It is especially worthy of remark that in judging a system of doctrine we must take it as a whole, and not confine ourselves to a few utterances of the man who urges it, however unequivocal they may appear when taken in isolation. He whose motive to action is always some idea of his own personal good is an egoist. But a philosopher may hold that human motives are always of this sort, and yet reveal unmistakably, both in his life and in his writings, that he is not really an egoist at all. In which case, we may tax him with more or less inconsistency, but we should not misconceive him. 102. THE ARGUMENTS FOR EGOISM.--So much for the forms of egoism. It remains to enquire what may be urged in favor of the doctrine, and what may be said against it. (1) It has been urged that egoism is inevitable. This, to be sure, can scarcely be regarded as an argument that a man _ought_ to be an egoist, for there seems little sense in telling a man that he ought to do what he cannot possibly help doing. But the argument may be used to deter us from advocating some other ethical doctrine. "On the occasion of every act that he exercises," says Bentham, "every human being is led to pursue that line of conduct which, according to his view of the case, taken by him at the moment, will be in the highest degree contributory to his own greatest happiness." [Footnote: _The Constitutional Code_. Introduction, Sec 2.] From this we might conclude, not only that every man is an egoist, but also that every man is at all times a prudent and calculating egoist-- which seems to flatter grossly the drunkard and the excited man laying about him in blind fury. But one may hold that egoism is inevitable without going so far. [Footnote: Psychological Hedonism, the doctrine that "volition is always determined by pleasures or pains actual or prospective," need not be thus exaggerated. See SIDGWICK's _Methods of Ethics_, I, iv, Sec 1.] (2) The egoistic ideal may be urged upon us on the ground that it addresses itself to man as natural and reasonable. Thus, the Cyrenaics saw in the fact that we are from our childhood attracted to pleasure, and, when we have attained it, seek no further, a proof that pleasure is the chief good. [Footnote: _Diogenes Laertius_, II, "Aristippus," Sec 8.] Paley maintains that, when it has been pointed out that private happiness has been the motive of an act, "no further question can reasonably be asked." [Footnote: _Moral Philosophy_, II, Sec 3.] Our citations from Hobbes and Bentham and Green reveal that these writers never think of giving reasons why a man should seek his own good.