How are you going to make people less selfish and more
considerate of others? Less mercenary and more honorable? Less immoral,
or unmoral, and more virtuous?
That is the main thing which counts, from a practical, personal
point-of-view: "How am I to benefit by your conclusions and how are you
going to make others benefit by them? Unless you have something tangible
and useful to offer, your observations, though curious and instructive,
are not of much account."
Let us try, therefore, to reply, in this same spirit, and hazard some
suggestions which may prove helpful to those who want help.
In the first place, let us call attention to the fact that after an
individual has reached maturity, and his character and habits are
formed, it is extremely difficult to change them to any great extent.
The motives and point-of-view which determine most of his acts have
become, so to speak, a part of his second nature. This second nature is
something of slow growth and development. That is the obvious meaning of
the old adage--"As the twig is bent, the tree's inclined.
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