he danger of the
non-egotist is not sufficiently to realize his significance. Egotism is
the natural temptation of all those whose individuality is strong; the
man of intense desires, of acute perceptions, of vigorous preferences,
of eager temperament, is in danger of trying to construct his life too
sedulously on his own lines; and yet these are the very people who help
other people most, and in whom the hope of the race lies. Meek, humble,
timid persons, who accept things as they are, who tread in beaten
paths, who are easily persuaded, who are cautious, prudent, and
submissive, leave things very much as they find them. I need make no
attempt at indicating the line that such people ought to follow,
because it is, unhappily, certain that they will follow the line of
least resistance, and that they have no more power of initiative than
the bricks of a wall or the waters of a stream. The following
considerations will be addressed to people of a certain vividness of
nature, who have strong impulses, fervent convictions, vigorous
desires. I shall try to suggest a species of discipline that can be
practised by such persons, a line that they can follow, in order that
they may aim at, and perhaps attain, a due subordination and
co-ordination of themselves and their temperaments.

To treat of intellectual egotism first, the danger that besets such
people as I have described is a want of sympathy with other points of
view, and the first thing that such natures must aim at, is the getting
rid of what I will call the sectarian spirit. We ought to realize that
absolute truth is not the property of any creed or school or nation;
the whole lesson of history is the lesson of the danger of affirmation.
The great difference between the modern and the ancient world is the
growth of the scientific spirit, and the meaning and value of evidence.
There are many kinds of certainties. There is the absolute scientific
certainty of such propositions as that two and two make four, and
cannot possibly make five. This is of course only the principle that
two and two CANNOT be said to MAKE four, but that they ARE four, and
that 2 + 2 and 4 are only different ways of describing the same
phenomenon. Then there come the lesser certainties, that is to say, the
certainties that justify practical action. A man who is aware that he
has twenty thousand pounds in the hands of trustees, whose duty it is
to pay him the interest, is justified in spending a cer