When he enters upon the predatory stage, where self-seeking in the narrower sense becomes the dominant note, this propensity goes with him still, as the pervasive trait that shapes his scheme of life.

The propensity for achievement and the repugnance to futility remain the underlying economic motive.

The propensity changes only in the form of its expression and in the proximate objects to which it directs the man's activity.

Under the regime of individual ownership the most available means of visibly achieving a purpose is that afforded by the acquisition and accumulation of goods; and as the self-regarding antithesis between man and man reaches fuller consciousness, the propensity for achievement--the instinct of workmanship--tends more and more to shape itself into a straining to excel others in pecuniary achievement.

Relative success, tested by an invidious pecuniary comparison with other men, becomes the conventional end of action.