PREFATORY DEFINITIONS.
Much misunderstanding arises from the various interpretations of the meaning of terms. So different are the interpretations given to some words, that a large part of the dictionaries is taken up with synonyms whose varied applications are nearly as wide apart as the limits of the greatest misunderstanding.
Many of these different applications of words are the result of corruptions of the original meaning, but they are none the less misleading, and furnish an excuse for agreeing on specific definitions.
As an example of corrupt uses given to words that should be held to convey only a sacred meaning, take the word "love," as promiscuously applied, for instance. It should be removed from all selfishness, and attach only to such holy application as that implied by the expression, "God is Love." In its application to individuals, as in mother-love, child-love, love between husband and wife, or between brothers, it should only have spiritual significance, unalloyed by any suggestion of liking, approval, desire, or lust; and should even extend its mantle to spread alike over all created things.
Love had already been so corrupted in its uses in the time of Comte, that he was impelled to coin a new word to express unselfishness between brother-men, and hence gave the word "altruism"—(other-self)—to the world.
"Altruism," also, in its turn, has suffered by contact with the selfish habit-of-thought of the present time, until it does not longer express the highest quality of love—the spiritual—but rather the socio-commercial quality that seeks and expects reward of praise or material emolument.
Although it is some time since "altruism" was first used—and it is a word of most important meaning to sociology—there are few who can define it.
Probably the material rush of the time has allowed little opportunity for acquaintance with it. It is rarely seen in the magazines, and almost never in the daily papers. This is probably the reason why the author was able to find only three, out of thirty persons asked, who could define "altruism." These thirty were met haphazard, and represented a fair average of city intelligence. It follows, by inference, that there is not as much altruism as there should be in existence among us, for, if there were, the word chosen by Comte to express it would be more widely used and known.
In presenting a set of definitions, there is no intention of calling into question the intelligence of any reader. The idea was suggested by the wide difference of understanding of the meaning of the word "worry." This difference of understanding became apparent in the discussion of Menticulture.[1]
It was found that many persons defined "worry" as "any consideration of the future," whereas only apprehensive consideration of the future was intended to be meant by its use in Menticulture.