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NATIONAL LIBRARY OF MEDICINE
SURGEON  GENERAL'S OFFICE

    LIBRARY,
4NKE2

Section
 No. 113,   NO
W.D.S.G.O.
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3—613
NLM050046895 
 
 
SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY 
 
SHORT  TALKS  ON
PSYCHOLOGY
         BY

PROF. CHARLES GRAY $HAW, Ph.D.
     of New York University
Author of "The Ego and Its Place in the World," "The
  Ground and Goal of Human Life," "The Value
     and Dignity of Human Life"
NEW YORK
BRENTANO'S
 PUBLISHERS 
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       SS3<Vs



Copyright, 1920, by
  BRENTANO'S   .
All rights reserved
JUN 21  1320
   MADE IN U. S. A.



©CI.A571354 ^~'

,  V 
PREFACE
  The progress  of psychology has been so marked
that we might be said to be living in the psychological
age.   Psychology is now being applied in office and
factory,  in  army-camp and  college ante-room, in
literature and  journalism.   As a  result of this men-
tal activity, people generally have  become curious
to know what psychology is  like,  and how it may be
applied personally by those who  are desirous  of be-
coming acquainted with their own  inner lives.
  The Short Talks on Psychology, which have seen
the light of  day  in various newspapers,  are intended
to aid the  general reader  and  general thinker in
coming to an  understanding with himself.  Almost
everybody has the wistful desire to go behind the
returns of concrete experience; almost all of us  would
like to know why we think as we do, why our friends
act as they  do.  It is the  calculated purpose  of this
book to make the reader feel what Socrates felt—the
impressiveness of the Delphic oracle:  Know thyself!
to which the individualistic  injunction  might  be
added, "Know thy neighbor as well as thyself."
  The recent  war has given an  exhibition of what
man  is  and  can  do when  aroused,  for mankind has
done  and felt the impossible.  Yet mankind  is al-
ways  a  mystery  to himself,  so that psychology  is a 
PREFACE
study which is  both desirable  and imperative.  If
these Short  Talks enable any one to get at the mys-
tery of  conscious life as  shown  by that one person
they will not be in  vain.
  There is no lack of formal text-books on  the sub-
ject  of  psychology,  or is  there  any want of near-
psychological studies of a "psychic" character.  The
present  work seeks to get  at  consciousness, not from
the  standpoints of either science  or spiritualism, but
from the angle of Life.
                                       C.  G.  S.
  University Heights,
     New York City,
       March, 1920. 
CONTENTS
                                        PAGE
     I  What is Psychology?.....1
    II  The Psychology of Charm ....   3
   III  Psychology and the Pay Envelope   .   5
   IV  The Secret of Selling.....7
    V  The Raw Material of Mind ....   9
   VI  What Type of Mind Have You?   .   .11
   VII  Making Your Temperament to Order  .  13
  VIII  The Passing of Fear......15
   IX  The Psychology of the Agitator .   .  17
    X  Psychology and Citizenship  ...  19
   XI  Short Cuts and Short Circuits      .  21
   XII  Pleasure is Power......23
  XIII  The Psychology of Work ....  25
  XIV  Psychology and Play.....27
   XV  More Than Five Senses.....29
  XVI  Plodders and Dreamers.....31
 XVII  Have You a Fallen Arch? ....  33
 XVIII  A Sneeze.........35
  XIX  The Hang-Dog Look......37
   XX  Are You Rim Fire?......39
  XXI  False Windows in the Brain   ...  41
 XXII  The Muzzle Velocity of Mind ...  43
 XXII1  Are You Getting Dog Eared?  ...  45
 XXIV  Skull Practice.......47
 XXV  Laughing Before Breakfast   ...  49
 XXVI  Conscripting Your Own Brain Cells   .  51
XXVII  The Other Man's Mind.....53 
CONTENTS
                                          PAGE
 XXVIII  Where Delay is Dangerous ....  55
   XXIX  The Power of Attention   ....  57
   XXX  Your Will Works All the Time  .   .  59
   XXXI  Why We Welcome Obstacles  ...  61
  XXXII  The Terra Firma of Facts  ....  63
 XXXIII  Why Do You Laugh?.....65
 XXXIV  Where  Common Sense Ends ....  67
  XXXV  Psychological  Moments   ....  69
 XXXVI  Food for Thought......71
 XXXVII  Have You a Judicial Mind? ....  73
XXXVIII  Feeling Your Way......75
 XXXIX  What  is  the  Horse-Power  of  the
           Will?.........77
     XL  Habits  Good and Bad.....79
    XLI  States  of Mind.......81
   XLII  Energy or Bluster?......83
   XLIII  How We Become Partisan   ....  85
   XLIV  The Long and Short of Memory  .   .  87
   XLV  The Pin Cushion Brain.....89
   XLVI  Psychological  Substitutes for Alco-
           hol   .........91
  XLVII  Emotional Reaction Upon Life ...  93
 XLVIII  Practical Hypnotism.....95
   XLIX  How Sensations Affect Feelings     .97
      L  The Control of Emotion   ....  99
     LI  The Desires of Life......101
     LII  The Value of Pain......103
    LIII  Crossed Eyes of the Mind  .... 105
    LIV  Raising One's  Self by  One's  Boot
           Straps.........107
     LV  Emotion and its Effervescence   .   . 109
    LVI  The Variability of Pleasure     .   .111
   LVII  Being at One's Prime......113
   LVIH  The Psychology of Personalty   .   .115 
CONTENTS
                                           PAGE
     LIX  Synthetic Consciousness   .   .  .   .117
      LX  Instinct and Intellect  .....  119
     LXI  The Psychological Blessings  of Mo-
            notony   .........121
     LXII  The Psychology of Substitutes  .   .  123
    LXIH  Conscious Self-Deception  ....  125
    LXIV  Fretting.........127
     LXV  Number Forms.......129
    LXVI  Dropping Non-Essentials   ....  131
   LXVII  The Psychology of the Golden Rule .  133
  LXVIII  Thrills..........135
    LXIX  Mental Side Tracks......137
     LXX  The Theorizer.......139
    LXXI  Brain Bubbles........141
   LXXII  The Gilt-Edged Mind......143
  LXXIII  The Psychology of Advice .   .  .   .145
  LXXIV  Lucid Moments.......147
    LXXV  Love and Hate are the Same  .  .   .149
   LXXVI  Is Your Mind  Muscle Bound?  .  .   .151
  LXXVII  Psychological Fog-Time.....153
 LXXVIII  The Psychology of Culture  .  .   .155
   LXXIX  The Air of Expectancy.....157
   LXXX  The Brain a Barrel......159
   LXXXI  A Mental Close Up......161
  LXXXII  Sore Spots.........163
 LXXXIII  The Full Rigged Mind.....165
 LXXXIV  Finger Prints........167
  LXXXV  Mental Overtones......169
 LXXXVI  The Cream Separator of the  Brain .  171
 LXXXVII  Do Not Make  Yourself Scarce .  .  .173
LXXXVIH  Saving Dayught—Burning Daylight .  175
 LXXXIX  The Psychology of Manners  .  .  .177
      XC  The Psychology of City Life .  .  .179
     XCI  Giantism.........181 
CONTENTS
XCII	The Mental Dry Dock . . .	PAGE 183
XCIII	The Heart in the Right Place .	185
XCIV	Double Sympathy.....	187
XCV	The Appucation of Will Power .	189
XCVI		191
XCVII	Psychological Semaphore .	193
XCVIII	A Phantom View......	195
XCIX	The Psychology of News .	197
C	The Sentimental Victory .	199
 
SHORT TALKS ON  PSYCHOLOGY


                       i

            WHAT IS PSYCHOLOGY?

    MOST people look at  the word "Psychology" as
     though it stood for  something of a mysterious
character like witchcraft, hypnotism, New Thought or
the like, when as a matter of fact Psychology is noth-
ing more than organized common sense applied to the
problems of the mind.
  If you have wondered why a building four hundred
feet high looks longer than  a ship four hundred feet
long, if you have asked yourself why they always have
music at the moving-picture show, if you have  noted
that time passes rapidly when  you are busy, if you
have observed green shadows after gazing at red, if
you have heard the newsboy ask "what paper" instead
of offering papers in general—if you  have  done
things of this kind you have begun the practical  study
of psychology.
  In a more scientific way, Psychology may be called
a study of one's own mental states and his neighbor's
acts; it is thus a science of the mind's  states and acts,
of the intellect and the will.  It is not sufficient for the
                       1 
SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
mind to think or the will to act, not enough for one to
have mental states and for the other to exhibit certain
acts; to be a psychologist you must know the why and
wherefore of these inner dreams and outer deeds.
When you put yourself into an interrogative mood as
to ideas and motives, you put yourself in the position
of the psychologist.
  In order to turn your brain into a  kind  of home-
laboratory,  gaze  all  about you  and  then inquire
whether your eyes have seen anything more than col-
ors  and grays; listen to every sound in the street and
then note whether you have heard more than tone and
noise.   Suggest  to  your  mind  such things as—a
shovel, Washington, D. C, the moon, last Sunday and
see what other idea immediately leaps into your mind.
  Do you know why it is that in the simple but pain-
ful  act of arising in the morning, you keep thinking
that you ought to get up but do not budge and then
suddenly find that you are out upon the floor?   How
do you tell  when another person  is growing angry?
Why does fear show itself in wide-open eyes?  Can
you tell when a man is just on the point of buying
goods or when a woman is prepared to say "yes"?
  These  are psychological  questions with which we
are  generally familiar, but the secret of them means
study,  the most  interesting study in the world.   It  is
Psychology!
2 
II
           THE PSYCHOLOGY OF CHARM

/^HARM is like complexion; if you have either, the
^  lack of other things is not noticeable; but if you
lack the proper life-color, the presence of other merits
does you only  a limited amount of good.   Charm  is
not an effeminate affair, but a  solid  quality of life
which is worthy of being cultivated, because it is often
worth more than its weight in gold.
   Although charm appears to be something on the
surface of  the individual's life, it is really a sense of
the other person's individuality.  Just as it was said
of a certain man, "he was deliciously aware that other
people were present,"  so the charming person is one
whose own personality has the will and the power to
appreciate  the  presence  and  the  desire of other per-
sons, and that in a "delicious" manner.
  Writers who  charm by their style do not fail  to ex-
press their  own personalities, but they  do this in such
a complete way as to include the interests of others.
The great writer reads  his work while he is writing it,
so that he takes both his own point of view and yours.
The  result  is that the reader has the feeling that the
book must have been written for  him.
  To cultivate  the kind of charm which is to spell
                         3 
SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY
success, one has  to intuit the interests of the other
persons and then cultivate them  as though they were
flowers in a garden.  In talking with a boy, one turns
the conversation away from  the stock-market to the
baseball-field or camp.  If an elderly person is pres-
ent,  the  conversation which  involves  the past will
serve to charm the person who lives in memory.  The
person who rides his hobby in the presence of others
is mounted on a steed conspicuous for lack of charm,
no matter how well he may ride.
  The higher  charm  consists  in  introducing  such
topics of conversation and such plans of action as are
of interest to all;  and one reason why we refer to the
weather is because all are interested in this  one, su-
preme subject.   But there  are spiritual weathers in
fairer skies, and he who would have grace and charm
is careful to consider just where human interest lies.
In the lower sense, we are fond of gossip, but there is
a better gossip than that of the community;  there is
the eternal gossip of mankind which is ever a subject
of charming interest.
4 
Ill
     PSYCHOLOGY AND THE PAY ENVELOPE

    NO one can pay any degree of attention to the work-
     ings of the mind without noticing that our human
consciousness has its own way of working.   The eye
sees light as "color," the ear hears sound as "tone,"
the tongue  tastes chemicals  as  "sweet" or "sour."
The mind is a law unto itself.
   In addition to this principle of internal independ-
ence, there is a kind of Monroe doctrine of mind in
the light of which one sensation is brighter or belter
when contrasted  with  another.   Red  is  most rosy
against green, blue is at its best when laid side by side
with yellow.   The dull  world of physical facts may
be unaware of this, but  it is what every mind knows.
   Furthermore, the mind is in the habit of noting
things  in  ways purely  relative, so  that it  depends
upon attendant circumstances whether this or that idea
will make an impression  upon the mind.   In the
brightness  of day, you  cannot  see  the  stars for all
their shining; in the noise of the subway, you cannot
hear the tones of ordinary conversation  talk  as much
as will your companion.
   This sense of "it depends"  has an economic signifi-
cance upon whose basis one can gain some insight into
                        5 
         SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY

the present situation  in  the  industrial  order.  The
principle may be recognized at once when one notes
that a penny to a child is as a dime to a youth, in the
youth's mind the dime equals the dollar of the grown-
up man, while with the worker whose wage is, or was,
low the dollar extra may seem  the  equivalent  of a
hundred.   It all depends upon the economic starting
point.
   Economists and statesmen will have to work out the
problem of sane and just distribution; meanwhile the
psychologically minded may dwell upon the fact that
a sum  like  a hundred  dollars  has no fixed value, but
means  one  thing to  one man,  another to another,  all
depending upon what has been the individual's expe-
rience with money.
   If a man of brawn is to receive forty  dollars per
week for manual labor,  he will have to readjust his
mind along lines of critical psychology, for the simple
reason  that large  pay is  a new experience for  him.
From what one observes among the spendthrifts, ex-
cessive wages find  the  worker  in  no condition  to
realize the  meaning of money.   The Bolsheviki are
poor psychologists.
6 
IV
            THE SECRET OF SELLING

  IF a person about to buy  an automobile, a  suit, a
   house were able and willing to confess his  mental
state, it would be of great interest to the man who has
studied and practised salesmanship, one of the very
latest arts.   The business of selling is easier, is more
difficult than we buyers and  sellers imagine.
   Take the easier part of it first.  He who goes into
the market carries with him something more than his
purse; he enters the store fully equipped with all the
inherited instincts which go to make up the social con-
sciousness of the soul.   He  is credulous, gullible; he
believes all that the advertisement says and more; he
will take the  salesman's word  for  it and will cor-
roborate his testimony in any court.
   No soldier  in a trench is better fortified than the
salesman behind his counter; all that one can do is to
throw up his  hands, and cry, "Kamerad!"   Every-
body who reads this will admit the truth of the  follow-
ing confessional statement:—"/ have bought many a
thing which I did not want."
   Why is  this?  The social  urge makes  us follow
fashion, trust to experts, and obey the impulse  to keep
money in circulation.  We  are  born buyers and are
                        7 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

subject to business-hypnosis if not to humbug.  All
of this social consciousness is in favor of the man
who is there to sell the goods, to sell them to you.
  On the other hand, there is the hesitation, the con-
servatism, which acts as a counterpoise for the prodi-
gality which has descended to us from the race.  The
brain as brain is there  to buy; the  individual behind
that brain is there to resist the sale.  The man who is
looking at coat or car, at house or jewel, wishes to be
made to  buy.   Here is the salesman's  opportunity.
He can sell this thing to this man here and now; how
about future sales?
  "The customer is always  right"—in his desires; as
often wrong in his ideas.  He wishes to be convinced,
converted.  Courtesy works well enough on the out-
side, but it is sincerity which must  ring out in  the
midst of the salesman's melody.   He should lead, not
force, the buyer; he should be on the  buyer's side of
the fence.  Salesmanship is in its infancy; the key to
it lies in knowledge of  human nature  and  human
need—in Psychology.
8 
V
         THE RAW MATERIAL OF MIND

  IT'S an old saying that there is nothing in the intel-
   lect which was not first in the senses.  Certainly it
seems as though the free ideas which float through the
mind in reverie or thought betray their origin in what
we have seen or heard, so that ideas are so many kites
held down to earth by the slender strings of sensation.
  But there are different ways of viewing the mind's
raw material.  From one point of view, thought is not
born but like Topsy, it "just growed."   A more noble
view is the Greek idea of Minerva, the goddess who
sprang  full armed  from  the head  of Zeus.  The
Topsy-view makes mind a growth as natural and irre-
sponsible as that of the  plant.  The  Minerva-idea
would have us survey mind as something complete in
itself and independent in its  operations.
  To mediate between these extreme views, one might
suggest a third woman-character—Eve, whose orig-
inal desire was for knowledge; whence  she ate of the
fruit of the Tree.  There is  a sense in which the Eve
of Mind is and is not dependent upon  circumstances
for the knowledge which the mind is to  enjoy and ex-
press.   The mind is so prepared  for knowledge that
sense-impressions have all meaning to the scientist, no
                        9 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

meaning to  the dog who accompanies him.   In this
sense, mind  is like Hamlet in Denmark,—to the man-
ner born.
   Even if we grant that the affairs of mind  and its
world are a sort of fifty-fifty, with honors  equally dis-
tributed, we must not fail to note that the mind can
make both itself and its world.  The savage and the
scientist have  the same senses and  live in the same
world, but the ideas of the  scientist makes both his
mind and his  world  over anew in the image  of the
thinker's soul.
   The raw  material  of mind  is at  your disposal.
You may make of it the crude pottery of the Indian
or the  fine China of the Oriental.  The  threads are
put into your  hands, but it is  for you to design the
tapestry.  What did Raphael  make of  his impres-
sions?   How  did Shakespeare use his  sensations?
What meaning did the perceptions of Columbus have
to him?   The  lesser contemporaries if  these men
found  the mind's material raw,  and left it  in little
better state.
   There  is enough material in sensation for  works
great and fine.  The  possibilities of sensation have
just begun to be tapped.  Arts, sciences, and  indus-
tries have a great field at their disposal.
10 
VI
        WHAT TYPE OF MIND HAVE YOU?

TF one is to "make up his mind," he must cast about
-*• in his brain and see  what type  of  mind he pos-
sesses; then he will be better able to  develop his brain
along the lines of its truest advancement.   Of course,
there are the well-known  temperaments, but the kinds
of intellects are not so fully recognized.  In general,
minds are either visual, auditory, or tactual.
   The visual type of mind is common to all, although
some have better powers of visualizing.   To test your
mind along visual lines,  note what you do when you
try  to  recall a  telephone-number.  Do  you  say,
"three—five,  six, four,  or  do you actually see in
imagination the  3,  the 5, the 6 and 4?  Or, when
you  attempt to fix such a number in your mind, do
you  repeat until you get the sound  of  it, or do you
look at the numbers until they make a kind of arith-
metical  picture?
   The visual mind  keeps snap-shots of names, num-
bers, and the like, so that they move their eyes rather
than their lips when they strive to recollect.  Those
who  have visual minds will succeed in drawing and
painting, in sciences which  require exact calculation.
When they come  to write, they may have to borrow
                        11 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

from the auditory mind, but they will translate mental
sounds in mental pictures.
   The auditory mind is found in public speakers as
also in writers, while others make use of the sound
of the name, thing, or number to fix it in their minds.
A public speaker has sometimes the feeling that a sort
of mental prompter stands behind him  telling  him
what to say, while certain writers have the imaginary
experience of having their sentences dictated to them
by another self within the mind.
   The tactual mind which is  found in skilled arti-
sans, holds ideas by recalling the movements made
when those ideas were expressed in words or forms.
How often, in trying to recall a  name,  do you not
take a pencil and try to write it, as though your mem-
ory conserved the muscular activities involved in writ-
ing the word.  Typists and pianists cultivate the tac-
tual mind, and are guided to their ideas by means of
habitual movements of the muscles.
  Make up your mind!  You have all  three forms,
but one of these must be most typical with you.
12 
VII
 MAKING YOUR OWN TEMPERAMENT TO ORDER

HPHE old talk about temperament was something to
 -*-  the effect that we had just this or that sort  of
mentality—sanguine, choleric, phlegmatic or the like,
but the new psychology has advanced the  idea that
temperaments  are something like clothes which are
made to measure.   In the business of making  your
own temperament to order you are  your own tailor,
and keep taking your own measure.
  The whole matter  of the temperament, which makes
one person charming and another disagreeable,  may
be traced back to the type of mood which one is in the
habit of entertaining.  If one make a business  of
giving way to angry moods it will not be long before
the temperament becomes an accomplished fact—a
mark of the  individual's  character.  The  tempera-
ment has been made out of the mood in the same way
that a suit is made up from cloth of a certain pattern.
  But it is necessary to go behind the moods to find
the more immediate sources of temperament.   The
moods grow out of the emotions, just as the tempera-
ments grow out of the moods.  It is quite natural and
necessary to have on tap such an emotion as anger,
but to display this on all occasions is to cultivate the
                       13 
          SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

 mad-mood out of which will grow the choleric tem-
 perament.   In the same manner, one may be efferves-
 cent and over-hopeful most of the time and from such
 an emotional  tendency grows the sanguine tempera-
 ment.
   Emotions last for moments, moods for hours, tem-
 peraments for years.   If a man does not care to be
 over-optimistic he will be careful about cultivating the
 joyous  mood;  that  is,  he will not be excessively
 pleased at trifles.  In the same way  if one does not
 wish to become cross-grained, he will be careful about
 carrying a chip on his shoulder.  If  he desires to
 steer clear of  pessimism he will not  make room for
 every unhappy emotion which tries to ferment  in his
 consciousness.
   In the midst of this,  the expression of the emotion
 becomes an  important matter, for an emotion that is
 unexpressed is no emotion at all.   On the other hand,
 it is quite possible for the mere imitation of the emo-
 tion, as in the case of the actor, to produce the emotion
 itself as the cause from the effect.  You can grow
 ugly by making your face frown and scowl, just as
 you can grow cheerful by putting a smile about your
 lips and eyes.
  Your temperament is your own and you have a
right to it, but you are responsible for the type of
emotion which  you put into your brain.
14 
VIII
             THE PASSING OF FEAR

  IN connection with the war and its aftermath, we
   hear more  about the  itch of the cootie than the
twinge of fear.  If there were any cowards, they are
all out of the way now.   Nevertheless,  fear is  a
common emotion which  no swashbuckler can wave
away with a boast.  In the animal world, fear is uni-
versal; did you ever meet a dog or a snake which was
not ready to run or writhe away?
   Fear need not arise from a terrible spectacle in
front of one; fear is just as likely to spring from the
intense  nothingness of darkness.  For the  most part,
fear seems to be due to a sense of unfamiliarity;  an
old animal however ferocious is not as bad as a new
one.  In this  spirit,  Nietzsche's nervousness  made
him dread above all things else—surprise.
   To  pass through the  worst street  in  the town we
know is not as hard as to walk through the best thor-
oughfare in the town we know not.   In olden times,
the wayfarer was the wayfearer, so that the traveller
went armed.   Darkness we dread because  it gives us
no  information; death is terrible because we know
nothing about what, as Goethe said, must be a benefit
since it is so universal.
                        15 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

