EGOTISM, OR SELF-SEEKING
EGOTISM, taking for its motto "Every one for himself," is very much opposed to fraternal charity and the family spirit. It never hesitates, when occasion offers, to sacrifice the common good to its own. It isolates the individuals, makes them concentrated in self, places them in the community, but not of it, makes them strangers amongst their brethren, and tends to justify the words of an impious writer, who calls monasteries "reunions of persons who know not each other, who live without love, and die without being regretted."
Egotism breeds distrust, jealousy, parties, aversions. It destroys abnegation, humility, patience, and all other virtues. It introduces a universal disgust and discontent, makes religious lose their first fervour, presents an image of hell where one expected to find a heaven on earth, saps the very foundation of community life, and leads sooner or later to inevitable ruin.
As the family spirit causes the growth and prosperity of an order, however feeble its beginning, so, on the other hand, egotism dries the sap and renders it powerless, no matter what other advantages it may enjoy. If the one, by uniting hearts, is a principle of strength and duration, the other, by dividing, is a principle of dissolution and decay. Sallust says that "the weakest things become powerful by concord, and the greatest perish through discord." Whilst the descendants of Noah spoke the same language the building of the tower of Babel proceeded with rapidity. From the moment they ceased to understand one another its destruction commenced, and the monument which was to have immortalized their name was left in ruin to tell their shame and pride.
On each of the four corners of the monastery religion or charity personified ought to be placed, bearing on shields in large characters the following words: (1) "Love one another"; (2) "He who is not with Me is against Me, and he who gathers not with Me scatters"; (3) "Every kingdom divided will become desolate"; (4) "They had all but one heart and one soul."