Lay Morals, and Other PapersStevenson, Robert Louis
Philosophy
Lay Morals, and Other Papers
Stevenson, Robert Louis
Essays; Short stories
At least, we have gained a very obvious point: that _what a man spends
upon himself_, _he shall have earned by services to the race_. Thence
flows a principle for the outset of life, which is a little different
from that taught in the present day. I am addressing the middle and the
upper classes; those who have already been fostered and prepared for life
at some expense; those who have some choice before them, and can pick
professions; and above all, those who are what is called independent, and
need do nothing unless pushed by honour or ambition. In this particular
the poor are happy; among them, when a lad comes to his strength, he must
take the work that offers, and can take it with an easy conscience. But
in the richer classes the question is complicated by the number of
opportunities and a variety of considerations. Here, then, this
principle of ours comes in helpfully. The young man has to seek, not a
road to wealth, but an opportunity of service; not money, but honest
work. If he has some strong propensity, some calling of nature, some
over-weening interest in any special field of industry, inquiry, or art,
he will do right to obey the impulse; and that for two reasons: the first
external, because there he will render the best services; the second
personal, because a demand of his own nature is to him without appeal
whenever it can be satisfied with the consent of his other faculties and
appetites. If he has no such elective taste, by the very principle on
which he chooses any pursuit at all he must choose the most honest and
serviceable, and not the most highly remunerated. We have here an
external problem, not from or to ourself, but flowing from the
constitution of society; and we have our own soul with its fixed design
of righteousness. All that can be done is to present the problem in
proper terms, and leave it to the soul of the individual. Now, the
problem to the poor is one of necessity: to earn wherewithal to live,
they must find remunerative labour. But the problem to the rich is one
of honour: having the wherewithal, they must find serviceable labour.
Each has to earn his daily bread: the one, because he has not yet got it
to eat; the other, who has already eaten it, because he has not yet
earned it.
Of course, what is true of bread is true of luxuries and comforts,
whether for the body or the mind. But the consideration of luxuries
leads us to a new aspect of the whole question, and to a second
proposition no less true, and maybe no less startling, than the last.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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