  It is not the heart which trembles but the brain, so
that we can say apprehension as fear is due to lack of
apprehension as knowledge.  Just as perfect love is
supposed to cast out fear, so does perfect knowledge.
The sailor has no fears from the sea, the mountaineer
from the  pass, the  fireman  from the  fire.  These
know what waves, peaks, and flames really mean.
  Why does one rise when a stranger enters?   What
is now a sign of etiquette was once the behavior of
fear; your ancestor rose to his feet in order to be on
his  guard against  the newcomer.  Why should  the
host  pour wine into  his own glass  first?   It might
look better to give this honor to the guest, but the same
ancestor had to do  that to show that his wine was not
poisoned.   Just as  soon as we know about people  and
wines, just as soon do we lose this onetime fear.
  The days of fear may be many, but they are num-
bered ; each day sees an old fear die of old age.   We
do not fear witches,  omens, signs,  strangers.   The
more we become acquainted with life and death, the
less dreadful they are.  Herein is an emotional argu-
ment for knowledge, for knowledge destroys  dread,
familiarity devours fear.
16 
IX
      THE PSYCHOLOGY OF THE AGITATOR

   THE proper treatment  of the Reds will have to be
    left to the proper authorities; but while they are
determining what to do, we may spend a little fruitful
time considering "Red" psychology.  WTiat is an agi-
tator, and how does a man get into the mood of agi-
tation?
   In connection with social psychology, it may be ob-
served that the social order itself  is responsible for
the production  of these  Gracchi, although it is far
from the purpose of society to warm such vipers in
its own bosom.   Society is  unwilling to  leave the
individual  to himself, but insists that the individual
become educated, or efficient as we say to-day.
   But when the work of  effective education has been
done  in the individual, the social order does not al-
ways have  a place for him, so that he may say, "He
that begat me had no bread for me."  When, there-
fore, a civilization produces men who are fit for lead-
ership but  can afford them no place  for the exercise
of their cultivated talents such men are likely to make
leaders of themselves, or  they become labor agitators.
There is no room for them among the captains of in-
dustry, so they make room for themselves as captains
of industrialism.
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SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
   In its rapid progress the social order throws off
these incipient agitators as a wheel emits sparks.  The
social order equips men for whom there is no place in
the genuine work of the State.  The professions are
so crowded  that these discontented ones become pro-
fessional trouble-makers.   There is no  room for them
in straight jounralism,  so they become self-styled edi-
tors of little red sheets.  The seating capacity of the
Senate chamber is limited, so that these quasi-leaders
must have a little industrial senate of their own.
   The remedy  is not so easily pointed out, for dia-
gnosis is often simpler than cure.  At the same time,
psychology can offer a suggestion on  this wise.   If
education and civilization generally tend to produce
these equipped men but have no horses  for them, they
have the high privilege of becoming something within
their own souls, captains of those same souls.  That
is, they may turn their intellectual forces inward in-
stead of outward, may construct rather than destroy.
   Idealistic as this may seem, it has been done by the
very best  of men.  Emerson found no place in the
State, but he  made  his own place  in  the mind.
Goethe did not use his mental powers for the purpose
of  agitating, but  with the  aim of promoting  the
"noble deed."   Psychology bids the agitator cultivate
his own soul's garden.
18 
X
         PSYCHOLOGY AND CITIZENSHIP

 A  SIDE from the special faot that psychology deals
•*■*- with the stuff out of which men as citizens are
made, it may be said that any form of scientific study
is likely to make for citizenship.  Science does this
because science proceeds by law,  hence there arises
an analogy between physics and politics.
  Psychology leads to citizenship because, in the first
place, psychology makes a man acquainted with him-
self, from which knowledge he may pass on outward
toward a comprehension of all mankind.  What man
knoweth the things of man save  by the spirit of man
which is in him?  If Plato made a good guess when
he declared that an ideal republic should have philos-
ophers for princes and princes for philosophers, we
may guess again democratically, and assert that a real
republic should have psychologists for citizens and
citizens for psychologists.
  In the psychology of citizenship, it is well to note
that civilization may be either  good or bad.  It is
good for those  who have the ability to absorb it,  as
has been the case with many who have come to us from
Europe, bad for those who have no capacity for it, as
in the instance  of the American  Indians.  The study
                        19 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

of psychology makes it possible for us to predict just
what kinds of people will tolerate and assimilate the
artificial ideas of civilization.
   Immigration is in large  measure a psychological
question.   It  can be  good for the immigrant who
comes to these far-off shores for the purpose of find-
ing more room for his efforts, just as it  can be good
for his host, who has an opportunity to  observe how
the other half lives.   But the moment that the immi-
grant-visitor and his native-host cannot  come to  an
understanding, immigration becomes a melting pot of
most uncertain brew, a veritable witch's caldron.
   Lack of psychological citizenship shows  itself in
strikes and riots, but does not fail to appear  in the
activity of the profiteer,  the speculator.  The effects
which  spring  from such  causes  are felt  by all souls
concerned.  For  this reason, a psychological ques-
tionnaire which should determine the reactions of all
citizens could  do only good, especially at a  time when
the world is wobbling along its orbit.
  A psychological recasting of the Golden Rule would
produce a new type of citizen.  That is, it would teach
every man that he is of like stuff with his neighbor.
20 
XI
       SHORT CUTS AND SHORT CIRCUITS

   THIS is the age of short cuts, short cuts in prepara-
    tory education, in work, in politics.   Hence it is
well to know just what the short cut can and cannot do
for one.   After we have seen that the cut may be too
short, we will shift to the short circuit.
  The short cut is a device whereby one in his efforts
seeks  to eliminate many of the details while he gets at
the essentials.   In education we will teach just what a
child  will need in life;  in work we will do just those
things which the results demand; in diet we will eat
such foods as produce the needed calories.  There is
so much to learn, to do,  to eat that we must have these
short cuts.
   In  contrast with the short cut which leaves out the
non-essential is the short circuit which keeps it in, but
does not fail to arrive at its goal with the same degree
of speed.   In  a short circuit, the whole charge passes
through the little connecting wire, or whatever the con-
ductor may be.  The important thing about the cir-
cuit is that, though short and condensed, it carries the
full force of the operation along with it.
   The man who despises the short cut with its narrow-
ness still has the power to condense and abbreviate, a
                        21 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

power made possible by the short circuit of activity.
He who knows the theory of number will short circuit
all this speculative science when he comes to foot up a
column  of figures.   He who  is proficient in grammar
and  syntax will short circuit  these things when  he
comes to write a letter.   The poet who knows the his-
tory  of  the word  that has come down to him from
the ancient Himalayas will short circuit his linguistic
knowledge and use the right word in the right place,
and that as if instinctively.   The short circuit has all
the advantages of the short cut, and many more be-
sides.
   The short cut has filled a place here and there, but
it  can do harm, since it  is always a movement away
from intelligence.   One needs both to do and to know,
to  understand what he does.  The demand of the day
in  the work of  reconstruction  is for men who know the
power of the  short  circuit, men of ability who can
bring all of their knowledge to bear upon a  given
point, be it a  canal at Panama, a riot in Seattle,  a
strike in Boston, a blizzard in Iowa.
   Side by side, the man  of the short cut and the man
of the short circuit may look alike, may for a time act
alike, but in the long run the accumulated intelligence
of the one will show the advantage  of  having the
whole mental charge leap across the wire.
22 
XII
               PLEASURE  IS POWER

  IN the endless discussion between Optimist and Pes-
   simist, the fact  that pleasure is  something more
than a mere  feeling has been overlooked.   Pleasure
is a power, joy moves on apace, and where pain dies
a natural death, pleasure has nine lives.
  The persistence of pleasure in the human mind is
attributable to the fact that the essence of vital force
is itself an enjoyment, the very enjoyment of exist-
ence.   Pleasure is creative, preservative, triumphant;
it holds in its merry hands the secret of life,' accom-
panies life, and plays into  life's hands.
  Pleasure is more tenacious than pain, so that when
one reviews his experience he finds that  it is usually
the pleasant  impression which remains.   Read biog-
raphies, and  you will  see  that in  spite of the hero's
pains, his  pleasures and  successes carry the work
along.  In the same manner, epitaphs are so flattering
that it seems  as though only  the pleasant things were
the facts remembered  in  the life of the deceased.
Evil and sorrow are interred  in the ground, but pleas-
ure and victory spring up like flowers.
   In  the life of man,  laughter builds up the system
while tears tend by attrition to wear the man away, as
                        23 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

a stream cuts its way through  a  rock.  The pleasure
of the heart is the heart's strength; it acts as a Spring
tonic, or strychnine.
   To observe the power of pleasure, note the reaction
upon your organism  when you  feel even  a limited
amount of  simple joy.  A sweet taste, a bit of good
news, money in a letter are little  things, but they have
the power to increase the capacity of the chest, rein-
force the heart, and cause the muscles to swell.
   In the same manner, pleasure  is a convincing expe-
rience, so that he who laughs must have logic on his
side.   In the sense  of pleasure  as power, there is a
"will-to-believe,"  a  conviction  that triumphs over
both error and sorrow.
   Enjoyment is thus a form  of energy utilized by
both will and intellect, so that  he who would succeed
in art,  politics, business, or what not, must have great
capacity for the joy  of life.
24 
XIII
           THE PSYCHOLOGY  OF WORK

HPHE employer is on the lookout for the man who
 -*- is "not afraid of work," but is work a thing to be
dreaded?  The nation does not advertise for soldiers
who are "not  afraid to fight," so that  it seems as
though work were the thing in life to be feared.
   The reason why work seems  fearful is because we
dread it in the form of toil, or the work performed by
the slave, who got his living out  of his ceasless efforts,
but who had no chance to look out from his work into
vistas of possibility.   In the form of hopeless, aim-
less toil,  work is a thing to be feared.
   A stage  higher and  a bit less fearful than toil is
labor,  a  form  of activity  in which the wage  paid
allows a  certain amount of  freedom.   Just as the old
form of work was that of toil, so that work performed
by the artisan of the day has about it the uncertainty
incident  upon both the will of the employer and the
dictate of the labor-leader.
   The psychological meaning of work  is found in the
ideas that work is something which the individual does
as coming from himself, although with Emerson  one
must lament that nothing is so rare with  a man as a
deed of his own.  Those who strike  for freedom in
                       25 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

work have their minds on work's wage, or work's limit
in hours, when the true freedom of work  appears in
the idea that what you are doing with your hands is
that which is dictated by your brain.
  To realize the ideal possibilities  of work, one must
put both personality and intelligence  into what his
hands find to do.   An  artist like sculptor  or painter,
actually toiling and laboring over his work realizes
work's meaning, since  he substitutes personality for
toil, intelligence for labor.  If every artisan could
work as an artist, the labor problem would be solved
in a way almost impossible for Congress or the labor
union.
  Work  becomes  genuine when there  is a certain
touch of beauty added  to it, and  the true worker is
he who can  see fairness and take pride in what he is
doing.   If one be a mere assistant,  helper,  or "holder-
on," the touch of beauty will take the toil out of work.
There were  days, say  in the thirteenth century, when
personality,  intelligence, and beauty made work real;
such days may come again.
  If the outer aim of work is to get value out of the
world, the inner purpose is to get worth out of the
worker.  Work properly done  is  one thing which  a
man may call his own.
26 
XIV
             PSYCHOLOGY AND  PLAY

   THERE is very little sincere appreciation of art, of
    the fine arts from architecture to music.  Some
affect aesthetics,  others scoff at extra refinement; but
art moves on of its own force,  as winter waters sweep
along underneath the ice.
   But, why art?  Why this  emphasis upon adorn-
ment when beauty does not bake bread or pay bills?
There  must be  some reason  for the semi-conscious
longing for the beautiful in nature and the five fine
arts.   WTierein does it consist, and how does art take
hold of man?
   Art  is play.   Play is the free expression of spon-
taneous and superabundant activity within the brain.
The ordinary demands of life, even in such strenuous
times as these, and the daily answer to the imperative
interrogatives, "What shall we eat, and drink, where-
withal shall we be housed and clothed?" cannot pre-
vent the perpetual quest of the  beautiful.
   As a form of play, art shows its nature in the sports
as well as in the arts.   Throwing a ball  back and
forth, batting it here and there over a net,  smiting it
from hole to hole, and all such extravagant ways of
consuming energy have in them the quintessence of
the artistic.
                        27 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

  The Greeks used such athletic movements to perfect
aesthetic forms.  Out of their games and battles they
brought the great arts.   American art is in the fluid
form.   We have the play-activity,  but neither  the
genius nor the appreciation which are  necessary  for
fixing these in their proper form.
  At heart, all of us are artists.  We are more will-
ing to consume time and energy in play than in work.
We prefer playing tennis to beating carpets, swinging
the bat to handling the hoe, throwing a ball to remov-
ing rocks from the field, driving a tin car to steering a
truck.   That  is, we prefer the useless, playful  and
artistic.
  Play's the thing.  Then, we still  cling to the primi-
tive life, as its forms of combat reappear on diamond
and gridiron.  The old-time music of the war-whoop
re-echoes in the college yell, the grand opera of our
academic institutions.
  How  greatly to be desired were  a rational change
from  European warfare to the  recent  Olympian
games!—We  need to  become  Greeks  and  Indians
again.
28 
XV
            MORE THAN FIVE SENSES

HPRADITION has hit upon the number five to indi-
 -■- cate the number of fingers on the hand, toes on
the foot, points on the star.  As far as the senses are
concerned, the number five is not half large enough,
for we have extra senses—the thermal, static, muscu-
lar, hunger, thirst, and the sense of movement.
   These senses are the range-finders of the brain, and
it  was probably because there  was no separate sense
for electrical phenomena that the physical force of
magnetism was  not discovered along with those of
sound, light, hard and soft, rough  and smooth.   In
dealing with the senses, the best psychological exer-
cise consists in  seeking out just what the sensation is.
Do your eyes seem more than  color and brightness,
your ears hear more than noise and tone, your tongue
taste  more than sweet, sour, bitter, salt?   Do  you
really taste coffee?   If  so,  why  does the flavor of
your  beverage disappear when  you hold  your  nose?
Can you taste peppermint when you have a cold in
your head?  Does ammonia really have an odor?
   Questions like these will sharpen your knowledge
of sensation, and you will see what the various senses
can and cannot do for you.  Just how faint a sound
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         SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY

can you hear?   Is it not possible that a cat has the
better ears than man's?  Can you see in the "dark"
the way  owls and other creatures  can?  Questions
like these will open up the way to a quantitative study
of the sensational mind.
   The senses have their own way of  behaving, so that
if you  gaze steadily upon  red you  will see a green
border on the red object.   If you place the points of
a pair  of scissors upon the tip of your finger, they
will feel like two points while on the back of the hand,
the arm,  the  shoulder they  may be  spread  far apart
and still feel like one.
   Different trades develop  different degrees of fine-
ness  in sensation.   The artist sees color to  which we
are blind, the musician hears overtones to which we
are deaf, the surgeons, the jeweler feels bits of pres-
sure to which we are dull.
   The more we know about  matter, the more we learn
about mind.  Almost any day may see the  discovery
of some new sense.
30 
XVI
            PLODDERS AND DREAMERS

TF the mind did no more than photograph the scenes
-■- which lay before it, there would not be  so many
psychological problems  for  us.   What  the mind
does  may  be likened  to  matching shades  of  silk
and ribbon  in the  dim light of a store, for the mind
picks out from  its supply the nearest shade to  the
one presented to it.   Out of this process,  which is
that of perception, comes the plodder or the dreamer,
or a third kind of  personality.
   The plodder  sees  things about  as  they  are,  al-
though he does not note that the actualities of nature
may have possibilities lurking in them.   The plod-
ding type of mind, famous for faithfulness and exact-
ness, misses much that may come when memory takes
unto itself the wings of imagination.   But the plod-
der has his  place,  and can change his mental habits.
   The dreamer-type of mind needs only a suggestion
from the outer world; then begins a sort of self-hypno-
tism in which the dreamer surrenders to his visions of
bright possibility.   In the dreamer-mind, a pumpkin
is a  coach-and-four,  mice become  horses.   Such a
mind  will write the  poems, tell the stories,  invent
theories;  it should  have its place in the school of  the
world.
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         SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY

  If plodder and dreamer could exchange places for
an hour each day, they  would  be better off;  since
the  plodder needs wings, while  the dreamer should
learn to touch the ground with a  firmer grip.  In
your own mentality, you  will have to find out which
type of mind possesses you, so that you can make im-
provements.
  If you plod  on  in  the stolidity  of  faithfulness,  it
might be better for you to give your  better nature a
rest, and indulge  your brain in a little romanticism.
If you are dreamy, and are thus inclined to mistake
the clouds in your brain for realities,  you will suffer
no harm when you come down  and  trudge side by
side with the plodder.
  A third mental type, which is  by no means as dis-
tinct, does not forego its free fancies, but tries in each
case to  see that they match  something  in the con-
crete world of experience.  On the other hand,  when
this kind of mind  deals with  grim realities, it  seeks
to touch them up with intelligence and ideality.
  As dreamy East is East and plodding West is West,
so with  oriental and occidental types of mind, but  it
is possible to bring about an  understanding between
the two.
32 
XVII
           HAVE YOU A FALLEN ARCH?

TN the walk of life, you want to make headway just
■*• as fast, just as smoothly as you can; to do this you
will have to look out for the fallen arch, the fallen
arch  in the foot as also the slipping down of your
mental  supports.  If you have a weak arch at head
or foot, you need an arch support, something to keep
you erect and well poised.
   If you examine your nature, you will see that there
are many arches in your  nature as there are in a
Gothic cathedral, and all of them are susceptible to
the fall.  If you give up your initiative for the sake
of imitating some one  else, if you drop your own
view for the general opinion of men, if you exchange
your  own ideas for the views of other people, your
brain will  suffer from  a  fallen arch.
   People who are mentally flat-footed are ungainly,
make slow progress, and soon grow weary when they
are afoot.  There is plenty of flat-footing in politics,
where the mass of voters  ballot according to what
the boss says, not in accordance with what they them-
selves think.   Then there is a kind of shuffling along
in the trend of fashion which makes us wear what tail-
ors think we ought to put on our  backs,  not what we
believe to be comfortable and becoming.
                        33 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

  It is your right and duty to put your foot down, the
moment that anything interferes with your own men-
tal gait, at that moment the arch begins to cave in.
People talk about " back bone " and a " stiff upper
lip;" what  they need just as much as these is a firm
arch for support and progress.
  Civilization has always been threatening our human
arches; if we had remained like the Indians we should
not have so many foot-troubles.   As long as a man
has to shift for himself in  the world, just so long his
arches support him; but when civilization offers him
all sorts of aids,  his arches in  head and foot begin
to weaken,  and he shuffles along in an uncomfortable
fashion.
  The cure for the  fallen arch of the mind  and the
flat foot of the will is  not so  easy  to find.   Shoe-
makers have devices for the real fallen arch, but if
your mental support is down,  you will have to find
a way of bracing it up.   Confidence and firmness will
do this.  Watch your arch!
34 
XVIII
                    A SNEEZE

TF we bless the man who invented sleep, how greatly
■*• should we praise the man  who  discovered  the
sneeze?  Taking snuff  is out of style, but one  can
easily  understand how  our forefathers  loved  to be
tickled  in  the nostrils  so that they might have  a
good sneeze.
   The glory of the sneeze is found in the spontaneous
act of  inhalation and  equally  spontaneous exhala-
tion.   Along with this  respiratory revolution, there
is a tonic effect noted by the heart, just as there is
a  sense of exhilaration  felt in  the whole muscular
apparatus above the waist.   Lung, heart, and muscle
have one delicious moment.
   If one knows how to  sneeze, he is in a position to
become aware of the fact that there is something to
him as a person; for the true  sneeze is the  sneeze
of selfhood.   As a rule, we employ the human self
selfishly; we use it as a hand which reaches out to
lay hold of  things which  our  misleading  sense  of
acquisitiveness thinks are worth while.   But the hand
is not the brain, or the purse, personality.
   The  sneeze of selfhood is an act which arises spon-
taneously from within, and goes forth into the  world
                        35 
          SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

 simply because there is power behind the sneezing in-
 dividual.   True selfhood, such as that felt by the man
 of genius, is so much self-expression, so much sneez-
 ing.  We do not think of Caesar's fortune, even though
 he  left quite a will.  We do not ask how much  Na-
 poleon would have had to pay in income-tax, or what
 the  film-royalties  of   Shakespeare   would  have
 amounted if his plays had been movied.  We think
 of these men as exhaling personal power, as sneezing.
   People  are always  telling  us that our  lives need
 more virtue, more wisdom, more efficiency; and per-
 haps they do.  Just as  much do they need more of
 that mental and moral effervescence which comes from
 the feeling  of extra power within.  Our  lives need
 more sneezing, which should be the involuntary ex-
 pression of that mental effervescence.
  Perhaps we need some of the snuff which the  old
 people used to  take  as stimulant  for  the glorious
 sneeze.  Our snuff may be found in  a good book
 which has the power to awaken us to the fact that we
 too may have some sort of mind in our own brains.
 Very often these stimulating books arouse the physi-
 cal sneeze by virtue of  the dust which has been al-
 lowed to gather in the pages.
  You have a right to sneeze, to express  forcefully
what slumbers within you.  If  you cannot do this
naturally,  try a little literary snuff.
36 
XIX
              THE HANG-DOG LOOK

    HUMAN life  is one  grand attempt to  avoid  the
     hang-dog look.   Shoulder and neck are equipped
with muscles—the trapezii—which work to hold  the
head back.   They are the check-reins in the harness of
the human steed; they keep the head from being hang-
dog.
   To hold your head up is a constant but unconscious
form of activity in which you indulge throughout all
your waking hours.  Grow drowsy  in chair or bed,
and  your neck-muscles  surrender you to  the hang-
dog look.  But without your will and of themselves,
the muscles work for you to make you look like a
man.
   One might imagine  that the head were  placed
upon the shoulders as a column upon a capital,  but
the fact is  that it is  only by your constant effort, or
the effort of those trapezii muscles, that your head
keeps its balance.  Your will works, not  merely to
advance you, but to keep you as you are.   You must
will in order to exist, if nothing else.
   There  must be no  let up, or the hang-dog look will
set in.  When the trench has been taken, the army
must keep on fighting to hold its new position.  Man
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

 is not a machine that is put together, but an organism
 which must keep on living, or cease to occupy space
 in the world.
   The self is the head which you must hold up and
 keep away from hang-doggedness by constant activity
 on the part of the will.   You  can say, "I am  I," or
 "Here  I am."   You must keep on working or you
 will cease to exist.  The man strives to secure  a
 position, the candidate works to obtain office, but the
 real work begins when position and office are achieved.
 If work ceases  then, the man  becomes hang-dogged.
   Plenty of people have the hang-dog look, perhaps
 because they do not understand that to  live is to work,
 to exist is to will, to have is to hold.   All existence is
 a kind of activity, and those who do not see this soon
 become  as dogs, weak infants,  and drowsy people.
 They show the hang-dog look.
   When poet and philosopher advise one to will him-
 self, they merely counsel one to keep  pulling on the
muscles of the neck.  Man will never become a giraffe
by stretching his neck, but he will continue to be man,
and will avoid the hang-dog look.
38 
XX
               ARE YOU RIM FIRE?

