the term "loyalty."
Then let me deal with my principal thesis, which is that the true spirit
of loyalty is not merely a proper accompaniment of all serious work, but
is an especially important source of a very deep insight into the
meaning of life, and, as I personally believe, into the nature of the
whole universe.

Three sorts of persons, I have noticed, are fond of using the term
"loyalty." These are quite different types of persons; or, in any case,
they use the word upon very different occasions. But these very
differences are to my mind important. The first type of those who love
to use the term "loyalty" consists of those who employ it to express a
certain glow of enthusiastic devotion, the type of the lovers, of the
students when the athletic contests are near, of the partisans in the
heat of a political contest, or of the friends of an institution upon a
day like this. To such persons, or at least at such moments, loyalty is
conceived as something brilliantly emotional, as a passion of devotion.
The second class of those who are fond of the word "loyalty" are the
warriors and their admirers. To such persons loyalty means a willingness
to do dangerous service, to sacrifice life, to toil long and hard for
the flag that one follows. But for a third type of those who employ the
word, loyalty especially means steady, often unobtrusive, fidelity to
more or less formal obligations, such as the business world and the
workshop impose upon us. Such persons think of loyalty as, first of all,
faithfulness in obeying the law of the land, or in executing the plans
of one's official superiors, or in serving one's employer or one's
client or one's chief, or one's fraternity or other social union. In
this sense the loyal servant may be obscure and unemotional. But he is
trustworthy. Now, a word which thus so forcibly appeals to the lovers
who want to express their passionate devotion, and also to the soldiers
who want to name that obstinate following of the flag which makes
victory possible; a word which business men also sometimes use to
characterize the quietly and industriously faithful employee who obeys
orders, who betrays no secrets, and who regards the firm's interest as
his own;--well, such a word, I think, is not as much ambiguous as deep
in its meaning. For, after all, loyal emotions, loyal sacrifice of life,
loyal steadiness in obscure service, are but various symptoms of a
certain spirit which lies beneath all its v