an unlimited supply of reformers, philanthropists, humanitarians, and
would-be managers-in-general of society.

Every man and woman in society has one big duty. That is, to take care
of his or her own self. This is a social duty. For, fortunately, the
matter stands so that the duty of making the best of one's self
individually is not a separate thing from the duty of filling one's
place in society, but the two are one, and the latter is accomplished
when the former is done. The common notion, however, seems to be that
one has a duty to society, as a special and separate thing, and that
this duty consists in considering and deciding what other people ought
to do. Now, the man who can do anything for or about anybody else than
himself is fit to be head of a family; and when he becomes head of a
family he has duties to his wife and his children, in addition to the
former big duty. Then, again, any man who can take care of himself and
his family is in a very exceptional position, if he does not find in
his immediate surroundings people who need his care and have some sort
of a personal claim upon him. If, now, he is able to fulfill all this,
and to take care of anybody outside his family and his dependents, he
must have a surplus of energy, wisdom, and moral virtue beyond what he
needs for his own business. No man has this; for a family is a charge
which is capable of infinite development, and no man could suffice to
the full measure of duty for which a family may draw upon him. Neither
can a man give to society so advantageous an employment of his
services, whatever they are, in any other way as by spending them on
his family. Upon this, however, I will not insist. I recur to the
observation that a man who proposes to take care of other people must
have himself and his family taken care of, after some sort of a
fashion, and must have an as yet unexhausted store of energy.