1DEFORE  the war, it was not an uncommon sight
*-* to see rifles and  pistols with little rim-fire car-
tridges, which exploded as soon as they were touched
on the edges of the metal.   Since the war, we have
grown used to great things, great men, great issues;
that is, we have thrown little rim-fire cartridges out of
our belts, and have filled them with ammunition which
is centre fire; it will not shoot until it is hit right in
the centre.
  The question for you to decide is whether your na-
ture  is such that it explodes easily like the old-style
cartridge, or whether you have taught yourself to shoot
only when something central and  vital in your nature
has been appealed to.   Perhaps there is more to your
nature than  you imagine; since this is most likely the
case,  it will be well for you to try the centre fire car-
tridge of your brain.
  The rim-fire man goes off in response  to mere  im-
pressions when he should turn these over in his mind
to see whether they have in them any  of the  central
ideas of the brain.   Just as the little rim-fire car-
tridge snaps as soon as it is touched, so  this type of
man  explodes  in the form of "snap judgment," snap-
action, snap emotion.   He has still  to learn how to
use the centre-fire cartridge.
                        39 
SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
   The moment you begin to think and act in accord-
ance with what is in your own nature and what  is
peculiar to  your own  experience,  you begin to use
the centre-fire forces in  your mind.   You have the
will, which  is like the hammer  in the rifle; all that
the will needs is the cartridge which is made to ex-
plode when  its very centre is touched and then  only.
   As Americans, we are beginning to see that the old
style shooting will not hit the mark  the way it used
to.  We cannot be provincial, selfish, and isolated
from the rest of the world;  as  Americans we  must
drop our rim-fire ammunition for the new style of
cartridge.  We honor the men who won victories with
flint-locks, but we need better guns and we have them,
too.
   WTien you  become  centre-fire, you  will  say less
and utter more; you will do less but accomplish more;
you will have fewer emotions and more  experience.
Your life is  something more than a shooting-gallery;
it  is  a  battle-field where your cartridge must be cen-
tre-fire.
40 
XXI
         FALSE WINDOWS IN THE BRAIN

  JUST as an architect  tries  to  make  a house look
   symmetrical by placing false  windows by the side
of the real ones, so people are often tempted to put
only the sash and blind in the place where there should
be a  real source of illumination.   The  houses and
brains thus treated may look better from the outside,
but there is no increase of candle-power within.  The
brain-windows are false.
  One great aim, and one as great and genuine as any,
is to have light and enjoy it;  since  light has the
power to illumine,  to cheer,  and sometimes to cure
ills.   If  we lived in  the  open, we  should be better
off;  but  since we  have decided as civilized beings
to come indoors, the subject of windows has become
important.
  False windows appear as soon as a person is under
the delusion  he  is  possessed of all  the illumination,
all the knowledge of out-doors.   In contrast with this,
we have the  sober  example of a Socrates, who ad-
mitted that his knowledge was no  more  than an  in-
tense consciousness of ignorance.  Socrates had done
away with all the false windows of his brain.
  Education, while  its main purpose is to give  light,
                       41 
         SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY

may serve as a false window.  Because  a person
has studied poetry,  it does not follow that he has
become poetical.  If he  has followed science, it is
not certain that the secrets of nature have been opened
to him.  The fact that he knows economics, will not
make him a success in finance.  Poetry, science, and
wealth come only to those whose brain windows are
genuine, not false and showy.
   Windows serve as well the purpose  of ventila-
tion.   When we  meet a person whose ideas are stuffy
and traditional, we know that he has not had enough
brain-windows open; perhaps his windows have been
only false, attractive affairs which  have admitted no
air into the halls of his brain.  On the other hand,
the man or woman  who has original ideas,  phrases,
plans,  is obviously  one whose windows  are real af-
fairs through which light and air stream freely.
   If we paid  more attention to what was  going on
within  the walls  of the brain and thought  less about
appearances, we  should live brighter, more airy lives.
If you have any false windows, get  your saw and
cut them out.
42 
XXII
         THE MUZZLE VELOCITY OF MIND

 OEOPLE are in the habit  of blaming others for
 -*-   exaggeration, because this  sort of excess is in-
 dulged in by the tongue.  Doubtless we talk more
 than is necessary, our adjectives abound, we are guilty
 of over-statement.  But there is a kind of exaggera-
 tion which has its place in the same  way that the
 extreme muzzle-velocity  plays a part  with the shell
 that is to land twenty miles away.  For that sort
 of operation, there must be excessive muzzle-velocity.
   Great work means a high degree of muzzle-velocity
 on  the part of the  mind  which plans great  deeds.
 The orator who seems to whisper  to the hearers  in
 the back row really shouts to those who are in front.
 The actor who seems natural  to the spectators is ex-
 aggerating every movement, tone, or bit of mimicry.
 The singer who is to reach ears and hearts puts an
 extra amount of tone and  feeling  into every note.
 With all of these performers, the muzzle-velocity of
 the mind is carefully calculated and executed.
  Conscious exaggeration is one of the marks peculiar
to genius, so that Shakespeare or Dante is little more
than the average man raised to the second  power;
he is the ordinary man  exaggerating  his ideas so
                        43 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

that they will carry like  the  shells shot from  the
gun with great muzzle-velocity.
   The  successful person  may  be  reserved in  his
speech, but he exaggerates in his actions.  The can-
didate who wants a thousand votes acts as though he
were after a million.   The salesman who wishes to
sell a dollar's worth has the  intense  air of a  man
who would make the bill a hundred.  He is selling,
not a book, but  a  library, not a chair but a suite
of furniture, not a  collar but a suit of clothes.   He
exaggerates  by means  of enterprise  and courtesy.
   The exaggeration which  comes from intense muz-
zle-velocity comes from the psychological sense of
superabundance, so that when we come to deal with
the person who is intense we are made to feel that
there is a great deal behind what he says and  does.
In  order to  operate a great  range, the successful
person overdoes the little things.
   To be one  of the "big  guns," you  will have to
overdo the common task, for the whole charge must
go off behind  each shell.
44 
XXIII
         ARE YOU GETTING DOG EARED?

HPHE best books are the most likely to become dog-
 -*-  eared, because they are read so  much that the
pages turn down and frazzle out at the corners; in
exactly  the same  way,  the good man  and  efficient
worker  are the  ones most  likely to become  a dog-
eared man because they use their brains and bodies
too  much.  The man  of leisure among  either the
rich or  poor is  not so  liable to this malady in the
ears.
   Routine is  a  good thing,  and the engineer who
runs his locomotive over the same  route  gets to be
the best  kind of man  for  that particular trip.  In
the same way, the man  who has stuck to figures, or
sold goods, or kept his  mind on advertising is the
most valuable sort of  man  to have  in connection
with the house.   Nevertheless,  these good men  are
like the best  books, since both have the tendency to
wear out on the edges and become dog-eared.
   The dog-eared man needs a rest, but a rest in the
best sense of the  term, which does not mean idleness.
His rest can come from a  temporary  change of oc-
cupation,  or  it  may come about in  the midst of
routine work as  an avocation which the man takes
to  refresh  his mind.
                        45 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

   President Garfield was  famous for his side-inter-
est in geometry, a famous bishop was known as a fine
checker-player, Franklin  flew  kites,  a well-known
mathematician collected plants,  a great financier col-
lected paintings.
   On a less pretentious scale, the average man may
save the book of business  from becoming dog-eared
when that man hits upon some side interest which will
give him little by-products of  the main enterprise.
Just as some travellers relieve the monotony of the
journey by making the hum of  the wheels play dif-
ferent tunes,  so the necessary sameness of  life and
work many be turned  into music by  all those who
have ears to  hear.
   Dog-ears on men often  come when  the man has
given himself up  to old ideas,  and if  men  stick  to
those they wake up sometimes to find themselves  in
a  sanatarium.  If a man  wants to be like  a crisp
volume  right off  the  press, he ought to keep his
brain open to new convictions; a man who gets away
from the idea that everything  will  always be the
same is the man who is saving himself from becoming
dog-eared.
46 
XXIV
                "SKULL PRACTICE"

 rT1HIS  vivid  but undignified  term serves to indi-
 •*-  cate the importance which cool thought has for
 ardent action; for it is only as the preparatory thought
 works itself out in the "skull" that action can  spring
 forth unfettered  from the hand.   The  will  stands
 in  need of  motivating  ideas,  which must be per-
 fected and smoothed out in what is called skull prac-
 tice.
   It  is not only  in  athletics with  signal-drills and
 the practice behind closed  gates that mental prepara-
 tion  is  of  use.   The  mural  painter,  Puvis  de
 Chavannes was in the habit of spending days before
 the blank wall-spaces he was to paint before he ever
 laid his brush to  the plaster.   He  had  to see his
 picture  in  his  brain  before  he could let others see
 it upon the wall, and  the fidelity of the preliminary
 painting in the mind  was  a  measure of the perfec-
 tion which the painting was  to  attain.
  From  what  we can  gather of  Marshal  Foch's
 strategy, it seems as though  the  battle  were first
fought out within the coils of his own brain; the actual
combat  was but the bloody realization of the clear
cut  ideas  which he had fought through  in his own
                        47 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

military  mind.   It was the lack of just this "skull
practice" which was responsible for the downfall of
German  arms.
  The surgeon who is to  succeed in a difficult,  dan-
gerous operation in major  surgery will be careful
to operate first upon his own  brain; that is, he will
go  through  the acts  which a few  hours  later  are
to become the real touches of the operation.  With-
out such "bloodless surgery"  beforehand the opera-
tion is not so likely to be successful.
  In  place  of  such brain-practice, those who think
about their  work, their duties, their  problems  are
more likely  to surrender to day-dreams.  This loose-
ness of the mind is far removed from that tight proc-
ess which the athlete has assigned to the hard skull.
Indeed it may  be said that  to think the  act through
is often  more  difficult than to carry it  into opera-
tion.
  In the same way that a little calisthenic exercise in
the morning is  good for the whole bodily system, so
a  bit of morning "skull practice" will serve  the
worker in the tasks he is to perform.  If he  has been
through  such  mental  calisthenics,  the  actual work
will move with unexpected smoothness  and speed.
There is  plenty of room in the brain for "skull prac-
tice;" there  is quite a gymnasium there.
48 
XXV
          LAUGHING BEFORE BREAKFAST

  IT  would seem as though the earliest hours of the
   day, in the reddest rays of the dawn and the fresh-
 est winds of Heaven, one would best do  his laugh-
 ing;  since night has effaced memory  of the  past
 while  day has come with its promises.  Neverthe-
 less, we are advised that he who laughs before break-
 fast  will  weep  before  night.  How  is this bit  of
 grandmother-psychology to be explained?
   In dealing with our emotions, we are soon brought
 to the realization that the amount of feeling which
 we have is limited; our hopes and fears,  loves and
 hates,  pleasures and pains  are  constricted by  the
 copious but definite  amount  of blood in  our veins.
 So then, he who has just so  much laughter must  be
 careful how to expend it, and the early laugh of dawn
 may find the  individual  empty of smiles and full  of
 tears when evening comes.
  Over and  above the  tendency  of emotion to  ex-
 haust itself through expression, there is an  emotional
 shifting which can easily turn laughter to  tears.   In
the instance  of  the  babe,  whose  emotional system
 is no harder  than its cranium, there is the observed
tendency to pass from tears to smiles, for the child
                       49 
          SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

 has a way of shifting from one source to the other,
 just as  it can easily mix the two in one fairly com-
 plete state of mind.   In the last analysis, we are all
 children of emotion.
   It has been noted by the historian that the worst
 moment for a bad government is that moment when it
 begins to grow better.  This paradox of emotion may
 be due to the idea of contrast between the new present
 and the old past with its pains; or it may involve
 the idea that emotion is sure to  shift from one course
 to another, so that the common man who has endured
 with stolid patience finds himself amused by causes
 which are less influential than those of the past.
  Emotions like  laughter and  tears are sure  to ex-
 haust their powers and give  way to  something differ-
 ent,  aye contradictory.  The soul that has  received
 extra-good news or fortune may  "weep for joy," while
 the saddened person will often express his  grief by
 a cynical smile.   Changes and contradictions are the
 rules which apply to all forms  of emotional expres-
 sion.
  Life  is a matter of  laughter, since both  life  and
laughter mean power to overcome difficulties.   As the
amount  of power we  possess is limited, so is the
amount  of laughter.  If we laugh first, we cannot
laugh last.
50 
XXVI
    CONSCRIPTING YOUR OWN BRAIN CELLS

   PSYCHOLOGY is not clairvoyance, not astrology;
    if there are faults with us they lie in ourselves,
not in our stars.  One may look for signs in the
sky or omens on earth, but it is better to have in-
side information.  It would be a fine thing if one
had a  kind of mental secretary to whom he could
say, "Please tell me  what I am thinking about, or
what I am going to do."
   The brain  itself must  be this  private secretary,
and the sooner one comes to an understanding with
his brain the better.   In that brain are bubbles which
rise above the long  conscious  stream which started
when man started, and it is  for you to  know just
where these bubbles will appear.  This is what makes
inside information an important matter.
   One should realize  that the equipment of his mind
is vast, its stores  wholesale in their magnitude, its
history  really prehistoric.  In a mystical way, the
Hindus try to  believe  that the individual is the whole
world  in  himself, and so he says of every existing
thing:   "That art thou."  In a more temperate man-
ner, one may  say of every existing thing that it may
have meaning for him, who may be the "mute, inglori-
                        51 
          SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

 ous Milton," or any other grand character in history.
 People used to play upon  this idea when  they in-
 formed the boy that he might some day become Presi-
 dent.
   Inside information lets one know that he is "in" on
 all that goes on in the world.  Goethe said  he never
 heard of a crime which he could not  have committed,
 and  one might say  generally that  he never heard of
 anything that he could not  have done.   As an  idea
 this feeling of being "in" on all the deeds and events
 of the world is a good thing;  it gives a man confi-
 dence, and lets him feel that he is the great man on
 a small scale, or in another situation.
  One has a right to become acquainted with himself,
 with his  Self.  Psychology has  the advantage of
 telling one that practically  all there is to the mind
 is a receiver of impressions, reacting upon impulses
 in the  light,  moist air of emotion.  The lessons of
psychology are like the great commandments of the
Law, Receive the world;  react upon  that world.
  You have the right to  conscript the  cells  of your
brain, put them in psychological uniform, and make
them fight.  It is your duty to mobilize your brain.
52 
XXVII
            THE OTHER MAN'S MIND

   THE tighter becomes  physical science, the looser
    are the ways  in  which we  tend  to  regard  the
mind:  rationalism is  accompanied  by spiritualism,
materialism by  New  Thought, occultism, astrology
and mind-reading.  In these forms  of effervescence,
man seeks relief from the restraints of  reason and
scientific calculation.
  W^hy should you try to  read another's  mind when
your own  is a  book  which you have not opened?
Why do you try  to read by moonlight when you have
failed  to use the brighter sunlight?  Your own mind
is a book written in your mother-tongue;  your neigh-
bor's is in hieroglyphic.  Become a mind-reader, but
let your mental  charity  begin at home.
  You may read into your neighbor's mind by con-
sidering how you feel under similar conditions.  He
has eyes and ears, heart and soul in the same way that
you have.  "There is no breach in nature  like the
breach between two minds," said William James.   "I
know," said Pestalozzi, "that no man is either will-
ing or able to help  any other man."  At the same
time, the breach between minds can be bridged over,
tunnelled under, flown across in a mental airplane.
                        53 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

   It is obvious that if one blinks he sees light, if he
turns his head he hears sound, if his eyes open wide
he is afraid,  if he concentrates on  something nearby
when you are talking he is probably paying attention
to what you say.   By looking into his eyes you  can
see in their light-shade whether your argument is  get-
ting back into his brain  or is  being resisted at the
eye-lids.  This is  genuine mind-reading;  it is  the
study of the other man's mind as a primer.
   A general like  Marshal Foch could read the Teu-
tonic mind in the trenches.  A diplomat like Lloyd
George  could and  did  read the  German  mind at
Potsdam.   In the same way, the good  pitcher reads
the batter's mind and vice versa.  We are not as far
apart as we may imagine, just as we are not so dull
in mind-reading as we may have supposed.  Nation
knows  nation;  sex, sex; class, class;  child, child.
The secret  of  it is sympathy which puts you in  the
other man's place  and sympathy which puts the other
man's place in you.
   Our country needs mutual understanding more than
it needs ships.  It needs national mind-readers more
than it needs  Senators.   Make a beginning by read-
ing the minds in your own home, own community.
54 
XXVIII
          WHERE DELAY IS DANGEROUS

T^OR the painter to lay his colors on a dry canvas
-■-  with the chance of scraping them off is one thing;
to paint in the fresh with wet plaster is a task far
more difficult.   The latter is the fresco-method; it in-
volves the sure touch of the  artist who  has  no op-
portunity to change his work.
   In the case of the human brain, the fresco-method
is necessary, if one is to develop his mentality to the
highest degree of perfection.  If we regard the brain
as so much dry, drab canvas to be painted at leisure,
we make a mistake; since the brain is moist and plas-
tic, so that its  walls and ceilings must be treated with-
out delay.
   To deal properly with the mind is  to lay the im-
pression on as soon as it  comes before the mind.
In the art of remembering, it is necessary  to have
the immediate touch of attention, and when one  has
taken note of a name, a fact, a number, he is not likely
to forget it.   The idea has been put upon the brain
in the way that the paint of the artist was laid upon
the receptive plaster.
   In  addition to this mechanical idea of the brain,
there is the added thought that, as paint upon the wall
                        55 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

or ceiling preserves the plaster, so a certain amount
of mental adornment is of value  in  preventing the
mind from decaying.  One may think perhaps that
the attempt to beautify his life were but a luxury to
be indulged in or not, but the psychological fact re-
mains that an adorned mind like a frescoed wall  is
more likely to stand the strain of time.
   But the preserving adornment is something which
must come upon the  mind while the  brain  is  fresh
and  receptive.  One  may delay in  saving  money,
since gold is a durable substance; but in the realm of
brain the delay is dangerous.  It is in recognition of
this  fact that the old education was in the habit of
giving esthetic training while the mind was fresh and
pliable.   The furnishing of the room may come  later,
but the frescoing must be taken up at  once or it will
be too late.
   If you have been looking upon your mind as so
much dry canvas, begin to regard it as moist plaster;
then you will see the importance of the fresco-method
with the brain.
56 
XXIX
           THE POWER OF ATTENTION

     WHEN we  strive to pay  attention to something
      which  we deem  important, we should realize
that the mind is apt to turn its powers in the direction
of  certain objects, ideas,  or thoughts  which some-
how have the power  to interest it.  Mind itself is a
kind of attention, and  like a stream follows certain
channels.
   In an old  curiosity shop, the  artist notices the pic-
tures;  the soldier,  the  old weapon;  the student, the
book; a woman, the old costume.  What we have in
us  by  nature or training thus  comes forth  to  greet
its  kind  in the objects about us.   Our attention is
guided by our general interest.
   In addition  to these general objects  of attention,
the mind  seizes upon  objects  which  are  like  those
which  have  just passed before our  gaze.   If  you
have listened to the call of the thrush, you will hear
the cry of the warbler; if you have noted the bridge
over which you have just passed, you will be ready
for the rumble of the train over the next one.
  In its process of attention, the mind makes note
now of the great things that men noted in the  past.
In  this way, ancestral  attention makes  us note the
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

soldier, whom the ages have honored, just as the minds
of our fore-fathers  bid us heed  tales of love and
romance.   If it were not  for these inherited  atten-
tions, we should not  be  impressed by the man in uni-
form or the story of human sentiment.
  You can experiment with your own attention by ob-
serving what topics  reported in the daily paper lay
hold of your mind.  Did you notice the rise or fall
of certain  stocks, the doings in realty, the result of
the base-ball game, the appearance of a new book on
geology,  the affairs  in  Japan?  Your attention was
guided by what was  already in your mind by nature,
education,  social training, personal interest
  The world sets up for  the  mind certain objects
which the world thinks  worth noticing.   As a result,
people are persuaded that fighting is better than  farm-
ing,  that position in  society or politics  is preferable
to the cultivation of  talent.
  Attention grows like a weed; the thing to do with it
is to cultivate it.  For the next twenty-four hours,
try to observe something new to  you.
58 
XXX
        YOUR WILL WORKS ALL THE TIME

     WORKS on will-power with their  promises  that
      they will teach you the secret of success, happi-
ness,  and health are made possible by the fact  that
the will is a mystery.  About  it almost anything can
be  said—freedom, fate,  and  occult  power.  It is
true that the ways of human will are strange and past
finding out.
  The old idea was that the will was a sort of sleep-
ing lion whose slumbers were not easily  disturbed;
once aroused, the trouble began.   The newer notion
is that the will is in perpetual motion, that it is a  sort
of merry-go-round or stream on which or  into which
we  place our private powers.  This  led Schopen-
hauer  to  say, "The will is  not only free but  al-
mighty"; or,  as we  may put it, the will works all the
time.
  Action on the part of man  is due to his selecting
one among many of his promising impulses; he will
leap on this or that train  which is moving along its
own tracks.   In the  same way,  human action is a kind
of signaling to these trains—says "yes" and opening
the  road to one, saying "no"  and closing the track
to others.
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         SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY

