And John Harrington knew
himself to be strong, and believed himself to be right, and thus armed he
was prepared for any struggle.
The quality of vanity exists in all men, not least in those whose chief
profession is modesty; and seeing that it is a universal element, created
and inherent in every one, it is impossible to say it is bad in itself.
For it is impossible to conceive any human creature without it. A recent
philosopher of reputation has taught that by vanity, by the desire to
appear attractive to the other sex, man has changed his own person from
the form of a beast to the image of God. Vanity is a mighty power and
incentive, as great as hunger and thirst, and much more generally active
in the affairs of civilized humanity. And yet its very name means
hollowness. "The hollowness of hollowness, all things are hollowness,"
said the preacher, and his translators have put the word vanity in his
mouth, because it means the same thing. But in itself, being hollow, it is
neither bad nor good; its badness or goodness lies in those things whereof
a man makes choice to fill the void, the inexpressible and indefinable
craving within his soul; as also hunger is only bad when it is satisfied
by bad things, or not satisfied at all, so that in the one case it leads
to disease, and in the other to the committing of crimes in the desire for
satisfaction.
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