Considering the good and bad of ambition with examples

CONSIDERING THE GOOD AND BAD OF AMBITION WITH EXAMPLES

Ambition is another name for man's desire to do well, to hear himself praised and to attain fame and immortality. It is man's struggle against his mortal existence. It would be foolish to deny the importance of ambition for it is the fuel needed for success and fame. Men have sacrificed some immediate gain, health and at times even wealth for the sake of satisfying their ambition. Each man's ambition may be different from that of his neighbor. Somebody may want to become a doctor, another a musician, still another a politician or general. It may not always be the ambition to win wealth and fame, it may only be a non materialist ambition to do a job well. But though ambition may vary in kinds, the quality of ambition cannot differ. It needs determination, devotion and at times even ruthlessness. 

Napoleon. The son of a Corsican lawyer became the supreme dictator and emperor of France. Other men have risen to fame from similar modest beginning and have been of great service their country by struggling hard to realize their ambition. Marconi in spite of his personal wealth, had to struggle, scientists like Madam Curie are people who have used their ambition correctly and faithfully and have not allowed it to deteriorate into greed. There are other people whose greatness and courage at once come to the mind. 

The Indian leader Mohanlal Gandhi is one such. His ambition was to create in fellow men mutual love, his ambition was to free his country through a non violent revolution and he never allowed any personal gain or loss to come in his way.

In fact good men who have not allowed ambition to get an upper hand strike one as being so modest that one does not normally associate the word ambition with them, primarily because their ambition has been for others and not for their limited selves.

All constructive efforts is motivated by ambition whether for self or for others. Patriots, writers, soldiers, and men in other walks of life are all motivated by it. Only the extremely servile and the extremely complacent are not affected by it. There is a very narrow line between ambition and greed, and some people, if they happen to meet rapid success, are  prone to lose their bearings, when ambition becomes free from all social and moral responsibility, it result in the destruction of man's integrity.

Many men who began well and rose from humble beginnings lost their moorings and headed towards self destruction. There are examples of men who put personal gain before social gain and whose ambition became perverted .

Many great men have aided their own destruction by refusing to recognize the legitimate limits of ambition. The first lapse of mankind became possible when ambition entered Eve's breast, like the first fall of mankind, ambition is double edge if on the one hand it is the beginning  of a world of knowledge and experience, on the  other, it brings sufferings and death.

Ambition as Alexander Pope wrote.... First sprung from your blessed abode, the glorious fault of angels and of gods.

Ayeni Israel.