ClassicGist

Understand in about 5 minutes

The Kingship of Self-Control

by William George Jordan

William George Jordan argues that a person becomes king or slave moment by moment through the daily discipline of self-control.

Self-ImprovementCharacterMindPurpose

Idea map

The book in 4 ideas

Attain Kingship Through Self-Control Jordan's thesis: a person makes themselves king or slave by the daily discipline of governing the weakness within.

  • Two Creators

    A person receives raw material from one creator and shapes it as their own second creator.
    • Possibility A person is a possibility, not a finished thing.
    • Creator of Circumstance Strength makes circumstances; weakness submits to them.

  • Supreme Mastery

    Every advance is a new control, and the greatest of all control is control of the self.
    • King or Slave Each moment decides king or slave.
    • Moral Conquest Only man can wage a moral struggle.

  • Daily Discipline

    Self-control is developed by small exercises paid for on Nature's installment plan.
    • Installment Plan Small efforts accumulate as reserve power.
    • Single Day Govern the one day you actually have.

  • Its Fruit

    Governed character radiates influence and yields a happiness that comes from within.
    • Personal Influence Unconscious influence is unavoidable.
    • Happiness Within Happiness comes from being, not having.

Mental models

3 ways of thinking you can use

Moral Gymnastics

Self-control behaves like a muscle, strengthened by deliberately doing small disagreeable acts as daily exercises in discipline.

How it helps

It gives the reader a concrete practice instead of a wish: train the will on trivial difficulties so it is ready in serious ones.

The Single Day

Live each day as if existence were telescoped down to it, with no useless regret for the past and no useless worry for the future.

How it helps

It concentrates effort on the one day a person can actually govern, reducing the drift of regret and anxiety.

Unconscious Radiation

A person constantly radiates what they really are, and this silent, unconscious influence affects others more than any conscious pose.

How it helps

It reframes self-control as a duty to others, since governing the self quietly shapes the atmosphere everyone nearby must breathe.

Summary

The essence in plain English

The Kingship of Self-Control is the lead essay of a short collection of moral essays by William George Jordan. Its argument is direct: a person is placed into the world not as a finished thing but as a possibility, and self-control is the means by which that possibility is realized.

Jordan frames the inner life as a contest between two selves. In weakness a person is the creature of circumstances; in strength a person is their creator. He returns repeatedly to the figure of the king and the slave, noting that even a conqueror of the world can remain the servile slave of his own passions.

The essay is practical rather than mystical. Self-control, Jordan insists, can be developed the way a weak muscle is toned, through small disagreeable exercises done daily: dropping an absorbing book at its most thrilling page, rising at the first moment of waking, making conversation pleasant with a difficult person. Greatness in large things grows out of control in little things.

The wider collection extends this discipline across common human troubles. Worry is named the great American disease and forethought gone to seed; hurry is called the scourge that pays the highest price for everything; and unkind speech is treated as a crime of the tongue more destructive than a gun. Each essay asks the reader to govern a familiar weakness.

The closing essays turn toward what self-control makes possible. Jordan argues that personal influence is the responsibility a person can least evade, since unconscious radiation of character affects everyone nearby. Happiness, in his final essay, comes from within and consists not of having but of being, the soul's joy in what a person has become rather than what they possess.

Key concepts

Terms to know

The Two Creators
Jordan claims a person has two creators: the one who furnishes the raw material and laws of life, and the self who makes something of that material.
Why it matters: It places responsibility for character on the individual and rejects the excuse that a person is simply as they were made.
King or Slave
At every moment a person is either ruling the weakness within or surrendering to an appetite, condition, or failure.
Why it matters: It turns self-control from an abstract virtue into a present, repeated decision that defines whether a person leads or is led.
Nature's Installment Plan
Self-control is paid for in small progressive expenditures of energy, and Nature stores each small payment as a reserve fund for the hour of need.
Why it matters: It explains why no person is too weak to begin and why patience in small trials becomes strength in a crisis.

Selected Quotes

Short passages from the source

At each moment of man’s life he is either a King or a slave.
William George Jordan, The Kingship of Self-Control
He is a King ruling with wisdom over himself.
William George Jordan, The Kingship of Self-Control
Worry is forethought gone to seed.
William George Jordan, The Kingship of Self-Control

Source

Text used for this page

Source text: Project Gutenberg edition of Self-Control, Its Kingship and Majesty by William George Jordan.

HTML text: https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/51469/pg51469.txt

Project Gutenberg states this ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever.

Project Gutenberg presents the title essay within the collection Self-Control, Its Kingship and Majesty; no modern publication year is asserted here.