122 ETHICAL ASPECTS OF EVOLUTION 



we may remark that ambition, like prudence, may be altru 

 istic, that it is frequently devoted to the interests of others, 

 and that, when it is, it is almost always confused with mere 

 benevolence or the desire to give others pleasure. The 

 conscious ambition of many of the great lawgivers and 

 statesmen who have earned the reverence of succeeding 

 ages has been to raise the people for whom they worked 

 either by giving them freedom or by perfecting their laws 

 and their institutions, without reference to considerations 

 of happiness and unhappiness ; and such men, I think, 

 will rank as greater, and be rewarded by a larger share 

 of gratitude, than those whose ambition has been to make 

 their country rich and contented, without regard to higher 

 considerations. In combining the highest personal aims 

 with the highest form of altruism they earn a double title 

 of respect. 



Motives of morality and motives of ambition, though the 

 final end of both is advance in evolution, do not always 

 recommend the same line of conduct. Supreme achieve 

 ment, even in art and letters, is seldom reached except at 

 the expense of social and domestic duties, and, in practical 

 life, such as that of the soldier and the statesman, the 

 sacrifice is likely to be much more serious. The characters 

 of the saint and the ruler, though their combination is not 

 unknown, are in principle contradictory, but one is as neces 

 sary as the other to the commonwealth. The explanation 

 is given at once when it is recognized that evolution advances 

 towards its end by the opposition of contrary principles 

 the opposites here being self-effacement and self-assertion. 

 All morality consists either in the absorption of the self 

 in love for others, or in the inhibitions on the free action 

 of individuals, which are demanded in order that men may 

 live together in societies ; and religion sanctifies the same 

 principles by connecting them with the worship of a Supreme 

 Being. Even asceticism, though its end is often selfish, 

 chooses for its means the subjugation of the self, and earns 

 no lasting respect unless it promotes, either by example 

 or by active service, the amelioration of others. But the 



