254 ESSAYS SCIENTIFIC AND PHILOSOPHICAL. 



even the most sacred region, where it is incon- 

 sistent with reverence to ask the question Why ? 

 though we may have to answer our own question 

 with the words " Behold, we know not anything." 

 The truth is that we are wrong to speak of pride 

 or humility as if they could be properly predicated 

 of the reason. Pride is always in the Will. 1 And 

 that which is rightly called Pride is an attitude of 

 the reasoner towards truth, not the process by 

 which he seeks it. It is in this sense that Pride 

 is said to lie at the root of all sin, because it is the 

 unwillingness to recognize our true relation towards 

 God and our fellow man, 



" Whence flowed rebellion 'gainst the Omnipotent, 

 Whence hate of man to man, and all else ill ? " 



In the case of our fellow men this is obvious, 

 though we rather call it selfishness than pride. 

 For at the root of selfishness lies the belief, a belief 

 indeed which is seldom consciously expressed, that 

 the individual is complete in himself. It follows 

 as a natural consequence that while he is an end, 

 others are but means, and that he may make use 

 of them, so far as he is able to do so, for his own 

 enjoyment. Such pure unvarnished selfishness is, 

 indeed, rarely stated. But it is none the less the 

 unavowed, if not quite unconscious, principle of 

 every self-indulgent life, though, like the theoreti- 

 cal basis on which it logically rests, it needs only 



1 St. Thorn. Aq., Summa Theol., 2. 2, Qu. clxii. Art. iii. 



