tables exist, its inner organization becomes disjointed. In time it
will go to pieces. We can, however, imagine a magic table, which might
be consolidated by all it does. At first it was a little weak, but by
upholding the glass of water it grew stronger. As I laid the book on
it, its joints acquired a tenacity which they lacked before; and only
after receiving the hundred pound weight did it acquire the full
strength of which it was capable. That would indeed be a marvelous
table, where use and inner construction continually helped each other.
Something like it we may hereafter find possible in certain regions of
personal goodness, but no such perpetual motion is possible to things.
For them employment is costly.



VII

I have already strained my readers' attention sufficiently by these
abstract statements of matters technical and minute. Let us stop
thinking for a while and observe. I will draw a picture of goodness
and teach the eye what sort of thing it is. We have only to follow in
our drawing the conditions already laid down. We agreed that when an
object was good it was good _for_ something; so that if A is good, it
must be good for B. This instrumental relation, of means to end, may
well be indicated by an arrow pointing out the direction in which the
influence moves. But if B is also to be good, it too must be connected
by an arrow with another object, C, and this in the same way with D.
The process might evidently be continued forever, but will be
sufficiently shown in the three stages of Figure 1. Here the arrow
always expresses the extrinsic goodness of the letter which lies
behind it, in reference to the letter which lies before.