Suppose a case where I alone know that the wrong is on my
side, and although a free confession of it and the offer of
satisfaction are so strongly opposed by vanity, selfishness, and
even an otherwise not illegitimate antipathy to the man whose rights
are impaired by me, I am nevertheless able to discard all these
considerations; in this there is implied a consciousness of
independence on inclinations and circumstances, and of the possibility
of being sufficient for myself, which is salutary to me in general for
other purposes also. And now the law of duty, in consequence of the
positive worth which obedience to it makes us feel, finds easier
access through the respect for ourselves in the consciousness of our
freedom. When this is well established, when a man dreads nothing more
than to find himself, on self-examination, worthless and
contemptible in his own eyes, then every good moral disposition can be
grafted on it, because this is the best, nay, the only guard that
can keep off from the mind the pressure of ignoble and corrupting
motives.
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