are intellectual and other accomplishments, to which I at least cannot refuse the title of virtue. But I cannot assume that, without exception, these must all somehow add to what is called social welfare; nor, again, do I see how to make a social organism the subject which directly possesses them. But, if so, it is impossible for me to admit that all virtue is essentially or primarily social. On the contrary, the neglect of social good, for the sake of pursuing other ends, may not only be moral self-assertion, but again, equally under other conditions, it may be moral self-sacrifice. We can even say that the living “for others,” rather than living “for myself,” may be immoral and selfish.
And you can hardly make the difference between self-sacrifice and self-assertion consist in this, that the idea pursued, in one case, falls beyond the individual and, in the other case, fails to do so. Or, rather, such a phrase, left undefined, can scarcely be said to have a meaning. Every permanent end of every kind will go beyond the individual, if the individual is taken in his lowest sense. And, passing that by, obviously the content realized in an individual’s perfection must be also above him and beyond him. His perfection is not one thing apart from the rest of the universe, and he gains it only by appropriating, and by reducing to a special harmony, the common substance of all. It is obvious that his private welfare, so far as he is social, must include to some extent the welfare of others. And his intellectual, aesthetic, and moral development, in short the whole ideal side of his nature, is clearly built up out of elements which he shares with other souls. Hence the individual’s end in self-advancement must always transcend his private being. In fact, the difference between self-assertion and self-sacrifice does not lie in the contents which are used, but in the diverse uses which are made of them; and I will attempt to explain this.
