The-Conquest-of-Happiness-by-Bertrand-Russell

mundane preoccupations; they require energy and
intelligence directed to the material environment.
Those who think that matter is an illusion are apt to
think the same of dirt, and by so thinking to cause
their children to die.
Speaking more generally, one may say that some
kind of power forms the normal and legitimate aim
of every person whose natural desires are not
atrophied. The kind of power that a man desires
depends upon his predominant passions; one man
desires power over the actions of men, another
desires power over their thoughts, a third power
over their emotions. One man desires to change the
material environment, another desires the sense of
power that comes from intellectual mastery. Every
kind of public work involves desire for some kind
of power, unless it is undertaken solely with a
view to the wealth obtainable by corruption. The
man who is actuated by purely altruistic suffering
caused by the spectacle of human misery will, if
his suffering is genuine, desire power to alleviate
misery. The only man totally indifferent to power