What Is Man? and Other Essays Part 8

Y.M. Oh, well? Go on.

O.M. In _all _transactions, the Interior Master looks to it that _you get the first profit. _Otherwise there is no transaction.

Y.M. Well, then, if I was so anxious to get that profit and so intent upon it, why did I throw it away by losing my temper?

O.M. In order to get _another _profit which suddenly superseded it in value.

Y.M. Where was it?

O.M. Ambushed behind your born temperament, and waiting for a chance. Your native warm temper suddenly jumped to the front, and _for the moment its influence _was more powerful than your mother's, and abolished it. In that instance you were eager to flash out a hot rebuke and enjoy it. You did enjoy it, didn't you?

Y.M. For-for a quarter of a second. Yes-I did.

O.M. Very well, it is as I have said: the thing which will give you the _most _pleasure, the most satisfaction, in any moment or _fraction _of a moment, is the thing you will always do. You must content the Master's _latest _whim, whatever it may be.

Y.M. But when the tears came into the old servant's eyes I could have cut my hand off for what I had done.

O.M. Right. You had humiliated yourself, you see, you had given yourself pain. Nothing is of _first _importance to a man except results which damage _him _or profit him-all the rest is secondary. Your Master was displeased with you, although you had obeyed him. He required a prompt repentance; you obeyed again; you_ had _to-there is never any escape from his commands. He is a hard master and fickle; he changes his mind in the fraction of a second, but you must be ready to obey, and you will obey, always. If he requires repentance, you content him, you will always furnish it. He must be nursed, petted, coddled, and kept contented, let the terms be what they may.

Y.M. Training! Oh, what's the use of it? Didn't I, and didn't my mother try to train me up to where I would no longer fly out at that girl?

O.M. Have you never managed to keep back a scolding?

Y.M. Oh, certainly-many times.

O.M. More times this year than last?

Y.M. Yes, a good many more.

O.M. More times last year than the year before?

Y.M. Yes.

O.M. There is a large improvement, then, in the two years?

Y.M. Yes, undoubtedly.

O.M. Then your question is answered. You see there _is _use in training.

Keep on. Keeping faithfully on. You are doing well.

Y.M. Will my reform reach perfection?

O.M. It will. Up to _your _limit.

Y.M. My limit? What do you mean by that?

O.M. You remember that you said that I said training was everything. I corrected you, and said "training and _another _thing." That other thing is temperament -that is, the disposition you were born with. You can't eradicate your disposition nor any rag of it -you can only put a pressure on it and keep it down and quiet. You have a warm temper?

Y.M. Yes.

O.M. You will never get rid of it; but by watching it you can keep it down nearly all the time. _Its presence is your limit. _Your reform will never quite reach perfection, for your temper will beat you now and then, but you come near enough. You have made valuable progress and can make more. There _is _use in training. Immense use. Presently you will reach a new stage of development, then your progress will be easier; will proceed on a simpler basis, anyway.

Y.M. Explain.

O.M. You keep back your scoldings now, to please _yourself _by pleasing your mother; presently the mere triumphing over your temper will delight your vanity and confer a more delicious pleasure and satisfaction upon you than even the approbation of your _mother _confers upon you now. You will then labor for yourself directly and at _first hand, _not by the roundabout way through your mother. It simplifies the matter, and it also strengthens the impulse.

Y.M. Ah, dear! But I sha'n't ever reach the point where I will spare the girl for _her _sake primarily, not mine?

O.M. Why-yes. In heaven.

Y.M. (_After a reflective pause) _Temperament. Well, I see one must allow for temperament. It is a large factor, sure enough. My mother is thoughtful, and not hot-tempered. When I was dressed I went to her room; she was not there; I called, she answered from the bathroom. I heard the water running. I inquired. She answered, without temper, that Jane had forgotten her bath, and she was preparing it herself. I offered to ring, but she said, "No, don't do that; it would only distress her to be confronted with her lapse, and would be a rebuke; she doesn't deserve that-she is not to blame for the tricks her memory serves her." I say-has my mother an Interior Master?-and where was he?

O.M. He was there. There, and looking out for his own peace and pleasure and contentment. The girl's distress would have pained _your mother. _Otherwise the girl would have been rung up, distress and all. I know women who would have gotten a No. 1 _pleasure _out of ringing Jane up-and so they would infallibly have pushed the b.u.t.ton and obeyed the law of their make and training, which are the servants of their Interior Masters. It is quite likely that a part of your mother's forbearance came from training. The _good _kind of training-whose best and highest function is to see to it that every time it confers a satisfaction upon its pupil a benefit shall fall at second hand upon others.

Y.M. If you were going to condense into an admonition your plan for the general betterment of the race's condition, how would you word it?

Admonition

O.M. Diligently train your ideals _upward _and _still upward _toward a summit where you will find your chiefest pleasure in conduct which, while contenting you, will be sure to confer benefits upon your neighbor and the community.

Y.M. Is that a new gospel?

O.M. No.

Y.M. It has been taught before?

O.M. For ten thousand years.

Y.M. By whom?

O.M. All the great religions-all the great gospels.

Y.M. Then there is nothing new about it?

O.M. Oh yes, there is. It is candidly stated, this time. That has not been done before.

Y.M. How do you mean?

O.M. Haven't I put _you first, _and your neighbor and the community afterward?

Y.M. Well, yes, that is a difference, it is true.

O.M. The difference between straight speaking and crooked; the difference between frankness and shuffling.

Y.M. Explain.

O.M. The others offer you a hundred bribes to be good, thus conceding that the Master inside of you must be conciliated and contented first, and that you will do nothing at _first hand _but for his sake; then they turn square around and require you to do good for _other's _sake chiefly; and to do your duty for duty's sake, chiefly; and to do acts of self-sacrifice. Thus at the outset we all stand upon the same ground-recognition of the supreme and absolute Monarch that resides in man, and we all grovel before him and appeal to him; then those others dodge and shuffle, and face around and unfrankly and inconsistently and illogically change the form of their appeal and direct its persuasions to man's _second-place _powers and to powers which have _no existence _in him, thus advancing them to _first _place; whereas in my Admonition I stick logically and consistently to the original position: I place the Interior Master's requirements first, and keep them there.

Y.M. If we grant, for the sake of argument, that your scheme and the other schemes aim at and produce the same result-_right living-_has yours an advantage over the others?