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The Growth of Thought - As Affecting the Progress of Society by William Withington
page 7 of 57 (12%)
office, the competition for making most gain out of the least
productiveness--these earnest pursuits of the men of this age--in the
next will be resigned to the children of larger growth; just as are
now resigned the trappings of military glory. Where then is the human
mind ultimately to fix? Where is man to find so essentially his good,
as to fix his earnest pursuit in one direction, in which the race is
still to hold on? Such seems to be the question, What is life?

The elements of that darkness, which excludes the light of life, may be
considered as these three: First, the excessive preponderance of
self-love, as the ruling motive of human conduct. Secondly, the
short-sightedness of self-love, in magnifying the present, at the cost
of the distant future. And, Thirdly, the grossness of self-love, in
preferring of present goods the vulgar and the sensible, to the refined
and more exquisitely satisfactory. And there are three ways, in which
we may attempt the abatement of existing evils; or, there are three
agencies we may call in for this purpose.

In the first place, leaving individuals to the operation of the common
motives, we may labor at the social institutions, to adjust them to the
rule, that, each seeking his own, after the common apprehension of
present interests, may do so consistently with acting the part of a
good citizen--contributing something to the general welfare; or, at
least, not greatly detracting therefrom. Here, the agency employed,
the Greeks would have called by a name, from which we have derived the
word _politics_; which word, from abuse, has well nigh lost its
original sense, _The science of social welfare_. _Policy_, we might
say, for want of an exacter word.

The second way, in which we may seek the same result, is, to inculcate
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