Is there not in each and every one of us a deep-rooted desire, which is wholly in accord with conscience, to make good in the rôle which has been assigned to us in the mystery of creation? Does not each individual feel moved to accomplish something beyond the mere continuation of life? Is there not within us a vague aspiration to do well and be something good and fine, according to our means and tastes? Do we not want to be a success rather than a failure, both for our own sake and for the sake of those we love, who also love us, and cannot help being affected by what we do?
If by any chance you are deficient in this feeling yourself, or confused about it, you have only to look about any where, at any time, and you will find it in evidence among normal individuals from the days of early childhood.
A little girl likes to be pretty, to dance well, to sew neatly, to be helpful to her mother, to be petted, loved, approved.
A little boy wants to be a fast runner, a fine swimmer, a good fighter—he wants to be strong and brave and self-reliant and many other things, besides. He admires these qualities in other boys; a feeling of his inner nature, in accord with his conscience, tells him he would like to be that kind of a boy, himself. He feels it is the kind that every one ought to want to be.
And if he is a normal, healthy boy, this feeling arises within him just as naturally and spontaneously as the feeling which comes to a sensitive soul in the presence of a sunset, or musical harmonies and tells it they are beautiful. It is quite apart from any far-sighted calculations of the intellect concerning the practical use which those qualities may, or may not, have in after life.
The same thing is true of the little girl and what she admires and aspires to.
As the youngsters grow up to be men and women, they are still susceptible to the same sort of feeling, in spite of the fact that many other more practical and material considerations are liable to creep in and confuse it, alter it, distort it.
Somewhere, in the inner nature of almost everybody, there persists a feeling of admiration for the fine and noble qualities of mankind. Some of those qualities, experience may have demonstrated, are beyond our personal strength and reach—others may have practical disadvantages, which our self-interest and our reason over-rule, but as long as the feeling is there, it keeps whispering to us, however faintly, that we ought to try to live up to the best that is in us and not be satisfied with less.
Let us take care to note that this differs completely from another sort of feeling which cold-blooded cynics are apt to confuse it with. This other feeling is inspired by greed and controlled by selfish calculation, and tells certain individuals that by closing their eyes to what is beautiful and admirable in human nature, and by taking advantage of any and every opportunity, they may obtain a greater portion of worldly goods and material pleasures.
This latter feeling is not in touch with conscience and neither to ourselves, nor to others, does it inspire ennobling sentiments. A proper name for it is ambition—a selfish quality, whose essence bears no relation to the aspiration of boy and girl, man and woman, toward what is finest and best.