from
The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
Self-love \Self`-love`\, n.
The love of one's self; desire for personal happiness;
tendency to seek one's own benefit or advantage. --Shak.
[1913 Webster]
Self-love, the spring of motion, acts the soul. --Pope.
[1913 Webster]
Syn: Selfishness.
Usage: {Self-love}, {Selfishness}. The term self-love is used
in a twofold sense: 1. It denotes that longing for
good or for well-being which actuates the breasts of
all, entering into and characterizing every special
desire. In this sense it has no moral quality, being,
from the nature of the case, neither good nor evil. 2.
It is applied to a voluntary regard for the
gratification of special desires. In this sense it is
morally good or bad according as these desires are
conformed to duty or opposed to it. Selfishness is
always voluntary and always wrong, being that regard
to our own interests, gratification, etc., which is
sought or indulged at the expense, and to the injury,
of others. "So long as self-love does not degenerate
into selfishness, it is quite compatible with true
benevolence." --Fleming. "Not only is the phrase
self-love used as synonymous with the desire of
happiness, but it is often confounded with the word
selfishness, which certainly, in strict propriety,
denotes a very different disposition of mind."
--Slewart.
[1913 Webster]