Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 16.djvu/785

Rh when they might bear the cross into the blood-stained dens of the Iroquois." In the tortured captives they had baptized even amid the flames, they saw their own fate, but it caused not a moment's hesitation. These all chose what to them seemed most desirable; for, beyond torture and death, they seemed to see the martyr's crown, the eternal reward. Not less on these supreme occasions than in the most ordinary affairs of daily life, choice is determined by the apparent desirableness of things.

But, if this be granted, it immediately becomes evident that one's views of what is desirable arise from an infinite variety of coincident circumstances with which the individual concerned had no more to do than with the shape of his skull or the color of his skin. That no two persons have exactly the same preferences or tastes, or would choose alike on every occasion, is a truism. Their ideas of what is desirable may have resulted from congenital or inherited constitutional tendencies. A drunkard's children are often endowed with a craving for stimulants, that sooner or later brings them to drunkards' graves. One man possesses fierce and strong animal propensities; another is never tempted by vicious allurements. The social condition of men has a great influence in this respect. I do not suppose the Prince of Wales ever perceived the desirableness of snatching a loaf from a baker's cart; but many a starving London tramp has felt it. Hunger and poverty meet a thousand temptations that never assail full stomachs and well-clothed bodies. Victor Hugo says that English statistics prove four robberies out of five to have hunger for their immediate cause. Or the state of the health may influence men's views of the desirableness of, things. Of the effect of impaired vitality in vitiating desires, every physician is aware. Many of us, offered a glass of wine, could accept it without the remotest danger of thereby becoming drunkards; but others, men like Mr. Gough, tell us that for them such indulgence would be the first step to a long debauch. How powerful is the influence of habit in this respect! I enter a tobacconist's with no other desire apparent to myself than to do my errand and escape as soon as possible; but a venerable gentleman told me the other day that, after breaking off the use of tobacco for thirteen years, the chance inspection of some fresh samples renewed with overwhelming force the old appetite and refixed the old habit. Or the decision may be due to occasion and other surrounding circumstances attending the moment of choice. There is a profound significance in the petition, "Lead us not into temptation." Many a woman walks our streets wrecked, from the fortuitous conjunction of opportunity, temptation, and desire, whose virtue would never have yielded to either alone. What an immense influence is exerted upon men's desires by their religious belief! The Jesuit among the Hurons could choose a daily martyrdom that, now and then, he might touch a dying papoose with holy water and snatch its little soul from eternal fires;