Page:Dawn of the Day.pdf/137

Rh complaining of the impetuosity of a craving, it is really one craving complaining of another; that is, the perception of our groaning under such a yoke pre-supposes that there is another craving just as impetuous and even more impetuous, and that a struggle is imminent in which our intellect will have to range itself on one side or the other.

—We may in ourselves observe the following process, and I wish we might often observe and confirm it :—There arises in as, though heretofore unknown, the scent of a kind of pleasure; hence a new craving springs up in us. Now the question is, what is it that opposes this craving? If things and considerations of a more vulgar nature, or people whom we little esteem—the goal of the new craving veils itself in the sensations: "noble, good, laudable, deserving of sacrifice," all the inherited moral dispositions henceforth adopt them, adding them to those goals which are supposed to be moral; and now we imagine that we are striving, not after pleasure, but after a morality, thus greatly enhancing the confidence in our aspirations.

—Everybody who, in his childhood, observed varied and strong feelings,