end in itself

Idioms  

1. A purpose or goal desired for its own sake (rather than to attain something else). For example, For me, writing books is an end in itself; they don't really make that much money. This expression employs the noun end in the sense of “final cause or purpose,” a usage dating from the early 1500s.

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Example Sentences

Is college an end in itself or a means to an end?

From The Wall Street Journal

It seems there is a baked-in sense that those debates were an end in themselves, that kind of debating is an end in itself, for equality and liberty and dignity as we think about it as a constitutional value.

From Slate

I have tended to come out on the side of the principle that since the only alternative to law is raw power, the law must by necessity be an end in itself.

From Slate

Running out the clock as an end in itself.

From Slate

In his article, O'Brien argued having a "pleasant, civilised nice place to live" was an end in itself.

From BBC