being if I am not even sure
about His existence? Or, the believer can even say that
while he admits the existence of God, he does not see how
God could satisfy his innermost desires. Many believers
consider God as a God of fear and they cannot connect the
Supreme Being to their human cravings. Some would even
say that if they were rich and forever young and could have
the usual pleasures of life to an unlimited degree, they
could not desire anything more.
This situation is very much like that of a young child
who, because he thoroughly enjoys his lollipop and is loathe
to share it with anyone, hides behind a door to indulge his
pleasure. If perchance an older person offers him a
thousand pesos in exchange for the lollipop, the young child
would keep his lollipop rather than accept an amount of
money which could buy him a carload of lollipops. This is
because he does not understand the purchasing power of
money and cannot postpone the pleasure he is presently
enjoying. He cannot wait for a future but greater pleasure
which to him is uncertain. When a person disclaims that
God is the satisfaction of all human desires, and that he
would rather have his “heaven on earth,” it is only because,
like the young child, he does not understand that a future
and enormously greater happiness awaits him, and that he
would rather indulge his small pleasure here and now.
That God or the Supreme Being is the satisfaction of all
our desires is a theme orchestrated by saints and mystics
and wise men all the world over. Eastern as well as Western
philosophers have copiously written about experiences
beyond the reach of logic and common sense. The Muslim
sufi was known to have exclaimed, “I went from God to God,
until they cried from me in me, ‘O Thou I’. The Indian rishi
or seers understood that only Brahman or the Supreme
Being could satisfy all human desires, and thus the path
that yoga treads is ananda marga or the “path to joy”
because it leads to union with the Supreme Being. What
welds religions together is the common aspirations they
share towards a Supreme Being whether he is called God or
Allah or Brahman. Hence the idea that God or the Supreme
Being alone can satisfy man as man transcends
geographical boundaries and time zones. It is not confined
to Christian writers and/or Catholic saints.
 If we therefore search ourselves deeply for the
satisfaction of our deepest human desires, we would find
that only the Creator can satisfy His creatures. Hence, God
or the Supreme Being is the ultimate purpose of human life
because He alone can make man completely happy. God or
the Supreme Being is the beginning as well as the end of
human existence, truly the Alpha and Omega, the first and
last letters of the Greek alphabet.