  The will, however, is not as much of a Bolshevik as
one might imagine; it responds  to the idea, which
must touch it off.   The  mysterious thing about  the
will is that it responds to hair-triggers; the slightest
thought-impulse  is  enough to initiate  important  ac-
tion, and a little fire kindles a great matter.
  In addition to its ideal response, the will has a way
of postponing action until the will  is  ready.  You
think  about getting up in the morning, you  have  the
idea of leaving the office, you plan to go to the game;
but instead of linking idea with act, the will sets up
its motions after the idea has come and gone.   It
works like the "delayed  steal" on the  diamond, like
the "delayed pass" on the gridiron.   The idea that
you have had, say, a moment ago, an hour ago, a year
ago, ten thousand  years back  in the past  when your
ancestor did  your  thinking for you—that idea now
comes to the  front as something altogether new, and
you act.
  WTiy  do fighting soldiers receive  the training  of
militia,  of parade-soldiers?   Why all  this business
of "attention!" "march!"  "halt!"?  In the skirmish,
there  will be none of this; no, but the soldier whose
will has  learned to respond  like gun  to trigger  de-
velops a will  which obeys instantly.  What you think
out today will be the act of tomorrow, of  the far fu-
ture.
60 
XXXI
         WHY WE WELCOME OBSTACLES

  IT would  seem strange  if a man expressed prefer-
   ence for a rough road or a hard task, but it is true
that the  human will  is fond of  resistance.  Every-
body hangs up before his fists some sort of punching-
bag, in order  that he  may  enjoy himself through the
resistance  and reaction of the thing.   As  Aristotle
used to teach,  we might live without pleasure, but we
could never live without  activity.   In the same man-
ner, we like the activity which has resistance in it.
   The species has struggled to exist, so that the man
who today moves about on the planet is a reminiscence
of the creatures who  struggled to obtain a foothold
upon earth.  We cannot forget this struggle; we must
keep up  the fight, and so we look for obstacles.  In
this is the deeper secret of human happiness—having
obstacles, setting up obstacles for the  sake of  over-
coming them.
   The joy of overcoming is the higher life-joy.   Men
look upon  seas as things to be crossed,  upon moun-
tains as  things to be climbed, upon gold as some-
thing to  be wrested from the earth.  The whole af-
fair of life is a hurdle-race in which we prefer to
have obstacles every now and then.
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         SHORT TALKS ON  PSYCHOLOGY

  What is the psychological secret of this perverse
pleasure of ours?  It seems to be a situation in which
the mind puts will at the top as numerator, the will as
the denominator below.  The intellect  sets up ob-
stacles, hurdles for the will to jump, and the will is so
constituted that it must find pleasure in the act of
overcoming.
  WTiy  are children  usually joyful?  It is  because
the will is in the excess of intellect, so that the tasks
which the intellect sets for the will, in school, on the
play-ground, in the home,  are such that  the will can
easily overcome them.   In the same  way, but more
pathetically, the twilight happiness of old age comes
about when the intellect is  the first to leave the field,
and in the petty tasks to which the aged person ap-
points himself  there  is  plenty of power left in the
will.
  It is the person midway in the stream, the adult who
is seeking to secure  position, wealth, name,  and the
like, to whom  the obstacle  becomes exceptionably
real.  Even here, the presence of the  obstacle is wel-
comed,  and like Alexander the deepest sigh is for
another world  to  conquer.   To  resist  is  human.
"Man is of value in proportion to his power to resist
life."
62 
XXXII
          THE TERRA FIRMA OF FACTS

     WE are more on our guard against the sins of the
      will than the  fallacies of  the  mind,  but  it is
here also that we should struggle against being led
into temptation.  At heart, we are all Sophists; we
make the worse  cause appear the better, and  seek
to prove the point, reason or no reason.  Read the
arguments for and against the League of Nations and
the Prohibition of the States;  does  a colander  hold
water any better than these average  arguments  hold
truth?
   One of the most eminent of fallacies is that which
attempts to  pass  from a general situation to all the
specific details which that situation  involves.   This
style of fallacy, the  fallacy of accident,  is heard
quite often  from the  top of the oratorial soap-box.
"There  should be justice for all;" quite true in that
general way of stating it,  but how about the details
of  a  justice which  demands due  process  of law?
"The laborer should have the full value of his labor;"
no doubt about this, but how can this  "full value" be
figured out apart from all the financial details of this
or that particular concern?
   The doctrinaire, whether in politics, economics, or
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art, is usually guilty of this fallacy;  he is right in
his grand premise, but is not able to  square it with
the minor details of the argument.   Any one who has
argued, or tried to  argue, with a Utopian socialist
will recall how his vigorous opponent  kept the argu-
ment  high up above the stubborn  facts  of everyday
experience.
   At  the other extreme is the partisan who will look
at no question in a general way, but must discuss it
from  the  stand-point of his community, party, re-
ligious denomination, race.   The  doctrinaire cannot
take a nose dive downward to the terra  firma of facts,
cannot steer his canoe  among the real rocks  of the
situation,  but the partisan cannot  rise at all, cannot
navigate the stream of thought, since he sticks to this
provincial viewpoint.
   The right-minded citizen will avoid both the cos-
mopolitan and the provincial  points  of view.  He
will not empty his mind  of  all furniture or clog it
with too  many what-nots.  He will  follow the  com-
pass but will keep a weather-eye to windward.
   If necessary, you would part with your appendix;
are you as willing to have your fallacies removed as
so many  tonsils?
64 
XXXIII
             WHY DO YOU LAUGH?

   LAUGHTER and life are  two  of  the commonest,
     simplest things, but they are not so  easily ex-
plained.   Indeed,  it is often the commonplace af-
fair  that baffles  theory, so that one finds  it hard to
tell just how a cat purrs.
   In its purest form laughter is life, the artless glee
of children whose powers  are coming into being.
The  more life, the more laughter.  Laughter means
strength, hence one speaks  of  the "laughing lion."
But there are forms of  laughter that are not so pleas-
ant to those who hear the merriment.
   Laughter in the form of the ludicrous  arises  as
one perceives some defect in another; a drunken man,
a  deaf  person,  a  stammerer seem funny when  in
reality each is a pathetic example of human life.  As
the slang expression puts it, "the  laugh is  on them."
   Laughter is both self-consciousness and the feeling
of superiority.  He who is able to  raise himself above
his fellows  laughs at those beneath  him.  We live
in a laughing world, but the tendency to equalize
men  has worked to reduce the amount of laughter.
Some new source of laughter must be  found.
   We laugh at the  funny picture because it represents
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          SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

the subject of the sketch  as being in a position  in-
ferior to  our own.  He is about to step  into some
kind  of a pit-fall, or his misdeeds have found him;
so we say, "Ha!   Ha!"
   The better laughter, the kind of merriment that is
democratic arises when we observe how all men fall
short of the mark, how all life is still below the plane
of the ideal.  It is  such  laughter that  Shakespeare
and  Ibsen produce.  They do  not laugh at men but
at Man.
   Real humor  binds men together; all behave  as
though they were at a picnic. Wit often divides men;
satire tends to degrade certain  people at the  expense
of others.  There is satirical laughter which advises
man that he has not reached his goal;  then  there is
human humor which makes him feel that  all are  in
the same boat.
  Be careful of your laughter.   Don't  let the laugh
be "on you."  If you cannot laugh broadly, do not
laugh at all.
66 
XXXIV
          WHERE COMMON SENSE ENDS

    THE  word "real" is  about  as  ambiguous as any
     word in the language.  Common-sense takes it
to mean what can be seen, heard, touched; uncommon-
sense believes  in what eye hath not seen, or  ear
heard, or what has not  yet entered into the heart of
man.  According to  idealism—"That which  is, is
not; that which is not, is."  WTiich is  right, the solid
individual or the dreamer?
   Imaginary reals may  mean more to  you than prac-
tical ones.  WTiich is the more nearly real, home or
apartment, father or man, war  or  guns, love  or
caress?   Often it seems that the  spider-webs of  im-
magination are more real than the huge beams from
which they are suspended.
   You cannot get at the  real in things, acts, or events
without a  definite amount of imagining.   In your
case, the whole war took place in your  own mind, fed
as it was by reports made up of your free imaginings
about it.  The real of past history is an imagined real
in which the historian is poet.  The past is just  as
much a  dream as the future.
   What we call America was a bit of imagination on
the part of Columbus, just as victory was originally a
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

dream in the brains of Foch, Pershing, Haig.  Imag-
inative people with their dreams are the leading citi-
zens of the national Tomorrow.
  You have too much common-sense and are too little
inclined to fly.  You are inclined to say, "What is, is,
what will  be—will be," when in truth "what is" de-
pends upon  interpretation; "what will be" hinges  on
what you will  make it.  If lack of imagination were
the  rule of reality, then beasts, idiots, and over-prac-
tical people would be correct; sages, poets, scientists,
wrong.
  Imagination is little more than intelligent memory;
it gives the inner  meaning of memory.  In  practical
life we have facts innumerable with more coming in
every day, so that the one thing needful in human
knowledge is  the  weaving  process  of  imagination
whereby the raw material of mind may be turned into
fabrics.
  The remedy for too much dreaming is more dream-
ing, and you must save yourself from the poison  by
an  overdose.  Have we imagined too  much about
America?   We have not yet begun to get the reality
of our country from  the vast imaginings which it de-
serves.
68 
XXXV
           PSYCHOLOGICAL MOMENTS

TN  the  Franco-Prussian War,  the  Germans  talked
■*■ about the "psychological moment," by which they
meant the psychic factor, or momentum, rather than
any special time.  In this war, they have been talking
about The Day.  It is  Time itself which defeated
these same Germans.
   Do you have psychological moments, or are your
times purely physical?   Does time act upon you as it
has worked upon the stone, as it shows its power in
the plant; or do you take the pendulum into your own
hands?   Do you watch the clock, or do  you yourself
drive the hands around?
   Psychological moments  are  internal; they  are
marked  by clock-wheels within wheels.   Time is so
arranged that a moment here may be altogether differ-
ent from a moment there.  All depends upon the will
of the individual.  The clock is neutral; it marks all
hours alike.   If you are to have special psychologi-
cal moments, you must mark them yourself.
   True  time is such that a  cycle of Cathay cannot
compare with a century of Europe.  Standard time is
so constituted that a day in the high courts of Truth
and Beauty is  better than a thousand upon the low-
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

lands of humdrum  and drab.   The real moment is
psychological, soul-like.
  To make psychological moments,  you  must look
into the clock.  The special, sudden moment is meas-
ured in terms of insight.   When one has  seen into
the mystery of things, the time-moment is really eter-
nal.   The  first moment when  the Wright brothers
flew in the simple air-plane had the power to lift them
above the mere time of earth to the timelessness of the
skies.  From that moment forth, the character of time
was changed.
  The times that are psychological are those in which
the will takes hold of life and makes resolutions for
us.   The will has the power to  turn Time into Eter-
nity.   It can change general considerations into the
overt act.   It can change the earth into a star.
  Feeling is another factor which has power to change
time into timelessness.  Grand  emotion is so rare
with us that we have  to pay actors to engender and
express it for us.  The grand emotion is eternal.  It
makes the heart stand still and lets it lay hold of the
eternal.
  Perhaps you need to change the clock.  You have
set it an hour ahead.   Why not try to have it mark
the depth as well as the length of your moments, your
psychological ones?
70 
XXXVI
              FOOD FOR THOUGHT

 A  GENERATION ago, they were telling us that,
■*•*- since  phosphorus was good for  the  brain,  we
must become wise by eating fish.   They might just as
well have advised us to become  rich by eating gold
fish.  Just  at  present,  certain advertisements assure
us that their breakfast  foods are good for the brain.
  There is food for thought, even if it does not con-
sist of fish or some cereal.   In the  pantry  of  the
brain, there is a five-foot shelf, perhaps, but it is bet-
ter  to go out to the garden for the brain's  true food.
The garden is  life and  the world.  From such a gar-
den the writer gathers his food  instead of taking it
from a can.  The world is a pasture where you may
browse for  a long time.
  Shall we be camels or cows?  The  camel has five
stomachs, the cow but one.   Shall we fill up five men-
tal stomachs, or chew the cud from the one which we
really have?   If food for thought is real food, it is a
cud worth  chewing over and  over again.   Lincoln's
mental stomach contained comparatively little, but he
chewed it over and over again.   They  say  that of all
the  men of  his day he read the least and thought the
most.   His cowlike mental stomach let him chew the
cud.
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

   Mental restaurants, with their quick lunch arrange-
ments, are  quite common in these days of  perpetual
hurry  up.   But nothing can take the place of the
mind's  own kitchen with its  home-cooking.  Plato
knew no kitchenette or quick lunch counter.  Before
books  were printed, he managed  to find  food for
thought.  Shakespeare's library could not have been
much larger than a set of his own works.   He could
not have read one tenth the  number  of books which
have  been  written about his  plays. Yet, he had
plenty of food for thought.
   Thought  is food for thought.   The book is  the ap-
petizer  or  the dessert,  little more.   Perhaps your
mind suffers from mal-nutrition.   If  so,  give  it food
for thought.
72 
XXXVII
          HAVE YOU A JUDICIAL MIND?

    EVERY man is on the bench of a court which is
     supreme—to  him.   We are so constituted that
we pass sentence  upon everything which passes be-
fore  us—books  and  plays,  fighters  and  athletes,
beauty  and  ugliness.   Is lynching right?  Should
Italy keep  Fiume?  Were the  Reds  really  better
than the White Sox?   Life, liberty, and the right to
judge seem  to us to be the real benefits of the Con-
stitution.
   But our main trouble in the judgeship lies in the
fact that we set all ideas or things in pairs, and then
take one side to the exclusion of the other.   It  is so
simple, so we think, that the college debater can take
either side of the question.  Then all of us feel that we
ought to judge, and that it is cowardly  to keep out of
the mental  fray.   The number of decisions which
come from these private courts would fill a five-mile
shelf of cases, and that  every day of the  calendar
year.
   To judge  is instinctive, like swallowing, laughing,
sneezing.  It is only the  irresponsible  person  who
withdraws from the forensic scene, and says,  "Nit-
chevo," or "I should worry."  The  average person is
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         SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY

interested; he  feels that his ideas are  important.
You are supposed to have opinions, but "snap-judg-
ments" are as unsatisfactory as snap-shots.
  Certain great shifts have come about of late, and in
new lights do we survey old questions.  The Germans
are not the salt of the earth;  "made  in Germany"
proves very little.   Nowadays  Republicans  behave
like old Democrats  and  vice versa.   Certain labor
leaders begin to argue like capitalists.  England sees
that democracy is real;  America begins to  feel  the
importance of the State.
  If mankind generally  can change its views, why
cannot you  make your ideas more flexible?  Keep
on judging, but beware of the personal and partisan.
The habit of viewing questions as a man, as a woman,
as southerner, as business man,  is a habit; that is  the
best one can say about it.  It is natural to split  the
question and then consider one side only; it is better
to look at both sides at once and see where the misfit
comes.
  The judicial mind in literature,  politics, art, busi-
ness, is a need the greater than which our country
does not know today.
74 
XXXVIII
               FEELING YOUR WAY

TF it is a fair question, did you not often feel that
-*- you were by the side of Marshal Foch whom you
advised  as to certain  points of strategy  during his
defensive drives of months ago?   Were  you not in
the trenches, and  did  you not say, "Come  on,  fel-
lows!"  as the doughboys went over the top?  How
about the recent world-series; did you not take your
turn in the box or at the bat  when one of the crucial
moments came?
   If you did not do any such thing, if you have not
the habit of so feeling your way that you put yourself
into Life and its various situations, you will hardly
understand why psychology  calls  Empathy,  a tend-
ency on the part of the individual to put himself into
life here and there as  his wrought-up  fancy pleases.
Most travellers are willing to confess that upon visit-
ing a strange land they have wondered how the cities
could have  been put  there without their own  aid.
Think it over, and find out how empathic you are.
   We counsel a man to be fair when we say, "Put
yourself in his place."  But  this is just what we do
all the time, only we are more likely to introduce our
personalities  into  scenes than other people's skins.
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We are all empathic, egoistic, self-centered, and that
is why we wish we could have been at Versailles, or
could now be in the Senate, where our brains are so
sorely  needed.
  This habit of feeling one's way into life is a good
thing until the percentage of the fancy becomes too
high.  It is the first step toward sympathy; it makes
one believe that he is one with the whole world.   It
can become a bad habit when it is taken too literally,
as in the case of King George IV, who kept asserting
that he had been at the battle of Waterloo until finally
he  came  to believe  it  himself.  Beware  of  such
Waterloos.
  You must feel your way as well as will and  think
your way about in the world.   Your empathic tend-
ency will help you in becoming  a teacher, a salesman,
an  engineer.  You may start out by  feeling that you
have been this already, and some one may try to palm
off  ideas of previous existence.   At any rate, you have
the right to feel that you have been almost in this  or
that position which you  try to fill; then  you will suc-
ceed all the more easily.
   You are  not needed  in the  Senate or on the big
league team, but you are needed elsewhere, so that
you do well to feel your way,  to feel that you have
arrived.
76 
XXXIX
   WHAT IS THE HORSE-POWER OF THE WILL?

     WHEN you play the ace, do you gain any more
      tricks  by slapping the little card down with
great force, or is the work of the high card independ-
ent of any muscular power which you put behind it?
In this simple question there is involved the secret of
the human will.  What is the horse-power of the will;
how may it be increased?
   The common notion of volition is that of the card-
player who puts force into  his play.  Many people
are of the impression that to will means to exert force,
to make noise, when  the most perfect  fly-wheel of a
vast engine gives the idea of silence, of passivity.   It
must be that  will-force, the  will-to-do-this-and-that is
found in some other place than the power-house of the
brain.
   The key to the will is in the idea behind it, just as
the key to the suit  of  cards lies  in the  silent  ace.
The man who uses his will properly, whether in toil-
ing, selling goods, or leading a company of soldiers
is the man who makes the Idea direct and energize
what he wishes to do.
   As soon as one sees  that his  will responds to an
idea, and does not work like a spring or rubber band,
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he begins to see further that the power of will may be
increased by clarifying and fortifying of ideas.   The
man of the new will  comes to believe in the  horse-
power of his own consciousness.   In this, which may
seem  new,  lies the secret of Hatha Yoga among the
Hindus.
   The man with an intellectualized will, or practical
Yoga, comes to believe that he can do more and better
than he has ever done before.   If he has walked ten
miles at a  time, he knows that he  can walk twenty.
If he has done a good piece of work, he knows that
he  can do  better.   If  he has  paddled across the
creek, he feels that he can swim across the river.
   It is  not the will which is weak or incapable but
the intellect, which is, or should be, behind that will.
WTien you realize that you are  using but a fraction of
your  brain, that  you are going only half  of your
proper distance, that you are  working or playing in
only ordinary  form, the idea behind the will informs
you that you can do  more.   This kind of believing
has won the war in face of  greater  physical  force.
This  kind of intellectual will  always wins.   It is a
will-to-believe  and to do.
78 
XL
             HABITS GOOD AND BAD

 |"T would seem strange if an old-time drinker whose
-*- alcoholic thirst had been put out of date were to
 advertise, "A Habit Wanted," but this would be true
 of human nature.  If we do not have one habit we
have another, and so  long as the practice is habitual
our brains do not seem to care whether the practice be
good or bad.  Now that the drink-habit is out of the
way, it may be well to look for some new habit, just
as the  old inspiration once afforded by the wine-cup
may have to come in some more direct way of making
the nerves tingle.
   One cannot easily account for habits after the anal-
ogy of the tracks over which our actions usually run;
it is wiser to think of these habitual practices as the
rubber tires which make our wills  run  smoothly al-
most   anywhere.  To  save   trouble,   nature  has
equipped us with processes, the employment of which
makes  life easier for  us.  These processes are tend-
encies  which our forefathers may have set up  for us
or which we may have elaborated upon our own re-
sponsibility.
  Why is it  that people from the country have a gait
whose strong, plodding steps make the man from up-
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state quite different from the man of Broadway, Main
Street, or the boulevard?   Long  ago,  Balzac sug-
gested that the dapper gait  of the city bred man is a
habit engendered by the constant need of stopping at
curbs, of turning out on the sidewalk to  avoid colli-
sion, while the solid walk of the countryman arose in
a situation where there was no need to stop or turn.
This sounds reasonable, and shows that city-life has
an unexpected advantage.
  The peculiarity  of  habit, good  or  bad,  is that  it
gives us more pain  when we do not follow it than  it
bestows pleasure when we do.   If we do not do this
or that at a certain time, we are  uneasy,  not because
we wish  to go to the movies or  read the paper, but
because we have always done these  upon certain occa-
sions, at  definite times.
  You need your habits,  if not all of your old ones,
then certain new, serviceable ones along with some of
the old ways.  The well-read man does not devour so
many volumes, but he makes a  business of reading
something each day.  The clever writer does not rush
off a great story as from a reel, but  he has the habit of
using his pen daily.   The rich man may have made
no great stroke, but he had  the saving habit, which is
worth more  than  money.   It is  better to  have bad
habits than none at  all, good ones  are better, but the
main thing is eternal habit.
80 
XLI
                 STATES OF MIND

 T^HE person who is guided by his states of mind is
 J-  like Eliza crossing the river on separate cakes of
 ice instead of on a bridge.  The  thing can be done,
 but the mental states must be massive and plentiful.
   In the minds of most of us, the winds of thought
 blow without filling our sails while the rain-clouds
 sweep over  us  without  letting fall the  refreshing
 drops.  Our mental states are but the fringe of the
 full fabric.  In a landscape, the  artist sees color as
 something which he might quarry out, so solid is it.
 In a concert, the musician hears tones, the resolution
 of dissonances into the harmony  of remote keys, as
 though those tones were events in nature, a strong
 wind or a storm.   The rest of us realize no more than
 mere tinge or faint echo; our soul-states are not mas-
 sive enough.
   Every writer  of short  stories—and almost every-
body wishes he could produce stories—has the power
to embrace and enjoy full states  of  mind which  he
will use later in his  entertaining tale.   For him
common conversation has in it the ping-pong tone of
real dialogue,  while  the doings  of  people easily
thicken into plots.  Characters grin out to him from
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

the real faces into which he peers, whence living peo-
ple become literary characters.
   Solid, massive states of  mind  do their  work  in
business also.   In selling this article or that bill  of
goods, the genuine  salesman obtains meaning which
will build  up  trade  for  him.  In managing  Tom,
Dick, and Harry, the good foreman, the efficient effi-
ciency expert will acquire permanent mind-states out
of his practical experiences.
   The way to  do this, whether in writing, managing,
selling, teaching, is to expect  the actual situation  to
be pregnant with meaning; out of this general  situa-
tion will come  the massive mind-state of which we are
speaking, which we are trying to cultivate.
   Emerson said that his neighbor envied his knack in
writing, but Emerson added that with his neighbor's
experience he  could do just as well as he had done
with his own.   WHiat did he mean?   He meant that
his experience gave him what we are calling the mas-
sive mental state, and that one mind could have it  as
well as another.  You  try to  get money; try  to lay
aside some of these valuable states of mind.
82 
XLII
             ENERGY OR BLUSTER?

