--a man
ALWAYS does. Public opinion cannot force that kind of men to go to the
wars. When they go it is for other reasons. Other spirit-contenting
reasons.

Y.M. Always spirit-contenting reasons?

O.M. There are no others.

Y.M. When a man sacrifices his life to save a little child from a
burning building, what do you call that?

O.M. When he does it, it is the law of HIS make. HE can't bear to see
the child in that peril (a man of a different make COULD), and so he
tries to save the child, and loses his life. But he has got what he was
after--HIS OWN APPROVAL.

Y.M. What do you call Love, Hate, Charity, Revenge, Humanity,
Magnanimity, Forgiveness?

O.M. Different results of the one Master Impulse: the necessity of
securing one's self approval. They wear diverse clothes and are subject
to diverse moods, but in whatsoever ways they masquerade they are the
SAME PERSON all the time. To change the figure, the COMPULSION that
moves a man--and there is but the one--is the necessity of securing the
contentment of his own spirit. When it stops, the man is dead.

Y.M. That is foolishness. Love--

O.M. Why, love is that impulse, that law, in its most uncompromising
form. It will squander life and everything else on its object. Not
PRIMARILY for the object's sake, but for ITS OWN. When its object is
happy IT is happy--and that is what it is unconsciously after.

Y.M. You do not even except the lofty and gracious passion of
mother-love?

O.M. No, IT is the absolute slave of that law. The mother will go naked
to clothe her child; she will starve that it may have food; suffer
torture to save it from pain; die that it may live. She takes a living
PLEASURE in making these sacrifices. SHE DOES IT FOR THAT REWARD--that
self-approval, that contentment, that peace, that comfort. SHE WOULD DO
IT FOR YOUR CHILD IF SHE COULD GET THE SAME PAY.

Y.M. This is an infernal philosophy of yours.

O.M. It isn't a philosophy, it is a fact.

Y.M. Of course you must admit that there are some acts which--

O.M. No. There is NO act, large or small, fine or mean, which springs
from any motive but the one--the necessity of appeasing and contenting
one's own spirit.

Y.M. The world's philanthropists--

O.M. I honor them, I uncover my head to them--from habit and training;
and THEY could not know comfort or happiness or self-approval if they
did not work and spend for the unfortunate. It makes THEM happy to
see others happy; and so with