14. With means in themselves indifferent, the case is otherwise. A
holy and pious end does formally sanctify those means, while a wicked
end vitiates them. I beg the reader to observe what sort of means are
here in question. There is no question of means in themselves or in
their circumstances unjust, as theft, lying, murder, but of such
indifferent things as reading, writing, painting, singing, travelling.
Whoever travels to commit sin at the end of his journey, his very
travelling, so far as it is referred to that end, is part of his sin:
it is a wicked journey that he takes. And he who travels to worship at
some shrine or place of pilgrimage, includes his journey in his
devotion. The end in view there sanctifies means in themselves
indifferent.
15. As a great part of the things that we do are indifferent as well
in themselves as in the circumstances of the doing of them, the moral
character of our lives depends largely on the ends that we habitually
propose to ourselves. One man's great thought is how to make money;
what he reads, writes, says, where he goes, where he elects to reside,
his very eating, drinking and personal expenditure, all turns on what
he calls making his fortune.
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