IV
But a second stage succeeds, the stage of desire. Indeed, though I call it a second, it is really but a special aspect of the first; for the ideal which I form always represents some improvement in myself. An ideal which did not promise to better me in some way would be no ideal at all. It would be quite inoperative. I never rise from my chair except with the hope of being better off. Without this, I should sit forever. But I feel uneasiness in my present position, and conceive the possibility of not being constrained; or I think of some needful work which remains unexecuted as long as I sit here, and that work undone I perceive will leave my life less satisfactory than it might be. And this imagined betterment must always be in some sense my own. If it is a picture of the gains of some one else quite unconnected with myself, it will not start my action.
But it will be objected that we do often act unselfishly and in behalf of other persons. Indeed we do. Perhaps our impulses are more largely derived from others than from ourselves, yet from desire our own share is never quite eliminated. I give to the poor. But it is because I hate poverty; or because I am attracted by the face, the story, or the supposed character of him who receives; or because I am unable to separate my interests from those of humanity everywhere. In some subtle form the I-element enters. Leave it out, and the action would lose its value and become mechanical. What I did would be no expression of self-conscious me. And such undoubtedly is the case with much of our conduct. The reflex actions, described in the last chapter, and many of our habits too, contain no precise reference to our self. Intelligent, purposeful, moral conduct, however, is everywhere shaped by the hope of improving the condition of him who acts. We do not act till we find something within or about us unsatisfactory. If contemplating myself in my actual conditions I could pronounce them all good, creation would for me be at an end. To start it, some sense of need is required. Accordingly I have named desire as the second state in the formation of a purpose, for desire is precisely this sense of disparity between our actual self and that possible bettered self depicted in the ideal.
Popular speech, however, does not here state the matter quite fully. We often talk as if our desires were for other things than ourselves. We say, for example, "I want a glass of water." In reality it is not the water I want. That is but a fragment of my desire. It is water plus self. Only so is the desire fully uttered. Beholding my present self, my thirsty and defective self, I perceive a side of myself requiring to be bettered. Accordingly, among imagined pictures of possible futures I identify myself with that one which represents me supplied with water. But it is not water that is the object of my desire, it is myself as bettered by water. Since, however, this betterment of self is a constant factor of all desire, we do not ordinarily name it. We say, "I desire wealth, I desire the success of my friend, or the freedom of my country," omitting the important and never absent portion of the desire, the betterment of self.
Of course a stage in the formation of the purpose so important as desire receives a multitude of names. Perhaps the simplest is appetite. In appetite I do not know what I want. I am blindly impelled in a certain direction. I do not perceive that I have a suffering self, nor know that this particular suffering would be bettered by that particular supply. Appetite is a mere instinct. In the mechanic structure of my being it is planned that without comprehension of the want I shall be impelled to the source of supply. But when appetite is permeated with a consciousness of what is lacking, I apprehend it as a need. Through needs we become persons. The capacity for dissatisfaction is the sublime thing in man. We can know our poor estate. We can say, That which I am I would not be. Passing the blind point of appetite, we come into the region of want or need; if we then can discern what is requisite to supply this need, we may be said to have a desire. That desire, if specific and urgent, we call a wish.
All these varieties of desire include the same two factors: on the one hand a recognition of present defect in ourselves, on the other imagination of possible bettered conditions. Diminish either, and personal power is narrowed. The richer a man's imagination, and the more abundant his pictures of possible futures, the more resourceful he becomes. Pondering on desire as rooted in the sense of defect, we may feel less regret that our age is one not easily satisfied. Never were there so many discontents, because there were never so many aspirations. It is true there may be a devilish discontent or a divine one. There is a discontent without definite aims, one which merely rejects what is now possessed; and there is one which seeks what is wisely attainable. Yet after all, it is a small price to pay for aspiration that it is often attended by vagueness and unwisdom.