TN Gorky's plays there is a character who says that,
-■- although he had always believed that he was born
for some  purpose,  he had never done anything but
put his clothes on and take them off again.   It may
have been a boy's  suit, a  student's uniform, or the
convict's stripes—it was no more than donning and
doffing, this life of his.  Have you been any better
off?
   There is nothing in the  mind more prodigal than
the will; it puts forth impulses but does not do deeds;
it works but does not act.   In  this spirit, Emerson
asked, "What is so rare with a man as a deed of his
own?"  In the midst of innumerable moves, there are
few acts, and as  on a checker-board we push our men
around until they are jumped and thrown out.  Few
reach the  king-row where all moves are  open to the
piece.
   It is foolish to talk about a "free will" until we
have settled the question whether there is any will at
all.  The will truly free is creative; it does its deed,
makes the man  behind it produce, and  adds  to the
values of  the whole world.   In the case of your will,
what have you done that might be called creative, a
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genuine product of the "Elan vital," or Vital Thrust
of things?
   Our main trouble with the will is  found in our
tendency to  identify action with noise, motion, imme-
diate results.  The Germans did vastly more than the
Allies, killed more men, won more battles, took  more
terrain.  But, which won the war?  The quiet man
whose  energy is the "energy of contemplation," the
unobtrusive  person whose will works like a noiseless
cylinder  is  more  active, more free, more  creative
than the big blusterer who uses  up  all his energy
making his  wheels go  round.   This party is like a
car making a tremendous noise because the clutch has
not yet been applied.  Once the car moves the engine
calms down.
   There is in all Americans a tendency to rush in and
win the war or perfect  peace, and  we are far  from
that Chinese conservatism which  tends to let things
go on as they have been going on from time imme-
morial.  The  American  as wilier and worker  need
not emulate  the Mongolian example, but he would do
well to oil his activities with a little thought.
   You may  think your will worn  out when probably
it is only partly used.  There is for you as for every
one a deed which you alone can perform.  There are
no substitutes for genuine action.
84 
XLIII
          HOW WE BECOME  PARTISAN

     WHEN we see a man wearing a monocle, we feel
      that he must be an affected person; but it is not
so much the glass at the eye as it is the man behind
the glass.  Then there is a sense in which every one
of us wears a monocle; all look at things with one eye
only, with the eye of private prejudice.
   Nature gave  man two eyes  in order that he might
see things fully, as they are and not in the superficial
vision of one eye only.   To see the  difference, you
have only to compare a single photograph with  the
double   picture  used  with   the  stereoscope.   The
stereoscope presents but one complete picture, yet that
single view is the result of double vision.
   You  wear a  monocle and take a superficial view-
point when you look upon questions from one stand-
point alone.   Suppose it is the League of Nations;
from one viewpoint, it may look like a mistake for us
to  be  within hailing distance of poor, old Europe;
but a complete view of the situation upon this planet
will change your attitude.  It is needless to state that
many Americans wear the monocle of narrow  preju-
dice in the form of superficial patriotism.
   Then there is the monocular view of the man who
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keeps considering things from the special  standpoint
of his party.   The party-viewpoint is all right if it is
combined with another angle of vision, say, that of
the whole country, of all  the people.  The Kaiser's
trouble, or one of his many infirmities, was found in
the fact that he looked upon the whole world from a
single point  of view,—the German one.  We had to
take his monocle away from him to improve his royal
vision.
   The various institutions which you  have  at your
disposal—the  State, the church,  art, education—are
all meant to correct and enlarge your vision.  They
teach you to see things in a real and  solid way, not as
your private prejudice might suggest.  Uncle Sam
has dropped his monocle  and is taking a broad view
of the  world.   How about you and  your  eye?   Do
you squint at facts, or look all around them?
   If you wear the  monocle of party-prejudice or de-
nominational pride, drop that monocle.  Be your own
oculist!
86 
XLIV
       THE LONG AND  SHORT OF MEMORY

A FRENCH educator has criticized  our youth by
     saying that it is unable to remember anything in
which  it has  no interest, as though there  should be
memory for memory's sake.  He might have said fur-
ther  that mind  itself is  largely memory, even when
one does not  believe with Plato that all knowledge is
so much reminiscence of prior existence.
   When it comes to memory, we know that we are
likely to forget some things, unlikely to forget others.
Our  interests, likes and dislikes, desires and aversions
have a way  of keeping us informed upon  certain
points.  One never forgets to eat, to smoke, to sleep;
his practical  interests see to it that there is all com-
mission and no omission on those points.
   But, if memory depends upon interest, the  way to
enlarge the circle of things remembered is to increase
the diameter of one's desires.   The office-boy remem-
bers  batting-orders and  batting-averages.  The thea-
tre-goer recalls the names  of  actors and actresses, of
plays and plots.  The scholar remembers where to
find  the  book,  the dog  knows where the bone was
buried.  The more interests you have,  the more mem-
ory,  the more mind. 
SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
  To commit you must omit to memory; that is, you
hold one thing by loosing another, so that to remem-
ber is to forget.  Out of a dozen impressions taken in
by  the mind there is  only  one worth remembering,
but to keep that one you must discard the others.  We
have no memory for weather,  the hot or cold spell,
the rain  or  the drought; you recall  what happened
last Thursday but you forget the temperature.  Past
weather has no importance for us, so we  let it slip
out of the mind in a way which we do not do when
it is a question of past  performances.  You have a
certain way  of remembering; when you recall a tele-
phone number, do you seem to see it  or hear it?  If
you visualize, then try to get a picture of the thing
you wish to retain.   If your memory be auditory, try
to keep an echo of it in your brain.   But, to remem-
ber in the future, pay attention in the present, since
memory  is little more  of a record than  that which
passed through the mind. The facts that were nailed
down in passing will not blow away in future winds,
but will stay where they were put.
88 
XLV
            THE PIN CUSHION BRAIN

   PIN-CUSHIONS are not as fashionable as they used
    to be,  but one does not fail to see the  stuffed
pillow with its array of pin-heads.  The pin-cushion
has plenty  of  pins pushed into and drawn out of it,
but it is difficult to see just where the cushion is advan-
taged by the pin-pushing process.
  There are human pin-cushions in  the world, plenty
of them.  They are like  the paying tellers in banks;
thousands of dollars pass through  their hands, but
how much of the sum can they call their own?  You
and  I  may be one of  these pin-cushions or  paying
tellers.   Pins  and  dollars go into and out of  us, but
what do we get out of the affair?
  People are  pin-cushions when they are simply  re-
ceptive.  There are ideas enough in the world, more
than man can use  for years to come.  The stock of
ideas in the world  is comparable to  the timber in our
forests, except that men  are more likely to fell and
trim trees than they are  to haul the timber of ideas
out of the forest of the mind.
  The receptive pin-cushion has ideas pushed into
and drawn out of it, but the net result is no more than
the  pin-hole.   Of  the ideas which  guide  the nation
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and the  race, how many have you originated, how
many have  you made your  own?   Have  you been
anything more than the silent, receptive pin-cushion?
   The pin-cushion brain is a failure because it does
not resist the pin-point, because it fails to respond to
the prick of the pin.   If it were the custom to stick
the pins  into our several skins, we  should not be so
apathetic about the pin-pushing process.   But to have
ideas jammed into your receptive brain is just as  un-
fair and cruel as it would be were the real pins thrust
into your real skin.   Your skin would be wise enough
to resist.
   Those  who have neither the will  nor the power to
resist life, as life is ever thrust upon them, are the pin-
cushions of the human race.  Pin-pushers are looking
for pin-cushions; do not let them find you.
90 
XLVI
  PSYCHOLOGICAL SUBSTITUTES FOR ALCOHOL

HPHE  dethroning of King Alcohol has created  the
 ■*-  fear that the heir apparent or Crown  Prince of
the realm might appear in the form of the Drug;  for
it seems as though mankind were bent upon getting
out of life more than there is in the ordinary run of
eating, sleeping, working.  What shall be the proper
substitute for alcohol, or for those sensations which
the ancient King was wont to call up in the hearts of
his  subjects?
  It used to be a question whether the effect of alco-
hol was that of arousing  or  subduing, whether  the
drink was a stimulant or narcotic, when as a matter of
fact liquor had the power to arouse certain tendencies
and ideas by quieting those which were in opposition
to  them.   When it  stilled certain portions of  the
brain, it put out of operation those functions which
usually acted as breaks or dampers, so that to still the
better nature was to arouse the more vivid and ele-
mental forms of human consciousness.
  But all of this is now  a matter of history, and we
are wiser if we cast about for something psychic to
take the place of the artificial sensations which used
to hover about the  rim of the wine-cup.   Centuries
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ago, the Apostle, who once recommended wine to  a
younger colleague,  gave sound advice when he said,
"Be not drunk with wine wherein  is excess, but be
filled with the spirit."
   It seems,  then, that there  are mental experiences
which may have the exhilarating effect of wine.   Is
not this the  case with music?   In  the harmonies of
Wagner and Verdi, in  the music of Mendelssohn and
Chopin, to say nothing of the stimulations of synco-
pated music today, there are intoxicating possibilities
whose sources we have still to tap.
   But if the major effect of alcohol was to produce  a
mental  condition at once arousing and quieting, it
seems as though, by a process of self-suggestion, man
might in himself produce the exciting and tranquil-
izing.   After  Emerson had  attributed  great poetic
possibilities  to wine, he asserted that  the sense of
truth was after all the great stimulant.  In the sense
of True, Good and  Beautiful there  is a tranquilizing
stimulation which can  vie with the sweet madness of
wine.
   An inventor brooding over his task, a poet in his
study, a chess-player at the  board are all  of them
examples of men intoxicated with their ideas.   Those
who miss the effects of wine may find some substitute
in increased activity of the brain.
92 
XLVII
        EMOTIONAL REACTION UPON LIFE

T^HE poet is defined as the man who  "surveys the
 -■-  spectacle  of life  with appropriate emotions."
The psychologist thinks of this more broadly, more
democratically as the native reactions of the brain to
stimuli.  As in the physical world so in the psychi-
cal order, action is equal to reaction; hence the ability
to make one's emotions  react,  respond  to the given
situation is a thing important.
   It was by proper reaction upon the bloody spectacle
of war that the war was won, for out of the Hun
breast there sprang no such emotional thrills as were
common on the near side of the deep trench.  Man
as mankind has made his general response to the re-
actions of the world; we  call them industry, enlight-
enment, civilization, culture.  By means of such emo-
tional responses, and not by sheer strength, has man
become man.
  The temperate zone of  emotional reaction is the
most fruitful for appropriate emotions.  The quick
responses of the young child and the nervous woman,
the sluggish reactions of  the hardened, blase party
are extremes desirably avoided.  In the case of most
of us,  it is safe  to assume that we are sufficiently
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realistic so that it is romantic response which is more
desirable.
   The more obvious elements of emotion are those of
pleasure and  pain, what we  like  or dislike.   The
deeper  factors in emotion are those which either ex-
cite or subdue us, as anger here, sorrow there.   The
desire for the emotional reactions of an exciting char-
acter  drives us into the movies, to the  ball-game, into
the theatre; here we find room  for ideal  excitement
out of which in the past came the fine arts.
   But there are  tranquilizing emotions and calm re-
actions, and as nature may express her  forces in either
earthquakes or the growth of tender plants, so  the
mind  may  react violently or by means of  subdued
emotion.  The progress of tranquility may be seen
in large cities where noise and conflict make people
devotees of New Thought, Yoga, and  all  sorts of
psychic movements with  their  "power through  re-
pose."  As Americans, we try to throw off  national
nervousness by means of Asiatic mysticism.
   The motive in this desire  for tranquility is sound
and sane, for our past reaction have made more lu-
natics than poets; the  only question  is whether the
means employed  is at all authentic.  Apart from any
fashionable mysticism, you may make your  tranquil
response to the hurly burly of times quite out of joint.
94 
XLVIII
              PRACTICAL HYPNOTISM

"TTYPNOTISM" is supposed to be a work to con-
  -■-J- jure with, when in truth it is one of the com-
monest traits of the mind.   In addition to that subtle
hypnotism which  requires  a  special demonstration,
there is  a practical form of  the art felt by all  but
realized  by few.
   In its last analysis, hypnotism is an influence, a sort
of mental malady or good health which is "catching."
For  this reason, men  used  to speak of a contagious
disease as an  "influenza"; that is, it was an influence
which one person passed over to another.   How many
hypnotists there are in the  form of mental typhoid-
carriers, those who in their  walking typhoid of mind
affect those who come in contact with them.
   The kind of influenza, typhoid germ,  or hypnosis
which such a  person  carries about with him is often
that  of discontent whence arise  revolutions, strikes,
and a general feeling of dissatisfaction with all given
conditions.  During the war such hypnotism showed
itself in the form of pacifism in which the pacifist first
hypnotized himself  and  then  proceeded  to  infect
others.   After the war, the  prevailing form of hyp-
notic  influenza has become that of Bolshevism.
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  The mental  typhoid-carrier  comes to  the  point
where he begins to enjoy his malady, as a patient is so
bent upon disease that he refuses to consult a doctor.
If he could keep his ills  to himself, it would not be
so bad, but it is peculiar to the person whose moods
have hypnotized him  that he must act  hypnotically
upon all  who come into contact  with him.
  Every  now  and then a  "Typhoid Mary"  of the
mind appears in the form of a  person who indulges
in gossip and gloom, but  it is in the present day that
these germ-carriers of discontent have  appeared in
droves.   To guard against such influenza, one  must
first of all be aware of the practical hypnotism  re-
ferred to, and must appreciate the  fact that he is not
wholly immune to mental disease by contact with the
hypnotic patient.
  On the other hand, there is good hypnotism as
there is bad, and those who live socially are subject
to the unconscious influences which ever are brought
to bear upon them.  One may, for example, "work
himself up to a pitch" of  patriotism or some  other
form of  healthy enthusiasm just as one may  convey
such good germs to his neighbor.   Hypnotism is here
to stay; the thing to do is to use it normally.
96 
XLIX
      HOW SENSATIONS AFFECT FEELINGS

  IN common speech, the term "sensation" is supposed
   to  cover a multitude of inner  experiences,  but
usually  those  of an  emotional  character.   In psy-
chological  speech, "sensation"  stands  for  a simple
matter—the immediate effect of a physical stimulus
upon  some  organ of sense.   Light turns  to  color,
sound to tone, chemical change to sweet or sour.   At
the same time, these  simple sensations can produce
feelings.
   Run through the various departments of sensation,
and ask yourself whether the simpler sensations pro-
duce emotional  responses.   Does a  tone affect you
more  than a  color?   Can  you  remain neutral to
sweet and sour as you do to yellow and blue?  WHiy
should some sensations come in  with emotional bag-
gage, leaving others to enter the mind free?
   In the animal world, the effect of sensations is
strikingly  marked.  What is there in the life  of the
bull or what  has been  his history that  his  anger
should be aroused by the simple sensation of red,
especially as the bull  is not camiverous?  WTiy does
the little girl fear to wear a red dress in the presence
of a turkey?
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  Other animals respond to other sensations; thus the
dog howls at music, the cat purrs with pleasure when
her neck feels tactual sensations.   Just why different
species  respond to different sensations is a question
which the psychologist must pass over to the natural-
ist.   Perhaps Mr. Burroughs can give us the answer.
  With our human consciousness, there are color sen-
sations which have a jarring effect, just as there  are
noises,  like the scratching upon glass, which grate
upon the nerves.  Odors  may nauseate  us,  flavors
produce extreme pleasure or aversion.
  The emotional response to sensation is the secret of
art-appreciation, but it is a question just how far these
sensations shall go.  It is only by straining that one
can endure cubism or jazz music, just as it was by
such a process of endurance that we learned to  have a
kind of liking for impressionism and "rag-time."   It
is obvious  that our emotions, ancestral though they
be,  are  not fully developed,  so that  we have  still to
learn how  we  should  feel in  the presence of  new
forms of sensation.
  As for emotional aversion to certain  sensations,
these can be controlled.   With the lower animal, this
may be impossible,  but the  adaptability  of man
makes him equal to all sensational changes.
98 
L
           THE CONTROL OF EMOTION

t1 MOTION  is more like a serpent which is  to be
■*—'  charmed  than a horse which is to be held  in by
the bit.  Unfortunately most of us tend to treat our
emotions as  forces to be controlled  rather than as
influence to be guided; they seem to be children which
need discipline, when in truth they are mature forces
which stand in need of instruction.
   The fears and angers, joys and  sorrows, desires
and aversions, seekings and shunnings  have  their
place in the brain; and they  are there to stay.  It is
only in an artificial system like Buddhism or  some
other form of asceticism  that these  emotions are
looked upon as plants to be uprooted.  But these age-
old trees are not  so easily torn from the  sub-soil of
human nature.
   The proper treatment of emotion comes  more from
the intellect than the  will; for the emotion is  to be
guided into its proper channel, not run aground on
the bank of the conscious stream.   This intellectual
guidance can come about by  interpretation, although
every one wears the face of the Sphinx,  whose smiles
and frowns are not easily understood.
   In a case of extreme joy wherein your happiness
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may prove embarrassing to you, the emotional control
desired can come about by finding the meaning of the
exultation.  WTien once you realize that  your little
satisfaction  due to  the day's  success  or fortune's
smile is indeed a small  matter,  you are not so likely
to feel elated or to boast.
  When one becomes a  prey to that nameless sorrow
which stalks about  in the dark, and when like the sen-
timental poet he says, "I know not why it is that I am
so sad," he would  best seek  the source of  the sorrow
which, as  a feeling,  cannot  bear  much analysis.
With all the obvious reality  of pain,  most  of the sor-
row  which we have is due to the  fact that we have
failed  to get at the  meaning of the  sorrow.   Once
comprehended,  the clouds of sorrow will vanish in
the sunlight of clear thought.
  Fear is  one of the  oldest of emotions, one which is
not easily dispelled;  and yet of what are we afraid?
The fear felt when one is alone, or in the darkness is
a nameless fear; if we are alone, we are quite sure to
be undisturbed; if in darkness,  we shall not be seen.
The interpretation of the fear conquers the  fear.
  Interpreted emotions are the very light of life, the
source of true art,  the essence of pure  humanity.
100 
LI
              THE DESIRES OF LIFE

   EVERYBODY believes that  his  own  desires are
    authoritative for him, but it is  doubtful whether
the average person knows what he  wants.   For this
reason,  instruction in desire becomes one of the im-
portant  matters in education; we must learn what we
think, and be taught what we desire.
   The  commonest  misunderstanding in  connection
with desire is  found in the illusion that the  heart
takes to pleasure as  the proverbial duck to water;
although it is an open question in psychology whether
man does desire pleasure.  Assume that he does thus
prefer the pleasant, shall we deny that man may have
desire for what is indifferent or even for the painful?
   That  which makes desire a problem for both prac-
tical man and theoretical psychologist is the element
of will which  enters into  all  desiring.   If it were
simply  passive feeling,  man would respond to  pleas-
ure as magnet to the north pole; but there is no such
rule of  attraction with the human heart.
   The indifferent object, that which neither pains nor
pleases, may easily become an object  of desire, if
only man will set his mind upon it.  He who climbs
a mountain for the sake of having found its peak, he
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who reads a book for the purpose of binding it in the
covers of his own brain may confess that he was
neither pleased  nor displeased, but still he satisfied
his desire by the climbing, by the reading.
   In exceptional cases, one may desire pain, since
such strenuous means of life show him life's meaning.
The real traveller does not object to the storm or the
genuine soldier feel averse to battle, since  storm and
battle  with  their pains give a realization  of  things
which could come about in no other way.
   Since the human heart in its strength may  desire
pleasure, pain, or that which is neutral emotionally,
the thing for the practical psychologist to do is to find
out just  what is desirable.   Just as we must learn
what the heart within us really desires, so must we
become acquainted  with what the brain deems desir-
able in itself.
   This notion of innate desirability comes through
judgment, whence we learn that, desired or not, some
things are in themselves desirable.   The boy does not
desire  knowledge, the man  culture, or the practical
person taste, but just these ideal benefits are the desir-
able things  of life.  If you tried to educate your
brain, give your heart a course of study in desirables!
102 
LII
              THE VALUE OF PAIN

