I like that comparison. I stumbled upon another continuum some years ago, and I think it makes a good companion. In this one, both ends are bad, and the middle

I like that comparison. I stumbled upon another continuum some years ago, and I think it makes a good companion. In this one, both ends are bad, and the middle is good. It's especially useful for dealing with any type of devotion to cause (or a person): Optimism ---- Improver ---- Pessimism Though people tend to go from Optimism -> Pessimism (-> Improver). The problem with optimists is that they will "defend the indefensible. He is the jingo of the universe; he will say, “My cosmos, right or wrong.” He will be less inclined to the reform of things; more inclined to a sort of front-bench official answer to all attacks, soothing everyone with assurances. He will not wash the world, but whitewash the world." The problem with pessimists is "not that he chastises gods and men, but that he does not love what he chastises . . . [In being the so-called ‘candid friend,’ the pessimist is not really candid.] He is keeping something back—in his own gloomy pleasure in saying unpleasant things. He has a secret desire to hurt, not merely to help. . . . He is using the ugly knowledge which was allowed him [in order] to strengthen the army, to discourage people from joining it." An example of the "Improver" is (are) women: "Some stupid people started the idea that because women obviously back up their own people through everything, therefore women are blind and do not see anything. They can hardly have known any women. The same women who are ready to defend their men through thick and thin . . . are almost morbidly lucid about the thinness of [their] excuses or the thickness of [their] head[s]. . . . Love is not blind; that is the last thing that it is. Love is bound; and the more it is bound the less it is blind." [0] Quotes from G.K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy(Garden City, N.Y.: Image Books, 1959), pp. 69–71. [1] Arrangement of quotes taken from https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/bruce-c-hafen_love-is-not-blind-thoughts-college-students-faith-ambiguity/ https://speeches.byu.edu/talks/bruce-c-hafen_love-is-not-bli...