The general function of desire in life is obvious; it is the most potent factor in conserving and extending life. Far back in a paleozoic psychic period life was below desire; but once originating under the pressure of the struggle for existence it has since developed into the most manifold and complex forms. Human life is the outcome of desire, and the human being is _par excellence_ the desiring psychism. As the moving factor of humanity history is its record, and present human organization, faculty, and achievement is its product. Desire, as the force to realize, to convert seen potency into actuality, the idea into reality, is now in the very highest examples of psychic development an ever increasing power, and no prospect of a psychic stage to be reached beyond desire is intimated in the present course of normal development. The tendency toward extinction of desire, when it does occur, appears always as pathologic or retrogressive symptom. It may be the dream of a philosopher or of a cult, but with Schopenhauer himself desire was a most forceful factor, and the devotee of desirelessness by very reason of being a _devotee_ to an object, desires it, namely, the state of desirelessness. We may desire to extinguish certain desires, and succeed in accomplishing this, but to desire not to desire, as general act, is a psychological contradiction in terms. A very low vegetative psychic status without any desire is possible, but all teleologic activity implies desire, hence extinction of desire can never be attained as an end. Desire moves the world and is the core of psychic being. Deprived of definite desire, we long for it, and if every wish were immediately realized, we should desire delay in gratification. The amount and value of life is measured by the quantity, quality, and effectiveness of desire. Orton characterizes the Indians of the Amazon as “without curiosity or emotion,” which must, however, be taken only as relatively true, but yet marking them as extremely low in the psychic scale. Education then, is a process of stimulating desire, of leading to ambitions and aspirations. As what is imposed on consciousness without desire is a hurtful burden, the true pedagogic method is always to awaken the wish for knowledge and power before it is granted. Desire as interest is assimilating power, and without it there is no mental growth. The art of education is the art of stimulating intellectual, æsthetic, moral and religious desires, and of providing for their progressive gratification with the best arranged and most suggestive material. CHAPTER XIV _SOME REMARKS ON ATTENTION_