PLEASURE and pain  are commonly regarded as
-L  things  to be sought and shunned  respectively,
when as a matter of fact one is just as  important as
the other.  Indeed, one might even say that pain is
of greater worth than pleasure.  In the  general rela-
tions of things, or the diplomatic affairs between mind
and body, pleasure has the office of showing what is
beneficial, pain  points out what is harmful.   WHiat
you like is good for you, what you dislike is bad; or
what pleases  mouth and  tongue is good for stomach
and lungs.
   Without  attempting  to indicate  exceptions  to  this
emotional rule, one can begin to see where his pains
are of singular service to  him.   The tooth-ache comes
into  being for the purpose of warning the man  that
there is something wrong with the dental member.
The headache suggests that the rules of eyes or stom-
ach are being violated.   The general sense of  unrest
in life tries to  show the individual that he has not
yet come to an understanding with the world.
   As storm-signals,  pains  have a place which  can
never be usurped; as semaphores,  they have a func-
tion with which the railways of life cannot dispense.
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Those who have gone deeply into the affairs of man
have been more likely to  distrust perfect happiness
than to be doubtful about perfect misery.  "Perhaps
perfect happiness is a monster which the human race
should not tolerate," said Balzac.
  One of pain's by-products is the sense of actuality
which tends to follow in the wake of all sorrow.
Many of us who got our  war from the newspapers
have little real comprehension of its  meaning, but
those who suffered peril and privation, disease and
wounds are the ones who know just how the short and
ugly word "war"  is  spelled.  Among the soldiers,
those who went to camp only envy the boys who were
overseas, while in some cases those who went through
the  fight  untouched envy those who got a  "nick"  or
two.
  The painful "nicks" of reality are tolerable if not
desirable, not  because they are painful, but because
by no other means  could the utter realness of life  be
brought to one's notice.  The crags and edges of the
real world are things which cannot be touched with
gloved hands,  but  must be met in the roughness  of
their real nature.   The rose  without the thorn is arti-
ficial, just as the cup without its bitter taste is insipid.
  Most of the work which genius has  produced has
been wrought  out  in pain,  while the most  typical
genius  in the  world,  Goethe, said, "Some god  gave
me  power to tell how I suffer."
104 
LIII
          CROSSED EYES  OF THE MIND

rPHE  reason why some people cannot see farther
 -■-  than the end of their nose is because they do not
look.   Their eyes are crossed.  The eyes have angles
of convergence  which allow them  to take in a far
scene as well as one near by.  The eyes have the
power of accommodation.   But the cross-eyed man
cannot accommodate himself to distance.
  The nose-looker of the human race is the man who
sees his own point of view, but no other.   He has
opinions but not views, prejudices but not philosophy,
an impression but no ideas.  His mental eyes do not
look beyond the mental nose with its limited range.
The man with the crossed eyes is the fanatic.
  The good point about fanaticism is its intensity.
If you look at everything,  you will see nothing.  If
your eyes are on the horizon of ideals you will  over-
look the neighborhood of needs.   But  the reverse is
no  less true.  If you keep your eyes on the  nose of
your  private opinions, you will miss  the vision of
possibility and progress; you will operate in  a small
sphere.  You  will be  a  mere coasting vessel which
dares not get beyond the sight of land.
  The nose-looker is always a dangerous person, for
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he will not accommodate his vision to enlarging and
changing circumstances.  He has always thought cer-
tain ideas just as his father did before him, has al-
ways been a member of this  particular  church or
party, as was the case with  his ancestors.   His gaze
has accommodated itself to nothing but his own nose,
and he is sure to run into people on the highway.
  National nose-looking has been one of our Ameri-
can ills.  Worse than that, it has been a local view of
all political questions, which we viewed as from the
North, the  South,  or the  West.  Even the  national
view as such became too narrow and nose-like, so that
of late  we  have  had to open the eyes to  the distant
scene across the  sea.  But Uncle Sam has good eye-
sight, and he is  learning to view his problems in an
Americo-European way.
  Your need  is probably that of accommodation.
Your eyes may be the dreamy kind that scan the hori-
zon,  but it  is more  likely that they are of  the nose-
kind, which see only what is right before them.  You
must  be your own  oculist and  must readjust your
own  views.  The fact that we Americans  could ad-
just ourselves to conscription  and the income-tax show
that  we have breadth and depth of mental vision.
We have looked at our private nose long enough.
106 
LIV
  RAISING ONE'S SELF BY ONE'S BOOT STRAPS

rPHE new theory of gravitation suggested  by Ein-
 -■-  stein  has not been worked out yet, but among
the implications of the new view there may come the
realization of an old impossibility—raising one's self
by  one's boot-straps.   In a certain sense,  men  have
always done just this; it is the act of self-education.
  Wliereas education is by nature a personal process
in connection with which no teacher can "learn" the
pupil any one of the three "R's," it has been the fate
of  education to go on publicly in the school.  The
State does for the child what the child might well do
for itself;  nevertheless, true education is no  such so-
cial elevator; it is a process of self-elevation by the
application of private forces.
  In getting at  the thing called education, one  must
try to break away from the mathematical standards
which the State has found it  necessary to  employ.
The pupil is graded, whence he receives a percentage
of merit and mentality.  Out in the larger school of
the world, men are classified according to the amount
of knowledge which they possess, not the kind of in-
telligence  which they  enjoy.   As a result,  most  of
us know too much for our brain's good; we possess
more than we can invest.
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   One can raise his head by lifting upon his mental
 boot-straps because knowledge is really a matter of
 kind  and quality.  You may not know as much as
 your  neighbor or your rival, but you  may  have a
 different kind of knowledge.  The man who as a lad
 could barely master fractions may be the manager of
 many vulgar fractions of  men under him.  The boy
 who succumbed before geography may be successful
 as a traveling man at home, abroad.   The child who
 forgot lessons may cultivate a fine memory for names
 and faces.   He who was as dull as Walter Scott may
 develop somewhat the same kind of imagination.
   It is quality in self-education rather than quantity
 in public instruction that  enables one to defy peda-
 gogical  gravitation,  and raise himself  by his own
 powers.  We  are  getting  away  from the idea that
 mere  eating gives  flesh  and  muscle, or that calories
 are found in food alone.  Just as we emphasize as-
 similation with the body, so we may stress the  idea of
 absorption by the  brain.  Calories and  curriculums
 are effective only as they are properly received.
   Self-elevation is dependent  upon  attention,  the
 focus of the mind upon things which either  are of
 interest or may be made interesting  by virtue of the
 attention paid them.  Added to attention is the free
imitation which the versatile mind employs to place
himself beside the more eminent man.
108 
LV
       EMOTION AND ITS EFFERVESCENCE

    ONE hears a great deal about the control of emo-
     tion,  and it  seems as though  most people  who
give advice were bent upon damping the fires of the
heart.  Just as much good psychology may consist in
the encouraging  of emotion and emotional response,
so that the smoking flax may not be quenched.
   Emotion as a human experience is an instinctive
affair which we share with the animals from whom, it
seems, we have  inherited  many forms  of emotional
expression, as in  the case  of scowl and frown.  But
the appropriate,  adequate  expression of emotion is a
matter which is left to  us, whence it becomes  impor-
tant to look into  the psychology of  emotional expres-
sion.
   Here and there one meets a person who fairly lives
in his or her emotions, but more often does one en-
counter the  stolid, practical individual whose emo-
tions are absorbed in duties, affairs, immediate inter-
ests.  For this reason,  the psychologist has the right
to recommend emotional expression.
   In order to see and feel how far short of emotional
expression you have fallen, watch  a dog in fear or
rage, mark the effervescent joy and  sorrow of a child,
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observe the acquired forms of emotional  expression
as these appear upon the features and in the form of
the gifted actor.
   Yours is the emotional life of the animal, the child,
the actor,  but you have seen fit to dampen  the fires
which in these others flame forth with naturalness,
perhaps with beauty.   Just  as  a  graceful person
knows how to respond to a toast at a banquet, so one
who has not lost the graces of life will seek  to ac-
quire the lost art of emotional  expression.
   Expression alone without the emotion will produce
affectation, but that's a risk the true human being will
run.  The  emotions which you experience daily are
sufficient in number and force to equip a whole stage
of players,  to fill out a whole volume of poems.  The
thing to do is to respond to these springs within the
mind.
   The best  response to an emotion is that in which the
meaning of the pleasure or pain is  shown  forth in
your gesture, tone, or attitude.   It is in such things,
such accompaniments of word and act that  emotion
shows its meaning, its age-old purpose.
110 
LVI
         THE VARIABILITY OF PLEASURE

r I ^HE  times  and seasons of human  enjoyment are
 •*-  such that what pleases us when we are young will
not afford enjoyment when we are grown older.  The
outer world  remains the same and  there  is  little
change in the inner man;  but the relationship between
yourself and your world cannot be counted upon to
remain  the same.   What's your  pleasure?  What
was it once, what is  it now, what should it  be in the
coming  years?
   When one recalls  the fact that,  as  a boy, he was
absorbed in tops and marbles, sports and  books  of
adventure,  he  may wonder why it is that such diver-
sions have lost  their charm for him.  Have  there
drawn nigh those evil days when  the man says,  "I
have no pleasure in them"?
   The reason  why one thing pleases now and not at
another  time is because pleasure and pain keep step
with life, so that what should give  pleasure at a cer-
tain period does so, while what  is destined to further
our future  activities  will not please us until the ac-
tivity has ripened.  What's your present pleasure?
   Once  upon a time, you took pleasure in some boy-
ish victory in a  game, or in  some trick  that you
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played upon your neighbor.  Now you wonder how
it was that such a pastime had any pleasurable mean-
ing for you.  At that time, as a boy, you noticed how
men  were as much pleased by work as you were by
play, and you doubted whether you would ever take
an interest in  the larger,  harder game.  WTiat was
your pleasure then; what is it now?
  Young people may be let  alone in the choice of
pleasures; at any rate they will have enough interests
to absorb all their powers of attention.   It is for the
mature person to realize that pleasures vary with age,
and that the increase of years may mark the decreases
of interests.  To meet the  decline of interest, some
take  up golf; indeed, that  old-age game seems to be
the one thing which preserves for man the pleasure of
the one-time boy.
  One of the main things  of mature  life  is to  nurse
interests in order that one may date ahead the evil day
when he will confess that he has no pleasure in things.
Some may do it this way, others that; but there is one
pleasure  which can span the whole range of human
life;  it shows in the child, and continues to shine forth
with  the man.   It is the pleasure of knowledge!
112 
LVII
             BEING AT ONE'S PRIME

TT is not for  mathematics to determine just when
-*- man in the midst of his three-score-and-ten reaches
what we call his "prime."  Still less has the physiol-
ogist the right to say that at a certain age, say forty,
the individual begins to become an undesirable citi-
zen.  All depends upon the individual, upon the psy-
chology of that person.
   Determinations of  the magic  prime  are usually
made in the light of the individual's body through
which science seeks to pass some sort of X-ray whence
the capabilities of the man may be measured.   Some-
where between twenty and fifty, or soon after the five
and thirty which one must possess before he can be-
come  candidate for the presidency; such appears to
be the prime of life.
   But  consider just what the ages  of  man present to
him as psychological issues.  In youth  there  is  the
pride  of knowledge and the desire for praise, whence
medals  and  keys with which  the youthful knower
would  decorate his proud person.   With maturity it
is the sense of power along with the desire for profit
which makes middle life what it is, often a prosaic
period of  human existence.  With age there arises a
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sense of dignity coupled with  a desire  for peace,
unless one be like the Tiger of France.
   Time runs on in the  same way for all, since time
is neutral; but measured by psychological time there
comes the idea of novelty.  Life seems slow and in-
teresting to the young person, because life offers new
dawns each  day, while to the experienced person the
lack of novelty makes the hours passed by unnoticed,
almost empty.
   The secret of the life-prime appears to repose in the
idea of interest, that which youth has in excess, that
which age lacks.   It is by our interests rather than by
our arteries  that we preserve youth; for the fountain
sought by Ponce de Leon is in  the brain.   Just as
long as the individual pays attention and suffers him-
self to become absorbed in the objects of  his experi-
ence just so long  does  he keep his prime.   Thus  a
well preserved person may  be old because  he lacks
desires, while an elderly man may be young refreshed
as he is by new interests and desires.
   Just what interests  will stand the storm and stress
of experience is not  so easily determined,  yet it is
safe to assume with the Greeks of old  that it  is the
intellectual desire with which youth begins which fur-
ther will accompany the veteran and serve him as  a
staff.  Congress should appoint a commission  to de-
termine the  leading life-interest.   Until they do this,
we will assume that the intellect is man's  most faith-
ful friend.
114 
LVIII
       THE PSYCHOLOGY OF PERSONALITY

TTUMAN beings have not waited for psychology to
■*■ *-  demonstrate the existence of the soul, but have
gone on to give a practical proof of it in the kinds of
lives they lead.  In the natural striving after indi-
viduality, which is as normal as the pursuit of social
life,  men  are often tempted to adopt standardization,
or a  life according to a rule for all.
   To follow this line of lesser resistance and  let the
social order dictate personality is like having the State
act as a  shot-tower whence,  as through  a  colander,
human beings descend to the same  level  and assume
the same form, the rounded form of the uniform shot.
All of us are molten, so that it is not difficult to  reduce
us to a single form, a common size.
   Instead of submitting to the influence which would
make men as homogeneous as so many shot, it is bet-
ter to observe how nature works when she lets snow-
flakes fall from the  sky.  To all appearances, these
flakes are alike in form,  size, color; under the micro-
scope, however, a thousand varieties and more  may
be detected.   Shall we let Nature make us varied in
the midst of our general likeness, or shall we adopt
some social scheme which  shall make all alike in
dress, habits, functions, pay and the like?
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  Every little community is a kind of colander which
attempts to reduce all personalities to a common form.
Every  communistic scheme is such a colander,  and
whatever may be said economically in favor of com-
munism, there stands out against it the psychological
argument  to  the effect that  men are  different,  feel
different, and act differently.
  The  rounding-out influence  of a book which one
reads or of a speech to which one listens may be nor-
mal and sane up to a certain point, but there is in both
nature  and mind a tendency  to make things and per-
sons varied, so that as no two leaves on a tree are the
same, so no two individuals  should strive after com-
plete similarity.
  The  symmetrical person is a  nuisance; far more
comfortable is it to mingle with  people who are dis-
tinct even to the extreme  of eccentricity.   Much as
we complain  of our present  social system, we  dread
all forms  of Utopia where all live one life.  To be
formed like a shot is to be dead,  and rather than roll
along in grooves,  one  would better be self-propelled
even if his gait be  unsteady.
116 
LIX
           SYNTHETIC CONSCIOUSNESS

     WHY not synthetic consciousness when  there are
      so many other kinds of combinations?   During
the War, the Germans manufactured synthetic com-
binations of various  kinds, while their  way  of de-
fending the righteousness of their own cause was the
most  synthetic of all.  At the same time,  there are
forms of  consciousness,  synthesis  or combination
which are natural and wholesome.
   Much of psychology is a matter of analysis in con-
nection with which  our everyday experiences are re-
duced to atomic, elementary forms to  which  marvel-
lous names are attached.  Most if not all of our life
as lived is a smooth synthesis of elements  which are
assembled  from  the four quarters of the mental earth,
which are  blown in upon us from  the winds  of our
mental  heavens. Because of its rare combinations,
life is interesting, because of its sharp analysis, psy-
chology may be  difficult and dull.
   The  most ordinary of mental states is a synthesis,
as when in the perception of an apple the mind fuses
the  impressions of red,  round, sweet,  smooth.   In
cookery which involves a little of this and a little of
that, there is an artificial synthesis which will pro-
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 duce  the  savory  morsel  upon  the  plate.  In  fire-
 works, there is the careful synthesis  of this  and that
 kind and  color of powder, which will result  in the
 fiery embroidery which  the beholder sees in the sky.
 In the same manner, such industrial arts as millinery
 and  window-dressing,   decorating  and   landscape-
 gardening are  similar examples of the way in which
 separate  sensations are  combined for the  sake of
 producing a pleasing totality.
   Just as there are these genuine syntheses,  so there
 may  be as many false  combinations of sensations,
 which will appeal only to those whose taste is morbid
 or fantastic.  In certain forms of suburban architec-
 ture,  in cubist  painting,  in the styles of certain mo-
 distes, there are these spurious syntheses, which  as-
 semble impressions meant to be kept apart.
   Your private consciousness is  a synthetic  product
 in which are assembled impressions from this or that
 corner  of  your experience, the business  man fuses
 ideas and acts,  the politician combines votes and mo-
 tives, the  scientist  makes up a pure fusion of ideas
 and ideas.   Consciousness responds to the  fusion, but
 it  remains for judgment to determine whether the
 synthesis is good and just.
   Among the varied forms of advice  given, psychol-
 ogy might elaborate this  one—beware of the fusions
which  your consciousness  keeps  elaborating  within
your brain.
118 
LX
            INSTINCT AND INTELLECT

T^HE subject of instinct like that of intuition is one
 •*-  which deserves and demands a certain kind of psy-
chological revision.   When psychology is confronted
by  the common notion of instinct, psychology must
make certain reservations.   The whole matter con-
perns the relation of instinct to intellect.
  According to the traditional notion, intellect begins
where instinct leaves off, while the same kind of rea-
soning has the habit of relegating instinct to animals,
intellect to men.  In face of this popular view,  we
have  the  extremely critical ideas of  advanced psy-
chologists.  James insisted  that man has all the  in-
stincts of  the animal and then more of his own.  Ac-
cording to Wundt, "animals never reason, men sel-
dom."
  The way out of this tangle may come about when
we  give up placing instinct and intellect  on a straight
line with mind  at  the top  and body  below.  We
succeed better with our interpretation of man and dog
when we place instinct and intellect side by side; for
their  behaviour is often  parallel rather than other-
wise.
  The animal with its instincts has a certain amount
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of consciousness as this appears in his emotional ex-
pression of fear, anger, and the like.   At the same
time, the  intelligence of the instinctive animal shows
in the way that it pays attention to certain things while
it neglects others.   In such emotion and  attention,
there is sufficient mentality to show that animal in-
stinct can be animal intellect, or instinctive conscious-
ness.
   In the  more important case of man, it is well to
observe,  especially when one  is considering a  Bol-
shevist, a profiteer, a striker, how instinct runs side by
side with  intellect, which it serves  as a sort of third
rail.   If men seldom reason, it is not  because  they
lack brains, but for the reason that instinct can  take
the place of promise and conclusion.
   If all this be the biological way of putting an old
problem,  there  is still a  political  argument  which
should be heard.  According to a political  psychol-
ogy, it is unfortunate that men  should use intellect so
little, instinct  so much.   The  State  of  the past  has
been  an instinctive  State, wherein food and fighting
were the  great issues, wherein  spear  and  pruning
hook, sword and plowshare were used without much
thought as to their meaning.
   The new State which is slowly coming in will be
less instinctive, more  intelligent.   It  may not change
man utterly, but it  may persuade him to shift from
instinct to intellect.
120 
LXI
 THE PSYCHOLOGICAL BLESSINGS OF MONOTONY

T 7"ARIETY may be  the spice but monotony is the
 '   meat of life.  What you really want  is what
men have wanted in the past; and if there be nothing
new under the sun, it is because novelty is not desired.
We bless the man who invented the old things—sleep,
work, love, beauty; we are not so likely to praise the
inventor of modern improvements.
  Life as books reflect it is the same old story told
and  retold,  revised and  revamped  but little.   Our
artistic tastes can tolerate nothing but the plays and
tales which deal with  love and hate, fear and anger.
We would not think of living in  old houses, but we
are at home in such theatres as the ancients knew and
enjoyed.   The scenery and language may be differ-
ent, but the plot is the  same old story.
  The reason why we are so  fond of gazing into the
fire  is explained plausibly  on the grounds that our
remote  ancestors were   fire-worshippers,  and  they
made flame-gazers of all  their descendants.  Variety
may add fuel to these  flames of life, but it is into the
same old embers of human experience that we gaze.
  All the great deeds have been done so thoroughly
that  modern heroes can do no more than imitate the
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Achilles  of antiquity.  All genuine  emotions have
been felt to the  full, hence the modern heart can do
more than murmur and  echo the passions of the past.
All the essential thoughts of the brain were  unrav-
elled by antiquity, so  that art, religion, law, love are
little more than reminiscences.
  The psychologically-minded person, or he who  is
aware  of his own  nature as human, will be  wise  to
come to  an understanding with the past and make
friends with monotony.   Those whose minds are less
real and  authentic  will wear themselves out trying  to
find something new in life which knows neither youth
nor age.
  Nevertheless,  monotony is not opposed to  variety
any more than  a negative pole is  prohibitive of a
positive one.   Just as Eros was the oldest and young-
est  of  the gods, and  the child of both poverty  and
wealth, so human desire may be youthful in  its age,
rich in its apparent poverty.
  It is those who have mastered their studies, solved
their problems, had their experiences  who are in the
best position to enjoy  them.  The greatest joy of life
is sure to involve something so ancestral as to appear
monotonous; its  basis  is that of useful habit.
  Because of  monotony, the values of life keep  at
par, and the things most desired are like jewels which
never become second-hand goods.
122 
LXII
        THE  PSYCHOLOGY OF SUBSTITUTES

 HPHE progress of man away from nature and toward
 -*-  civilization involves him in devices and  substi-
 tutes.   Our  age is pre-eminently the  age  of  substi-
 tutes for coffee, alcohol, meat, war and the like.  But
 in the  case of individuals the substitution of Peter for
 Paul is not always effective.
   In the world of persons whose lives are private and
 temperamental, the substitution of one for  another is
 a poor rule which does not work even one way.  Ro-
 meo must have Juliet, Hero Leander, Anthony Cleo-
 patra,  Jack Jill.  It is still to be explained how one
 person can be  everything to another and  all  others
 nothing.
   It is undeniable that in the world of affairs one
 may take another's place.  On the eve of  the Battle
 of Gettysburg  it was a question whether the  Union
 forces  should be led by Meade or Hooker.  In the
 European War it was first Von Kluck, then  Von Hin-
 denburg.   The English turned from French to Haig,
 the French from Joffre to Foch.  Action shows little
 preference, plays few  favorites, so  that when a man
 dies another can take his place.   "The king is dead,
long live the king"—such is the judgment of practical
life.
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  With love and genius, however, there is no  such
substitution.   Suppose Shakespeare  die  in the midst
of writing Hamlet; who will finish the play?   Isaac
Newton fails  to complete his  study of  gravitation;
who will take up the work where he left off?   Years,
centuries later, when another Newton or an Einstein
appears, the work may be done, but there is no direct
substitute for the man who is doing  creative work.
  We have vice-presidents but not vice-poets, "pinch-
hitters" but  not pinch-thinkers,  under-studies in play-
ing the part but not  in writing it.  If the great artist
grows weary, the work of art must wait, or as Dante
said, "If I go who stays,  if I stay who goes?"  The
genius is unique, solitary; in his place we can accept
no substitutes.
  Society has usually made the error of  thinking that
one man could take the  place  of  another; hence so-
ciety has killed prophets, poets, philosophers.   Soci-
ety's means  of education is calculated upon the  basis
that one man  can  take another's  place in the world.
Society wants people to  be the same, when in  truth
people are different.
   If you are doing  genuine work, no one can substi-
tute for you, nor can you substitute for  another.   It
is a good principle  to accept no substitutes for per-
sons; such  synthetic products can never prove  of
worth or effectiveness.
124 
LXIII
           CONSCIOUS SELF-DECEPTION

