A Person Of Definite Character And Purpose

The Idealist's Program Of Political Or Economic Reform May Be Impracticable, Absurd, Demonstrably Ridiculous; But It Can Never Be Successfully Opposed Merely By Pointing Out That This Is The Case. A Negative Opposition Cannot Be Wholly Effectual: There Must Be A Competing Idealism; Something Must Be Offered That Is Not Only Less Objectionable But More Desirable.

Institutions - Government, Churches, Industries, And The Like - Have Properly No Other Function Than To Contribute To Human Freedom; And In So Far As They Fail, On The Whole, To Perform This Function, They Are Wrong And Need Reconstruction.

There Is Perhaps No Sort Of Self More Subject To Dangerous Egotism Than That Which Deludes Itself With The Notion That It Is Not A Self At All, But Something Else. It Is Well To Beware Of Persons Who Believe That The Cause, The Mission, The Philanthropy, The Hero, Or Whatever It May Be That They Strive For, Is Outside Of Themselves, So That They Feel A Certain Irresponsibility, And Are Likely To Do Things Which They Would Recognize As Wrong If Done In Behalf Of An Acknowledged Self.

When We Hate A Person, With An Intimate, Imaginative, Human Hatred, We Enter Into His Mind, Or Sympathize -- Any Strong Interest Will Arouse The Imagination And Create Some Sort Of Sympathy.

To Have No Heroes Is To Have No Aspiration, To Live On The Momentum Of The Past, To Be Thrown Back Upon Routine, Sensuality, And The Narrow Self.