The Feast of St. Friend | Page 9

machines for doing simple jobs with the maximum of friction, expense
and inefficiency. I should define the majority of these societies as a
group of persons each of whom expects the others to do something very
wonderful. Why create a society in order to help you to perform some
act which nobody can perform but yourself? No society can cultivate
goodwill in you. You might as well create a society for shaving or for
saying your prayers. And further, goodwill is far less a process of
performing acts than a process of thinking thoughts. To think, is it
necessary to involve yourself in the cog-wheels of a society? Moreover,
a society means fuss and shouting: two species of disturbance which
are both futile and deleterious, particularly in an intimate affair of
morals.
You can best help the general cultivation of goodwill along by
cultivating goodwill in your own heart. Until you have started the task
of personal cultivation, you will probably assume that there will be
time left over for superintending the cultivation of goodwill in other
people's hearts. But a very little experience ought to show you that this
is a delusion. You will perceive, if not at once, later, that you have
bitten off just about as much as you can chew. And you will appreciate
also the wisdom of not advertising your enterprise. Why, indeed,
should you breathe a word to a single soul concerning your admirable
intentions? Rest assured that any unusual sprouting of the desired crop
will be instantly noticed by the persons interested.
* * * * *
The next point is: Towards whom are you to cultivate goodwill?
Naturally, one would answer: Towards the whole of humanity. But the
whole of humanity, as far as you are concerned, amounts to naught but
a magnificent abstract conception. And it is very difficult to cultivate

goodwill towards a magnificent abstract conception. The object of
goodwill ought to be clearly defined, and very visible to the physical
eye, especially in the case of people, such as us, who are only just
beginning to give to the cultivation of goodwill, perhaps, as much
attention as we give to our clothes or our tobacco. If a novice sets out to
embrace the whole of humanity in his goodwill, he will have even less
success than a young man endeavouring to fall in love with four sisters
at once; and his daily companions--those who see him eat his bacon
and lace his boots and earn his living--will most certainly have a rough
time of it. * * * No! It will be best for you to centre your efforts on
quite a small group of persons, and let the rest of humanity struggle on
as well as it can, with no more of your goodwill than it has hitherto
had.
In choosing the small group of people, it will be unnecessary for you to
go to Timbuktu, or into the next street or into the next house. And, in
this group of people you will be wise, while neglecting no member of
the group, to specialise on one member. Your wife, if you have one, or
your husband? Not necessarily. I was meaning simply that one who
most frequently annoys you. He may be your husband, or she may be
your wife. These things happen. He may be your butler. Or you may be
his butler. She may be your daughter, or he may be your father, and you
a charming omniscient girl of seventeen wiser than anybody else.
Whoever he or she may be who oftenest inspires you with a feeling of
irritated superiority, aim at that person in particular.
The frequency of your early failures with him or her will show you how
prudent you were not to make an attempt on the whole of humanity at
once. And also you will see that you did well not to publish your
excellent intentions. If nobody is aware of your striving, nobody will be
aware that you have failed in striving. Your successes will appear
effortless, and most important of all, you will be free from the horrid
curse of self-consciousness. Herein is one of the main advantages of
not wearing a badge. Lastly, you will have the satisfaction of feeling
that, if everybody else is doing as you are, the whole of humanity is
being attended to after all. And the comforting thought is that very
probably, almost certainly, quite a considerable number of people are in

fact doing as you are; some of them--make no doubt--are doing a shade
better. I now come to the actual method of cultivating goodwill.

SEVEN
THE GIFT OF ONESELF
Children divide their adult acquaintances into two categories--those
who sympathise with them in the bizarre and trying adventure called
life; and those