   EVERYBODY is on guard lest he be  deceived by
    others, but who takes care not to be  deceived by
himself?  Thou shalt not bear false witness against
either thy neighbor, or thyself.  Nevertheless,  self-
deception will arise, and we are so constituted that we
may be conscious of the trick  that we are playing on
our own brains.
  Psychology has used the idea of self-trickery  to
explain the artless play of the child, which so imag-
ines that a chair is a horse or a bed a boat that, for
the time, the object does take on the characteristics  of
the thing whose existence is pretended.  Such playful
self-deception is natural and  harmless.   Even  with
grown-ups, there may be  a similar  sort  of personal
trickery which should not  be  condemned.   But  self-
deception may easily prove a hindrance to success,
especially when the sick man imagines that he is well;
when the poor man thinks that in his poverty he  is as
well off as the rich; when the brain makes one feel
that he is well educated;  when the heart persuades
man that he is happy.   Here are junctures where hu-
man discontent may well arise.
  Just as there is personal self-deception, so a nation
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may consciously magnify its importance and its des-
tiny, until it seeks a place in the sun and over all the
earth.   The case of Germany, with  its exaggerated
nationalism, its political giantism is right to the point.
A race of people given to sentiment and  speculation
went to  work to deceive themselves into thinking that
theirs was an over-exceptional nation.  The result  is
now fully appreciated.
   Extreme cases of self-deception  where the  patient
actually perceives what does not exist in time or place
are subjects for the clinic, for the alienist.  It is the
mild  instance  of  conscious  self-deception   which
should engage the attention of  every  one  who strives
to live a normal authentic life.
   In dealing with your pet delusions, realize  first of
all that  many of them may be of value to you; since
ambition is little more than a  healthy form of self-
persuasion as  to  the individual's possible greatness.
Indeed it might be said that many people do not allow
consciousness  to  impress  sane self-deceptions upon
the mind.
   On the  other  hand, one  must  be on  his  guard
against  the Cinderella within  the  brain,  for pump-
kins are not chariots,  or mice, horses.   You yourself
must decide how much self-deception  you can stand.
126 
LXIV
                     FRETTING

  IT might seem strange were psychology to  approve
    of "fretting," since  most of the "psychic" move-
 ments of the day aim to relieve the individual of his
 irritations.   But there  is fretting and  fretting.  To
 fret is to wear away after  the manner of the stone-
 cutter who frets the column or the vault.  The result
 of such fretting is beautiful.
   Great men have always been distinguished  by their
 special  ability to fret.   Columbus  fretted his  way
 from the Old World  to the  New; Leonardo da Vinci
 fretted until his genius  had  painted the  Last Supper;
 Shakespeare's immortal fretting appears  in Hamlet.
 It was by  fretting, or "nibbling," that  France wore
 out the  German lines and the German Empire.
   Great human movements have always originated in
 fretting, whence it was the systematic worrying of the
 Puritans in England which brought about the civiliza-
 tion of New  England.   The  Colonists  fretted  until
they had worn their way to freedom.   In the form of
Local Option, Prohibition fretted its way into the life
of the nation.
  But the  mere chafing at  circumstances as  a  river
nibbles at its  shores is hardly the same as the  psycho-
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logical  fretting here  recommended.  The kind  of
fretting which counts is that systematic form of irri-
tation which is felt by  the object,  not the subject.
The  sculptor with his chisel indulges  in  a fretting
process, but the effect of this is felt by the stone, not
his hand.
   Without friction no work could be done, for all
would be a matter of sliding and skidding.  Without
mental friction there could be no work  done by the
human will.   The trouble with  the  "fretter" lies in
the fact that his irritation works inwardly upon him-
self,  when it is the  business of fretting to act as  a
sand-blast which irritates the stone in perfect condi-
tion.
   The process of fretting is  really an  artistic one.
We are in the habit of considering  it our calling to
assemble  masses of  matter,  of money, of  power.
Just  as much is the process of life a beautifying one,
that which produces the ornamentation of a building.
For the purpose of making the world beautiful, noth-
ing is more necessary than the  systematic course of
fretting.
   National fretting  with its power to beautify the
Republic is one of the prime needs of the day.  Thus
far, our American life has been an affair of quantity,
of how much?  By  national fretting, we may make
national existence a matter of quality, of how fine?
128 
LXV
                 NUMBER FORMS

  IT was due to the penetration and courage of Francis
   Galton that psychology came into  possession of
those peculiar bits  of  imagery known  as number
forms and  other varieties  of  mental embroidery.
The difficult thing about the discussion of the number-
form lies in the fact that if a  mind does not possess
any  such picturesque arithmetic, he does not know
what  you mean.
   It is simply this—that certain minds have a way of
representing the numbers from one to one hundred at
least, picturing them in simple  forms which are likely
to vary from obtuse angles to smooth  curves.   The
man with the number-form may count orally, but the
digits run along a certain line  and then turn at curve
or angle, and that most likely at the "teens."  At the
shift from the twenties to the  thirties to  the forties,
and  so on to  the hundred,  the  form turns  about  a
curve or around a corner, so  that  he who counts or
calculates does so by means of mental  sketches.
   To have the number-form or not, that is the ques-
tion.  Do you see the imaginary place of a number
like forty-three?   In subtracting six from fourteen,
does your mind run back  around the  angle of the
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teens to the smaller  numbers?   In adding five  to
eighty-seven, do you count on your fingers, or do you
watch the number run up to ninety and then proceed
to the place of ninety-two?
   Those who rejoice in number-forms, are  likely to
possess  similar sketches for the days of the  week,  so
that the passage from a Thursday to  the next Monday
is made by running over the little hillock of Sunday
and then down to Monday, instead of having the days
of the week squared up as on a calendar.   Then there
are month-forms whereby  one looks ahead  from  the
end of December to the middle of April, not by count-
ing up  the intervening weeks, but  by  watching the
ideal processions of these time-periods.
   Some who possess and use these forms for figures,
days and months may not be conscious of their men-
tal habits, while others may fancy that there is some-
thing whimsical about their own  minds.  Review
your counting, recast your calendar, and see whether
you do  not  have  reason to glory in the frame-like
imagery of mind.
   In rarer cases, the days of the week and months  of
the year may have a mental coloring and that wholly
independent  of winter's white, spring's green, sum-
mer's red, autumn's yellow.  But the possession  of
colored  mental forms  is  rare, whereas  the sketchy
outlines of drag figures and temporal periods is more
common than one supposes.
130 
LXVI
           DROPPING NON-ESSENTIALS

 /^\NE has to  have and use many pairs  of eyes to
 ^^ take note  of  all the signs displayed upon  bill-
 boards, trees, and in the Subway.  It is plain that
 somebody wishes all the somebody elses to take note
 of  certain important matters of which ignorance ex-
 cuses none.   How is attention controlled?   Just what
 should an advertisement contain?
   As  note-taker,   man  has  certain   peculiarities:
 among them is  the habit of letting  many things go by
 for the sake of  the one thing important.  As a matter
 of  fact,  you note  too many  things,  make too many
 responses to your nervous system,  so that you fail to
 see the forest for  the trees, the city  for the mass of
 houses.
   Inhibition, as it is called, is the  first step in noting
 the facts and things which are to  have meaning for
 you.  Do you notice all the letters in a word, or see
 how a "g"  is  formed,  or mark whether  the upper
 curve of the "s" is equal to the lower one, or whether
 your watch has a "VI"  on it or not?   No, you omit
 these, so why not drop other non-essentials?
  The social order, which always has an axe to grind,
has decided that the sons of men shall make  note of
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certain things.  Why is professional life praised, or
why does one wish to be called "doctor"?  The so-
cial order has attached honors to such  things, and to
this  we  respond.   To   make  the back-to-the-farm
movement count, it might be well to give degrees in
farming, as Doctor of Agriculture.  To get manual
labor back into the hands of Americans, it might be
well to have honors and titles attached  to work in the
shop.
  As it is, men neglect or fail  to recognize the  im-
portance of such things because the social order has
tricked them into thinking that position is everything,
when it is very little.  We have  paid too much atten-
tion  to these signs which say that doctors,  lawyers,
soldiers are the best men in the land.
  One of the lurid signs hung up before our eyes is to
the  effect that vocational training, which gives you
success at once, is better than cultural development
whose fruits do not come out in the first suns of sum-
mer.  Thus the materialities are ahead of the human-
ities, but both signs agree in asserting that knowledge
is the need of the new day.  The signs of the day
are to the effect that trained men must mobilize.
132 
LXVII
    THE PSYCHOLOGY OF THE GOLDEN RULE

HPHE golden rule is regarded as  Heaven's first and
 -*- last word to Earth; it has been set up as the gold-
standard of conduct.   There should be no doubt that
the major ills and crimes of human life would disap-
pear  if the  golden rule were  received  without the
crossing of a "t" or the dotting of  an "i," but we re-
ceive  it with our own reservations.
   The psychology of this great rule may help toward
an influential understanding of the  precious principle
involved  in the command to love one's self and one's
neighbor in  the  same way and at  the  same  time.
Then, psychology knows  how the rule may apply in
certain details of human conduct.
   Take the  simple case of conversation.   Why is it
that certain  people have  a  way of saying the things
that you both wish to hear, and which you believe are
the best things to be heard?   This person  has not any
occult power to read your mind, but he has a  way of
saying the right things in the right way.   The enter-
taining person is only  applying the  golden rule; he is
aware of your presence, and he seeks to give you what
he would like to have for himself.
   In letter-writing, the person whose pages are enter-
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taining is making use of no special art, but is putting
down for your eyes what he would like to have before
his own.   He judges your tastes by his, or appeals to
a common  sense of what  is pleasant and profitable.
In writing  for publication, the  great rule of style is
only the golden rule over again.  The real stylist is a
person who is conscious of his reader, whom he treats
as he would himself.  He  is as clear with you as with
his own  mind; he punctuates for you as  he would
pause if he were speaking; he chooses for you  the
figures of speech and expressions which appeal to him
as striking.  He loves his neighbor's mind as he loves
his own.
   A flippant writer has said, "Do not unto  others as
you  would have them  do  unto you,  for their tastes
may not be the same."   The error of this is found in
the idea that each has a separate form of taste,  when
in reality there are great  standards.   All of us like
pictures which are well drawn and carefully colored;
all rejoice in books which  are well written after they
have been  thought  through; all enjoy music which
sounds the  proper pitch and is  duly modulated.   In
all these cases, the golden rule is paramount.
   In the choice of the  best, altruism becomes aristo-
cratic, and  in the application of a golden rule all  are
enriched.
134 
LXVIII
                      THRILLS

    OUR nerves are usually covered over with pads of
     flesh so that the excitation of a stimulus gives us
more sensation and feeling than direct thrill.  In the
case of the "funny  bone," however, the nerve is so
near the  surface that we are directly conscious of the
shock which  flies to the brain.  In the midst of all
conscious experiences, it is usually the thrill more
than anything else which we desire.
   The presence  of the  nerve-thrill ought to answer the
time-honored question whether man lives for pleas-
ure; in many cases, it is true that we seek pleasant
experiences, but the most typical thing about the brain
is its native desire for the  expression of energy, for
the very thrill of life.
   Power is better than pleasure, energy is preferable
to enjoyment, while life in its very vitality is superior
to all of these.   In truth, all our bones are "funny
bones," for they are ready for the electric thrill which
the direct contact with the world can afford.   As na-
ture moves upward toward man, the number of thrills
increases.  The plant  is better than the stone, the ani-
mal superior to the plant, man  still better because
more thrilling.
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          SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

   Life is one search after its own thrills.   Those
 who live the most intensively may not have the great-
 est amount of solid pleasures or the greatest  sum of
 happiness, but they experience the most intense thrills.
 We read  books because we expect thrills from every
 page,  so  that the short story has  taken  the place of
 the old-time novel, because the condensed forces of
 the  story contain  more  thrills.   We  forsake the
 theatre for the silent movie, since the eye seems to
 have in it the power to record the thrills  which would
 slip through the floor of the legitimate  stage.
   Our age is the  thrilling one; we think  it is the
 era of prosperity,  of power,  of war, of new inter-
 nationalism; but beneath  all  these  outward things
 there is the omnipotent thrill.   We may  call it news,
 novelty, or new interest,  but  its psychological  base
 is at the  human  funny bone;  it is  all  a desire for
 thrill.
   The  life-thrill must  be  kept  within  appropriate
 limits  or  its value and power will be lost  to us.
The air around us  is so charged with electricity that
we have dispensed with wires and use the atmosphere
as a conductor, and it is  in such  surcharged  atmos-
phere  that we  live.  All  of this makes for extra-
vitality, but life without body or character would be
no  more  than the  display  of  nervous  force.   Man
was meant to be  a  bundle of nerves, but he  is sup-
posed to keep the bundle tightly  bound together.
136 
LXIX
              MENTAL SIDE TRACKS

   EVEN the single-track mind with its power to con-
    centrate may have  its side-tracks.  In both rail-
roading and psychology, the importance of the  side-
track  is receiving recognition.  WTiat  sort of  side-
tracks have you?
  When one watches another or himself, when the
person in question is working upon  some  problem,
he  will observe  that  the  subject  of concentration
uses certain  forms of  mental by-play,  which  have
the power to  assist him in the work that he is doing.
The minor form of activity accompanies the major
one, so  that he who is  solving a mathematical prob-
lem making  a speech,  or  trying to  decide what to
eat will indulge  his brain  in various forms  of by-
play.
  In  the  spirit of  the mental side-track, the  cal-
culator rubs his forehead, the philosopher strokes his
beard, if he have one, the public speaker plays with
his watch-chain.   These forms of side-tracked ac-
tivity  may become so  eccentric  as to annoy another
person, but the fact remains that they are a due part
of the total  work under operation.
  The explanation of this  mental  side-tracking ap-
pears  in the fact that  when  one set of  energies is
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 aroused, it  is likely to set others in motion.   Some-
 thing must  be done with these competing forms of
 nervous activity, whence the thinker or speaker per-
 suades them to follow a certain line of action which he
 arranges for them; that is, he side tracks the disturb-
 ing impulse.
   The mathematician  will do nothing but calculate;
 what  shall he do with other forms of nervous force?
 To get rid of these he rubs his forehead and makes
 all the disturbing forces cluster there.   Playing with
 the watch-chain is the speaker's method  of quieting
 the disturbing impulses, which he treats as if they
 were  children.  Fidgety movements with the fingers
 may  seem to express nervousness and  so they do,
 but they are  really devices  for avoiding a greater
 attack of  nerves.   Perhaps our national gum-chew-
 ing may be explained after the manner  of the rub-
 ber comforter given to the infant.
   In  addition to these narrow side-tracks, there are
 suitable forms of diversion which play their part in
 the full activity of a  busy man.   In this is the ex-
 planation of golf, the looking at  comics in the papers,
 the plays written for the tired business man.   In
 order to clear the trunk-line of  activity,  the  busy
 person runs his  competitive energies off to the  side-
track.
   Side-tracking  is  good railroading as  far  as the
mind  is concerned.   Diversions  and avocations, side-
interests and  pet philanthropies have  the  value of
clearing the  way for the main line of action.
                       138 
LXX
                 THE THEORIZER

T^HERE has  always been and will ever be a sus-
 ■*•  picion attaching to theories and theorizers, but
the psychology of the theoretical person has not re-
ceived any real recognition.  In trying to settle ac-
counts with the man of theory, one  can  do no bet-
ter than quote  an iron sentence  from  the  pen  of
Marshal Foch:   "Theory  is  a fine weapon  when
wielded by a strong man."
   The psychology of the genuine  theorizer seems  to
involve both clearness of thought and strength of pur-
pose; the sharper the sword the stronger must be the
hand.   In  this  connection,  Caesar, Washington and
Napoleon seem to be different from Hercules, Samp-
son, Hindenburg.   The victorious  brain is a  balance
of strength and vision; either alone is  fatal.
   In  this way,  theory  may be  likened  to the hair
trigger of a gun, it is a fine device  when held by a
steady arm.   Given theory alone and  we have in-
ertia of will, a  condition produced  by  the fact that
theory is likely to create a balance of opinion, whence
it may  be this,  it may be that.  Given  force  alone
and the train tries to run without tracks.
  It is unfortunate for the progress of  human in-
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SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
telligence that we should lay such  stress  upon  ac-
tion, and tend to  crown the man who does things.
We are on our guard against the man who simply
thinks, but are not so suspicious of the mere doer
of the word.   We are superstitious about action.
   A possible way out of the conflict between  theory
and  practice is  offered  by  psychology, which has
shown us that intellect and  will,  the power to think
and to do, are about  the same thing in complemen-
tary forms.  The real thinker is a kind  of  doer,
while the genuine doer of the word is likely to think
the word through to  its  logical conclusion.   In  the
recent war, the victory was won just as much by con-
sistent  thinking as by forceful action; the military
theory  was in the hands  of a strong man.
   In our country, we have looked upon  our land
as the place of force rather  than  as a seat  of intelli-
gence.   National  intelligence has been postponed as
a matter  which might wait.   It is  not too much to say
that our  chief lack has been lack of theory, so that
a kind of Providence has had to do our thinking for
us.  This situation has  been due to psychological
cause—love of action  and fear of theory.
   In the country and its citizen there is now  an
opportunity to combine strength and  vision: we have
the strong hand, we need only the clear theory.
140 
LXXI
                 BRAIN BUBBLES

   THE bubble  in the  water  has a strange way  of
    behaving, since it seems mighty enough to force
its way up through the heavy liquid to the surface,
but is  then  unable to  go farther.  On the surface,
a thin  film of water is  able to hold down the  bubble
which  a  moment ago was able to strive against the
obstacle.   There are simple  reasons  for this, per-
haps, but the fact remains.
  Bubbles  in the brain  behave  in pretty much the
same manner.  Given a hard task, like thinking out a
speech, and the  brain is quite equal to its work, but
when it comes to delivering what has been prepared
in solitude, the brain of the speaker feels the bubble
stop in its rising.   In the same way, a man may go
through the arduous work of mental planning only
to have the powerful bubble remain powerless when
the time for open action has come.
  Souls  are  full of just such bubbles;  given hard
tasks, and they  are equal to  the obstacle,  but when
the load  lightens, the task seems  over-difficult.  As
long as  the  Allies were  at war with  a  dangerous
enemy, they were able  to struggle against the weight
of national  difference;  but when the  war  was over
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and the bubble had made its way to the surface, peace
became more perplexing than war.
   In  the pathetic  case of  the Russian  bubble,  the
same  phenomenon has shown itself.   As long as the
Russian had to contend against the  weight  of Czar-
dom, he was able to strive and keep  himself together
as a citizen, but when  the oppression was over and
the bubble had at last reached the surface,  the easy
work of self-government became unusually hard.
   In an assembly,  a man may show great energy in
getting the  floor, but when  he comes  to deliver  his
speech he or his hearer finds out that the open  way
is more  difficult than  the  closed one.  He  cannot
speak with the force he used in gaining  his hear-
ing.
   Our population  is a bubbly  one.  Its  members
showed great power in breaking away from the home-
land and in  making their  material way here;  but
when  it comes to the citizenship  of self-government,
they find that the bubble cannot break the little film
of difficulty which envelops  it.
   There may be bubbles in your brain.  While you
were  struggling for  life and education, you were
strong; now that you have the opportunity to express
yourself in word or  act, you have lost the  one-time
power.  Beware of these bubbles; you have cast off
the heavy load, cast  off the  light one.
142 
LXXII
              THE GILT-EDGED MIND

HP HE gilt edge on the volume of  literature does
 ■*■  not make the  work a classic, but it has the
power to do more than  merely ornament the book;
it keeps the dust out  and preserves  the tome  from
the wear and tear of time.  Nevertheless the great-
est books have been  printed on the  poorest  paper, or
have been written upon parchment or  papyrus.
   The mind with the gilt edge of culture might ap-
pear to be  a  mere  matter of  outer adornments and
inner refinement, but such cultural adornment may
have preservative power; it may keep  the brain from
becoming dusty.  If a man deem it his business in
life to work,  the effectiveness of his mental engine
may be increased by the application of culture  as so
much oil for the parts where the friction is felt.
   All of this  shows  the desirability of form in con-
nection with work  of any kind.   The  athlete who
wishes to make  the  best kind of stroke with bat or
racquet is careful about the  manner  as well as the
matter; he strives to cultivate form.  On an athletic
field one is  often amazed at  the various exhibitions
of grace, and may assume that the player has the
gallery in mind; but careful consideration shows that
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         SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY

the player used form and  grace for the purpose of
enhancing  skill and power.   His work is  literally
"gilt edged."
   Mental form or refinement may have the  same
function  along a different line of activity, so that the
business  man  who  cultivates  art or literature may
have a mind which works all the better along its own
chosen tracks.  A man may work better in  his own
territory  if he knows what is going on in foreign
lands,  just as he may be  the better master of the
present if  he  be familiar  with the past.  The gilt
edge of mental polish has the power to preserve the
volume which he is called upon to use.
   The  importance  of gold-leaf  for  these  mental
volumes of ours is being  more fully recognized every
day, so that we are always  reading advertisements
about the way in which one should exercise memory,
carry on  a conversation, conduct himself with smooth-
ness.   Just as by-products  have come  to  be almost
equal in  value to  the main product, so the mental
by-product, or the gold-edge upon the  book, are re-
ceiving their just due of  attention.
   Psychology  is a part  of  the gold-leaf with  which
the binder decorates the book, for the more we know
of the  mind's ways and workings the better we suc-
ceed with men.  In the  last  analysis,  it may turn
out that  the  gilt edge is just as  important as the
stitching  of the book.
144 
LXXIII
          THE PSYCHOLOGY OF ADVICE

'PHE  subject of advising, the giving and receiving
 -*■  of  advice, has been treated in  a humorous way,
but the psychological secret of advice has still to be
discovered.   In the case of advice,  it is more blessed
to give  than to receive; then it is often said that,  be-
fore advising  a person, it is well to find out what he
intends to do.  Most  of the  advice asked, most of
the advice given has fallen to the ground as between
two stools.
   Take first the man or  woman who  askes  advice
about whom to marry, where to spend  the vacation,
what position to accept.  What  is the  real  motive
of the  person  who wishes to know what to  do, or
what you would do in such a case?  The advice is
asked, but it will not for a moment  be followed.
   In the  case  of  the  one asking advice, the prime
motive seems to be a  desire to communicate the fact
that an  opening of some kind lies before the one who
asks the other's opinion; somebody is willing to marry
him or her, certain summer or winter resorts beckon,
this  or that  office-door  is  revolving  on its  pivots.
In this spirit, one asks advice out of the  vanity which
would have you know of his or her  opportunities.
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

  The one who seems to  ask  a  question as to what
should be done by  him is more anxious to tell that
he is  going to do something.   He tells you the news
about himself, for which satisfaction he is willing to
bear but not heed your opinion in the matter.  As
Addison's Spectator said,  "A woman never asks ad-
vice about marriage  until her  wedding-clothes are
made."
  The cheerful giver of advice is just as hypocritical;
he wishes to impress you with the fact that the pros-
pect which looms up before you  is a matter in which
he is  fully experienced.  Like the one asking  advice
for the sake of talking about himself, the one  giving
advice has the same motive of self-communication in
mind.   Each talks  about  himself, and no  advice is
asked or given.
  In  spite of this unhappy situation, there is  still a
place for genuine advice  in the lives of  those who
wish really to live and who feel that they cannot live
in a solitary way.   It may be that the future will be-
come  to  a degree the  age of  advice, which will be
fortunate for human  beings whose  lives  are  made
such tangles by the complications of civilization.
  The new advice will come  as soon as we  realize
that we  should live shared lives.   In such  shared
lives,  the experience of one will become of value to
the other.  A true friend  will give the advice which
at present can come only from  doctor or lawyer.
146 
LXXIV
                LUCID MOMENTS

