Selfishness, in other words, is really already a kind of narrow compassion. If I am short-sighted, my compassion is extremely narrow: I only care about Five-Minutes-from-Now Guy. So I get drunker, and let Morning Guy worry about the hangover, which is his problem, not mine. If I'm a little more cautious, it just means my compassion extends a bit further: I want Morning Guy to not have it so bad. If I am prudent, my compassion extends still further, or perhaps leapfrogs selectively: I care about Five-Years-from-Now Guy, so I study and work instead of going out to get drunk; Twenty-Minutes-from-Now Guy and Tomorrow Guy can suffer for all I care, as long as Five-Years-from-Now Guy is happy!
We can see already that the dichotomy between selfishness and compassion cannot be absolute in a Buddhist context. Compassion is unavoidable; it is a necessary condition of all living beings, of all action, of all life. It's just a question of the range and criteria of its application.
---Brook A. Ziporyn, in Emptiness and Omnipresence---
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