Ambition (character trait)
{{Short description|Character trait associated with pursuit of lofty goals}}
Ambition is a character trait that describes people who are driven to better their station or to succeed at lofty goals.
Origin and nature
Ambition has been interpreted as the resolute culmination of a bold personal decision, but also as a receptive acceptance of an externally-provided great destiny.{{cite book|first=Orison Swett|last=Marden|author-link=Orison Swett Marden|title=Ambition and Success|date=1919}} It can be characterized as a drive or a goad that makes the person with ambition uncomfortable until they have realized their goals.{{cite journal|author-link=Joseph Addison|first=Joseph|last=Addison|title=Ambition: Its Use and Abuse|journal=Spectator|date=10 November 1711}} This discomfort can in part arise from the fact that the extraordinary goals that characterize ambition tend to come to public notice.{{cite book|author-link=Montaigne|first=Michel|last=de Montaigne|title=Essays|chapter=Of Three Commerces|quote=Ambition sufficiently plagues her proselytes by keeping them always in show, like the statue of a public place.|date=1580}} David Hume called it "the most incurable and inflexible of human passions".{{cite book|author-link=David Hume|first=David|last=Hume|title-link=The History of England (Hume book)|title=The History of England|date=1754–1761}}
Various philosophers have taken different views of ambition. Aristotle described it as virtue born of the love of achieving noble purposes, though he was ambivalent about its potential ends.{{Cite journal|url=http://www.jstor.org/stable/26224128|title=Aristotle on Ambition|author=Nieuwenburg, Paul|year=2010|journal=History of Political Thought|volume=31|issue=4|pages=535–555|jstor=26224128}} Philosopher Agnes Callard contrasts ambition with aspiration: in her view, ambition concerns goals with already-ascertained value: money, power, fame, and the like. Aspiration concerns goals that one does not yet fully understand the value of, but that one hopes to understand in the process of reaching for them.{{cite book|author-link=Agnes Callard|first=Agnes|last=Callard|title=Aspiration: The Agency of Becoming|date=2018}}{{page needed|date=May 2025}}