The great law of human action
The great law of human action is a principle of desire and motivation that Tom Sawyer stumbles upon during the whitewashing episode, and it stands as one of the most quietly profound insights in the book. The narrator, adopting the voice of a philosopher, explicitly states that Tom had discovered this law without knowing it: namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. The law is not presented as a formal theory but as a practical revelation that emerges from Tom's inspired manipulation of Ben Rogers and the other boys of St. Petersburg.
Discovery Through the Whitewashing Episode
The law is born on a Saturday morning when Tom, condemned to whitewash a thirty-yard board fence nine feet high, faces the prospect of watching his friends enjoy a holiday while he labors. His initial attempts to bribe Jim with a white alley marble and the promise of showing his sore toe fail when Aunt Polly intervenes. Tom then examines his worldly wealth—bits of toys, marbles, and trash—and realizes he cannot buy even half an hour of freedom. At this dark and hopeless moment, an inspiration bursts upon him: nothing less than a great, magnificent inspiration. He takes up his brush and goes tranquilly to work. When Ben Rogers arrives, personating the steamboat Big Missouri and expecting to jeer, Tom treats the whitewashing not as a chore but as a rare privilege. He tells Ben that Aunt Polly is awful particular about this fence, that it has to be done very careful, and that he reckons there ain't one boy in a thousand, maybe two thousand, that can do it the way it's got to be done. By making the work seem exclusive and difficult, Tom transforms it into something desirable. Ben offers first the core of his apple, then the whole apple, for the chance to whitewash. Tom gives up the brush with reluctance in his face but alacrity in his heart, and soon a succession of boys—Billy Fisher, Johnny Miller, and others—trade their treasures for the privilege. By midday, Tom is literally rolling in wealth, having acquired twelve marbles, a piece of a jews-harp, a piece of blue bottle-glass to look through, a spool cannon, a key that wouldn't unlock anything, a fragment of chalk, a glass stopper of a decanter, a tin soldier, a couple of tadpoles, six fire-crackers, a kitten with only one eye, a brass door-knob, a dog-collar with no dog, the handle of a knife, four pieces of orange-peel, and a dilapidated old window sash. The fence receives three coats of whitewash, and Tom reflects that if he hadn't run out of whitewash he would have bankrupted every boy in the village.
The Law's Formulation and Philosophical Context
The narrator, having described Tom's triumph, steps back to articulate the principle Tom has unwittingly applied. The great law of human action is stated directly: in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to attain. The narrator then expands this into a broader distinction between work and play: Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do, and Play consists of whatever a body is not obliged to do. This distinction, the narrator suggests, explains why constructing artificial flowers or performing on a treadmill is work, while rolling ten-pins or climbing Mont Blanc is only amusement. The narrator offers an example of wealthy gentlemen in England who drive four-horse passenger-coaches twenty or thirty miles on a daily line in the summer because the privilege costs them considerable money; if they were offered wages for the service, that would turn it into work and they would resign. The law thus operates on the psychological principle that perceived scarcity and difficulty create value, while obligation destroys it.
Application Beyond the Whitewashing
Tom's discovery of the law is not an isolated insight but a recurring pattern in his interactions. When he trades his accumulated Sunday-school tickets for a Bible, he has not memorized two thousand verses but has acquired the tickets through the whitewashing scheme and other exchanges. The envy of the other boys, who realize too late that they contributed to his hated splendor by trading tickets to him, confirms the law's operation: the prize becomes desirable precisely because it seems unattainable through ordinary means. Similarly, when Tom later joins the Cadets of Temperance, attracted by the showy regalia, he discovers that to promise not to do a thing is the surest way in the world to make a body want to go and do that very thing. The prohibition itself generates desire. When he resigns and is free to drink and swear, he finds to his surprise that he does not want to; the simple fact that he could takes the desire away. The law thus governs not only the whitewashing episode but Tom's broader experience of temptation and restraint.
The Law's Thematic Significance
The great law of human action is central to the book's understanding of childhood, motivation, and social behavior. It explains why Tom, who hates work, can make others eagerly perform his labor; why the Sunday-school prize, though worthless in itself, becomes the object of intense desire; and why the constraints of civilization—washing, church, proper speech—feel oppressive to Huck Finn while the same constraints, when voluntarily chosen, might seem attractive. The law also illuminates the adult world's hypocrisy: the same gentlemen who would refuse wages for driving a coach will pay for the privilege, revealing that value is not intrinsic but constructed by social context and perceived difficulty. Tom's discovery, though he does not articulate it as a philosopher would, gives him a practical mastery over his peers that no amount of physical strength or official authority could provide. The law is not a moral lesson but a psychological tool, and Tom's intuitive grasp of it marks him as a natural strategist in the social games of childhood.
The Law's Enduring Place in the Narrative
The great law of human action is never again stated explicitly after its introduction, but its effects ripple through the rest of the story. Tom's ability to manipulate desire—whether for whitewashing privileges, Sunday-school tickets, or the chance to join his pirate gang—depends on the same principle of making things seem scarce and exclusive. The law also explains the community's behavior: the villagers' intense interest in the murder trial, the funeral, and the treasure hunt all reflect the same dynamic of desire generated by difficulty and rarity. Even the treasure itself, hidden and hard to reach, becomes more valuable in the boys' eyes than any sum of money could be on its own. The law thus functions as a hidden organizing principle of the book's social world, a key to understanding why people want what they want and how Tom Sawyer, without ever studying philosophy, becomes a master of the human heart.
