The relation of desire to will has been a fertile subject of discussion from Aristotle down, but we have to take up but a single aspect, namely, whether will and desire may with reference to the same object be contrary or distinct. Take the example of contrariety mentioned by Stewart. I wish a certain man not to do a certain act, but yet I persuade him to do it at the request of a friend. If I say I will persuade him, though I wish him not to be persuaded, this merely implies that the wish to oblige my friend overcomes the aversion to persuading the man. And, in general, apparent cases of conflict of will and desire may be resolved into conflict of desires. Hence the phrase, “I will do it, though I do not want to do it,” is inaccurate or rather an incomplete analysis. We should always add, “because I have some extraneous and stronger desire.” A box of bonbons is hung in a room at a height to be had by whomsoever will jump and reach it. In any party of persons there may be some to whom the wish for ease, the disinclination to jump, overcomes the inclination for the bonbons, so that this volition does not occur, others who jump even against this disinclination, the desire for the bonbons being the stronger desire, and others, very active, who jump without feeling any disinclination to the act. Conflict of desires is a common and almost constant state with many minds, and the evolution of man has been mainly through conflict of desire in sacrificing an immediate to a future good. In lower minds with so little self-consciousness and consciousness of a consciousness that they do not grasp conduct as a whole, there is a simple alternation of volitions flowing from the desires of rival goods, till one by its intrinsic force dominates with some permanence. These are the creatures of impulse, unreflecting and unself-directing by principle and reason. Higher minds realize _their_ situation and consciously bring in higher desire or motive; they form rules and principles of conduct: they become ethical beings, having self-control and self-direction.