Page:An introduction to ethics.djvu/172

 inclinations. Now, as we recognised in a previous chapter, the inclinations and desires are natural to man. Without them human life would not be possible. Even if we would, we could not destroy them all. But the progress of the moral life consists in controlling and organising them. Every time a desire is restrained there is a contest for supremacy between inclination and duty. We want to satisfy the desire, but we know that it is our duty to repress it. Because our impulses are so spontaneous, our appetites so insistent, and our desires so importunate, duty must again and again come into conflict with them. Thus we come to regard the law of duty as set over against our lawless and unruly impulses and desires.

But we must not make the mistake of thinking that duty never conflicts with anything but impulse and passion. It may be our duty to gratify a natural appetite or impulse against a formed and consistent habit of life. The scientist may become so engrossed in his experiments that he may forget for a day at a time the need of satisfying the natural appetite of hunger. Here it is his duty to leave his laboratory for a few minutes to satisfy his bodily needs. The student may be so anxious about his work that he neglects natural desires for relaxation. In such a case it is his duty to play tennis of an evening for the sake of his health. Again, it may be a business-man's duty to obey an impulse of pity, in opposition to his formed habit of life, which tells him that it is "unbusinesslike." In all these cases, though duty lies on the side of appetite and impulse and instinct, it is always in conflict with the dominant interest.