In other words, we should avoid accusing the specific person or people across from us of harboring selfish motives. Such an accusation would not only be rude, it would also be tenuous. People are complex, and we can never know all that’s going on in another’s mind or life. To admit the ubiquity of selfish motives is not to deny the existence of lofty motives; both can (and do) coexist within the same person.