    LUCID moments  are  unfortunate  experiences in
     the minds of the mentally afflicted, for they are
but the bright lights against the background of men-
tal darkness.   In the mind of the  sane, however, the
lucid moment is the thing desirable, the thing to be
cultivated.  Most of our lives are drab and stale, but
there can come moments of special insight and defi-
nite resolution; these are the lucid  and strong mo-
ments  of the mind.
   A man has  a lucid moment  in the midst of his
work when he  stops to ask himself,  "Wliat is it all
about?   Why this rushing from place to  place, this
occupation with this task and that?"   One eats and
works, works and  eats, but the  purpose of this tak-
ing in and giving forth  energy does not appear at
the table or in  the office.   It  takes the special, lucid
moment  to make  things clear to the mind  of the
worker.
   Lucid  moments in 1914 could have prevented the
war just as these special, bright moments might have
terminated the conflict long before the end came.  At
the present time, the nations  of the world are trying
to get the lucid moment in whose light war shall be-
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

come less and less possible, or impossible altogether.
The lucidity of the moment has appeared in the form
of an idea — The League of Nations.
   In our own country, the lucid  moment of mean-
ing has  come in the form  of  a  question mark —
" What  is America, what  is the significance of her
doctrines?"   Once Uncle Sam was a sort of school-
boy,  who was better known by the name of Yankee
Doodle; then he became a  kind of newly rich among
the peoples  of the earth; now he is becoming a
strong man,  a helpful Hercules among the  weaker
sons of men.
   We do not slander our brains when we  suggest
that we  get through life with a minimum of intelli-
gence.   We  feel from time to time that the kind and
amount  of illumination which we enjoy is more like
the rays which come in through the deadlight in the
street than those which might be enjoyed in the open
of the day.   In our mental affairs we save daylight
when we might as well be  burning  daylight.  We
stand in need of the lucid moment.
   Psychology, with its power to  get  at the source
of ideas, can give every one a whole series of lucid
moments. We do not study the science for the sake
of passing an examination in college or normal school
or with the idea of becoming mystical, but primarily
with  the  purpose of gaining insight into the ways in
which the brain works.  Psychology deals with these
lucid moments.
148 
LXXV
         LOVE AND HATE ARE THE SAME

   PSYCHOLOGY prepares us for paradoxes most of
    which  spring from the tendency on  the part of
emotion  to  reverse its  processes and  put pain for
pleasure, fear for  hope,  hate  for love.   After all,
what is the difference between such contrary emotions
as love and hate?
   In  the most obvious but not most  important of
human love-hates is that which appears in the senti-
ment  which as  a web  is spun between  the  sexes.
Every suitor is a kind of Jekyll-Hyde, and is expected
so to be.  If he woo with  kindness he will have little
chance with the maid who has read about the Cave-
man.   The worst cases of hate are among those who
love, as the worst of wars are civil wars.
   In the same manner, but on a larger scale, it is
quite possible  for one to exercise both love and hate
toward his  country.  Among the Russian  Nihilists of
the last century, it was quite common for one to in-
sist that his hatred for Russia was really love of coun-
try, although the Bolshevists of the day do not make
such a fine distinction.
   It is quite possible and  tolerable for love of one's
land to  show itself in the  form of downright hatred
for the country as its affairs are conducted at some
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SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
one time.  The  Englishman may hate the England
of the Tory, the Frenchman the France of the Bour-
bon, the American the America of  the stand-patter,
the German the Germany of Hohenzollern.  It must
have been in something like this sense that Dr. John-
son said he liked a "good hater."
   If one is to be a good hater, whether of the other
person or his  own country, he must be  a hater  on
some grounds other than instinct or native repugnance.
He must hate  with a principle, and must avoid that
swift  reversal  of sentiment  whereby "each man kills
the thing that  he loves."  At the same time, it must
be admitted that such a boiling over of love into hate
is one of the commonest experiences with the  human
brain.
   The main thing in life is to have feelings  and to
have  them  in abundance.   Feeling must be pro-
nounced, if it be neither  hot nor cold, it  is  too
Laodicean for  human life.  Psychology may have no
cure for the love-hate malady, no surgery capable of
separating these Siamese twins, but  it can call one's
attention to the fact that love and hate abide in  the
same  breast,  as the same  fountain may  give forth
waters sweet and bitter, as the same mouth may utter
blessings and curses.
   Psychology  can do more perhaps;  it  can  advise
individuals that all their emotions, pleasant and pain-
ful, loving and hating, should have a reason for their
being.   It can show man the need of meaning in emo-
tion.
                       150 
LXXVI
        IS YOUR MIND MUSCLE BOUND?

   THE most advanced  methods of physical training
    seem to shun the heavy exercises famous with the
old-time giants, for the possession of too much muscle
may be as bad as having too little.  How is it in
the case  of mental training?  With so much more
to be learned,  are we careful to keep the brain from
becoming muscle-bound?
   The older idea of studying for the sake of men-
tal discipline,  with drill for drill's sake, memory for
memory's sake, seems  to  have produced the condi-
tion of the muscle-bound mind.   The student was not
flexible, he was found  ill-adapted to  activities which
required versatility; he was muscle-bound within.
   Not only education but all other forms of  human
activity have  the  tendency bind brain or brawn,
mind  or  muscle.   They say  that we learn to skate
in the summer and to swim in the winter, because the
cessation of the wonted activity has the power to per-
fect  the  performance of  the same when once  it is
resumed.   To refrain from skating or swimming is to
unbind the muscles involved.
   The need of life and  work is a  certain effervescence
which  makes old tasks  new and changes new ones to
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 old.  What work needs is  not merely strength of
 mind and  body,  but a  flexibility of the powers in-
 volved,  and it is just this flexibility which tends to
 pass away  when the mind or muscle becomes bound
 by habit.
  One may try to remove wrinkles from the brow or
 sore spots  from the muscles by having the masseur
 treat them  from without, but the best way to smooth
 out such wrinkles is to set brain and muscle at work
 upon some new tasks.  The ointment which is put and
 rubbed in vainly from the outside would better come
 from within as a varied form of activity.
  The habit of watching the ways  of  the  mind  in-
 stead of merely using the mind is one way to remove
 the  wrinkles from the brow.  The psychologist  him-
 self might profit by some form of manual labor such
 as he may  have indulged during the war, which oc-
 cupation was a  godsend to him.   But since the psy-
 chologist is exceptional,  it is well for others to make
 use of his  art for the purpose of removing stiffness
from the muscle, wrinkles from the brow.
  We are slowly coming to  the place where we are
 willing to admit  that  perhaps business is not busi-
 ness.  That is, we see that business tends to make us
muscle-bound so that we must indulge in some extra
 form of occupation for  the sake of  relief.  By put-
ting work into its right place we avoid the hardening
 of all arteries, the arteries of activity.
152 
LXXVII
           PSYCHOLOGICAL FOG TIME

T^HE  ferry boat may come to be a  thing of the
 ■*■  past, but the commuter will be a long time forget-
ting what the ferries call "fog-time."   There are all
sorts of times, as there are  various estimates of time,
but fog-time  is unique in that  it is no  definite time
at all.  The  boat goes out when  its mate drops  into
the other slip, and that no matter what the schedule
may have been.  Fog-time is the time of practical op-
portunity.
  Such fog-time is experienced by every one who has
not had  his or her education  according to schedule
or curriculum.  If such a person be wise, he will do
as the pilot does, and fare forth when the time comes,
no matter what the hour may be. To the credit of
those  who  attend  night-schools, take courses of  lec-
tures, and  read what may well be called books,  it
must be  said that they are showing themselves good
pilots who  put forth slowly when the bell rings out
its fog-time.
  Fog-time is of  a Fabian nature; that is,  it is the
indefinite, undetermined period when things can be
done no  matter what the calendar may dictate.   We
plant in Spring and reap in the Fall; yes, but life  is
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more  agriculture, and there are  many  summer op-
erations which must be done in winter.
  The nations of the  earth are now running accord-
ing to the bells of fog-time.   Reason would dictate
that they should cease from war and rehabilitate in-
dustry, but the times are not ready for such a rational
change so they run as  a boat in the fog, they work as
they can.  The Allies  must wait for the United States,
Russia must wait for  the miracle among the nations
of the earth.
  The individual who comes  to the realization  that
his moves are made  in an irregular form of time
arrives at a kind of time-consciousness impossible with
regularity of hours and days.   Thus he comes to an
appreciation of what we call odd moments, odd they
may be in their activities,  although they are just as
regular as other moments.
  Time, which is now under discussion  in the scien-
tific world, is more easily  felt than analyzed.   It is
good  psychology to appreciate the fact that time has
character and quality  as well as length of extension.
It is what we pay attention and what we do in a mo-
ment  that makes that moment real.  Just as they say
there is no time apart  from matter, so there is no real
time for man unless his will lay hold  of the moment
and realize its possibilities.
154 
LXXVIII
         THE PSYCHOLOGY OF CULTURE

Tj^VEN before the Kaiser made war in the name of
■*—'  Kultur, the idea of human culture was dreaded
by many people who were in the habit of fearing fine-
ness more than they dreaded ignorance.  To despise
and  dread  culture has been one of our human fail-
ings, and we have done all in our power  to  avoid
thought.
   It is commonly  supposed that culture means so
much  knowledge  or knowledge of a  certain  kind,
when in truth the possession of knowledge is far from
being  the important thing  about mental  refinement
and  taste.   One  does  not  consider the usher at a
theatre a cultured man simply because the usher has
seen many  plays,  or does one believe that a servant
in an art gallery a person of aesthetic culture simply
because that servant has spent  his  time  among the
fine canvasses.  Culture must be something more than
the possession of knowledge no  matter how  fine that
knowledge may be.
   From the psychological viewpoint, culture is more
than anything else  a matter of interest, an interest
in those things which concern  mankind as  a  whole
race.   For  this reason  culture  may be  described as
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 the having of remote interests rather than local and
 temporary ones.   The cultured person has interests
 in foreign lands  and foreign  languages, not because
 they are foreign to him, but for the reason that such
 interest makes him feel sympathy  for the lives  of
 men at all times, in all places.
   In addition to  the cultivation of broad, remote  in-
 terests, the would-be cultured person has or cultivates
 the power to internalize what he  sees,  hears, reads;
 that is, he makes the fact a state of his mind.   It is
 the easiest thing in the world  to respond in action to
 something near at hand, and to answer the questions,
 "What shall we eat and drink, how shall we be housed
 and clothed?"   It  is more  difficult, more  worthy to
 give mental  response to things which  have no  im-
 mediate interest for us.
   Our American  life has been  careless  of culture
 with its inner, remote interests, since our life has been
 a matter of quantity; how much coal, timber,  wheat,
 gold?  But our new national life can be just as much
 an affair  of quality, under whose influence we shall
 consider  what pictures we are painting, what  poems
 we are writing, what discoveries we are making.
   Culture can live upon a minimum of actual knowl-
 edge, since culture  is chiefly an attitude of mind.
 With little fuel the fire burns,  in light winds the ship
 sails, on  little food one can  still live.  So with little
 knowledge one may have the culture which demands
taste and courage.
156 
LXXIX
            THE AIR OF EXPECTANCY

T^XPECTANCY  is one of  our most human emo-
■*--' tions, and there is always an "air of expectancy"
about a person who is soon to see or hear something of
importance.  The opposite of expectancy is surprise,
an emotion which  comes upon us only to find us un-
prepared.  Which shall become your habitual emo-
tion, expectancy or surprise; in which condition shall
experiences come to you, in those of mental prepared-
ness or unpreparedness?
  In the course of events, the Unexpected is more
likely to happen; for, as H. G. Wells has suggested,
the  number of things which  may happen is  legion,
that of the expected is limited by human imagination.
In order to  prepare the brain for its future  experi-
ences, one would better expect the Unexpected.
  The  immortal difference between those who  suc-
ceed and  those who fail lies  in  the way that each
treats his expectations.  In the late  war,  Marshal
Foch had all expectations analyzed  and classified
so that when the enemy's attack opened he had only
to apply his forces to this, that, or the other expecta-
tion.  The war was lost  to the German  because he
could not conjure up enough rational expectations.
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  A man,  every  man, has a  right to expect some-
thing of himself and  the world he lives in.   Emer-
son said, "WTien  I  awake in the morning, I  expect
nothing of the universe," but that calm attitude may
have been due to the fact that the thinker's brain had
worked out all the expectations  the night  before.
The more you exercise the power of expectation, the
less you will be taken by surprise.
  One should expect  something of his brain, which
is as  a sea  in which the fish are still to be  caught.
The inventor, the discoverer, the scientist is little more
than a man who has expectations; the more  intense
the expectation the more likely is success.
  In  dealing with another  person,  one  should real-
ize that the oscillation of emotions is such that the
other is  likely to present  a different face  on the
morrow.  In recognition of this  unexpected  in emo-
tion,  it has been said that  one should  treat every
friend as though at some time he  might become an
enemy, every enemy as though he might become a
friend.
  Between  the  Expected  and the  Unexpected there
is but a shadowy line;  by the use of reason and imag-
ination, you may increase  the area of  expectation,
may  invade the  domain  of  the unexpected.  One
should cultivate the air of expectancy.
158 
LXXX
              THE BRAIN A BARREL

   ECCENTRICS  are good things  for locomotives;
    they make the driving-wheels go round.   But the
engine is not  all eccentric; its cylinders and piston-
rod are more  to the point when it comes to the ques-
tion of energy.  In your mental machine, how  much
of the energy  goes  into the eccentrics?
  The eccentric person presents to  the world a com-
plete  array of angles and  corners.  He has his  tradi-
tions, his whims, his habits.  Before he can  work,
he must  exercise all these collateral elements in his
character.  Wlien you approach him with a business-
proposition or a Liberty Bond, you  must look out for
his angles.
  It is better to be like a barrel, for a barrel with all
its load  presents few surfaces  to  the world.   The
barrel is not  nailed  together,  but  is  itself held  in
shape naturally by its staves, hoops, and heads.   It is
stout, but it  is easily handled.   At the end of the
trip the  barrel is in better condition  than the box.
  Can you not deliver your goods without presenting
so many awkward  angles to the world about  you?
Must  everybody else have a care about your private
opinions and  personal prejudices?   Your box-brain
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is carrying  no more  than the  barrel-brain of your
neighbor, but it gives much more trouble.
   The eccentric person with the box-mind  is likely
to stay  where he is put.  The  man  who resembles
the barrel will not stand unless his head is up.   Then
he is as firm as a rock.   To get into the more pliable
and pleasing position, you must substitute  thoughts
for opinions, acts for  impulses, views for sentiments.
He is as well put together as the barrel with its elastic
staves.
   Then,  the barrel-like  individual is well  shut in.
You can open him  only  at the  head.   His existence
is well thought out,  and you cannot carry  him around
as though he were a mere box of a man.   The eccen-
tric person gets in his  own way.   His  sides and corn-
ers make him fragile.   In his supposed firmness, he
is likely to crack open.
  When you want to pack fragile things  like bits of
China,  you choose the  barrel, which is pliable in its
toughness.   So with men; the stout, springing person
can safely carry the fine things of the  mind.
160 
LXXXI
              A MENTAL CLOSE UP

   THE progress of the movie has been such as to run
    the world on a reel, change the cosmos to celluloid,
and  make the  stage  a  non-essential  industry.  So
much motion is  there to  the moving-picture that now
and  then  there  must  be  a stationary  picture,   a
"close-up" in which the  exact features and the  com-
plete expression of the star may be beheld.
   In more than one way the action of consciousness
is like that of the movie-reel; we call it the "stream
of consciousness," but  a stream cannot mirror mental
states in the  way that the film can reproduce them.
All the mind's  a movie,  and we  are both actors and
spectators.
   The first mental close-up is  attention, the  power
of the mind over  itself,  the focussing  of  all the
revelant mental  states into one moment of conscious-
ness.  The cursory  glance and  general  impression
suffice for the most experiences, but there comes a time
when  there must be  the  concentrated close-up.  In
proportion to the frequency of  this state of mental
quintessence  is  the force  of  the individual,  or his
chance of success.   Men may thus be divided into two
classes—those who  pay  attention and those who do
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

not; those who have the close-up on the film and those
whose minds slip right along without pause.
  The close-up involves a consciousness of self, a
holding of the mirror up before the mind.   We per-
ceive  all other things, and are ever on the look out
for new views; why not close up the mind  and let it
look at itself?  People  shrink from the  close-up be-
cause they fear to know just who or what it is which
is doing all this acting in connection with daily work,
but the close  view of  the mind is sure to clarify the
whole film.
  It was a close-up on the part of Uncle Sam which
made the  war-movie take on a different  aspect.   As
soon as  Uncle Sam  saw the real  features of  the
Kaiser, who had strutted back and forth on the screen,
Uncle Sam decided to enter the  war.  The result of
this national  close-up will appear  when the history
of the war is written.
  Individuals and nations owe it  to themselves to
stop the film and secure a steady view of the parties
in action.  Perhaps the  nation cannot do  this until
the individuals who make up that nation resolve upon
separate close-ups.
  Not every shadow on the film and screen of your
consciousness has meaning, but there are  meanings
all along the line if you  will but focus upon them.
162 
LXXXII
                   SORE SPOTS

TTE who has a cut or bruise upon his hand comes
-*--!• to  fancy that everything  which  he  touches
smites him in return upon just that spot.  The pain
which the hand feels makes the hand believe that the
sore spot is the natural prey of all objects.   The fact
of  the matter  is that  one  is over-conscious at just
the sore  point, and  notices the touch which otherwise
would  pass by unchallenged.
   Like the  body,  the mind has  its sore spots,  or
places  where  one is touchy about certain topics  or
ideas;  and it seems as  though just those annoying
ideas were ever seeking out the weak points  in one's
mind.   Here again, there  is nothing unusual in our
experiences, but it is only that we are touchy or sore
about certain  matters.   All the others  are  recorded
without the significant pain which we feel here and
there, from time to  time.
   The person with  the sore spot on body or mind is
wise if he refrain from prejudice, for it is foolish to
believe that some envious thing or person is ever  on
the lookout for the weak point  in  our  nature.  The
sensitive spot  is there, no  doubt, but it is  not  likely
that our  circumstances seek it out as the enemies  of
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Achilles looked for the vulnerable point  above his
heel.  You may have  an Achilles-tendon in body or
brain, but it is best to think about  the sounder parts
of your make-up.
   The  chief disadvantage  of the  sore  spot lies in
the tendency to let it  afflict all  of  the body; if that
touchy  point be  in the  mind, it  will  suffuse  the
whole brain.  Just  as Achilles was  vulnerable  in
his body,  Othello was as susceptible in his brain.
This circumstance led Desdemona to assert that when
a man has something  in particular on his mind,  he
is  apt to  "wrangle with inferior  things"; that  is,
the one sore spot  makes  all the others  ache.   Des-
demona as psychologist added something to the ef-
fect that if just one finger ache,  all  the healthy  mem-
bers of one's body are found to feel the affliction.
  We may be cold in  hand or foot, but we feel the
chilliness  all over the body.   We  know that  bitter
taste is confined to the  cells at the root of the tongue,
and yet the feeling of  "bitterness" seems to pervade
one's whole  soul.   We realize  that  our sorrow is
special, and yet we make it general.  We let the sore
spot spread as though it were gangrene.
  The remedy for all this is, more than anything else,
an affair  of judgment.   There is  an occasion  for
feeling sore at one point but no  reason for feeling a
complete ache,  still less reason for  passing the ache
on to all other people.
164 
LXXXIII
            THE FULL RIGGED  MIND

   THE old-style full-rigged ship,  with royal and gal-
    lant-sails,  is seldom  seen in  our ports or on
the high seas  in these days  of  steam and  electric
shipping.   Like other lost arts, the building and sail-
ing of such frigates is largely a  matter of memory.
But the reminiscence of the full-rigger, yards  and rat-
lines, cringles and  cross-trees is  a  glorious one full
of romance.  The  nearest approach to this proud
sea-bird is the modern schooner of several  masts.
   In  the same way, full-rigged individuals  are giv-
ing way to the steamer or schooner-type of men and
women; the completely equipped  personality is as
rare as the full-rigged ship.   Time was when  man
made his own clothes and shoes,  built his own house
and raised  his own  food.   In those days, a man, like
Franklin, could write and print his own book, while
men generally worked out their  own  political plat-
forms and formulated their own creeds.  Those were
the days of full-rigged men.
   Like clothes and houses, man's education  used to
be square-rigged with several masts and  plenty of
sails  upon  them.   Instead of being what  we call a
"specialist," such a man was  a sort of "generalist,"
who had sails for all kinds of winds; then, he had the
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 wit and the courage to fare forth for a voyage which
 might last months or years.  This type of full-rigged,
 long-distance man has been replaced by the efficient
 individual of our day.
   What has become of the well-informed person, the
 man or woman who specialized on all subjects, and
 who did not feel that anything of general interest was
 out of his line?  WTiere is the man who used to write
 letters and carry on conversation?  The man of the
 day dictates or dictaphones  what becomes a typed
 communication which  goes right to  the  point,  but
 which has no such graces as  used to appear  with
 swan-like ships or full-rigged men.
   The remedy for our over-specialization is not to be
 found, of  course,  in a return  to  old types, but we
 may go forward to new ones.  From what one  may
 glean of certain advertisements,  it is  apparent that
 the need of the old-style  humanism is being appre-
 ciated.  We are invited to learn the art of writing,
 of speaking in public, of conversing, of meeting men.
 Are not these the  features of  the square-rigged in-
 dividual who has been laid up in the harbor?
   Sailors  like to keep  up the traditions of the seas,
 and those  who are as genuine in their mentality will
 sympathize with them.  To re-approach  the square-
 rigged person, one might  become a sort of auxiliary
 craft  fitted for both steam and sail propelling.   He
may specialize upon the basis  of  general  ideas and
keep his square-rigged balance in the midst of modern
 improvements.
                       166 
LXXXIV
                 FINGER  PRINTS

  IT is difficult to find two  faces alike even when na-
   ture makes faces out of a few features.   It must
be  that the inner expression  of the  countenance is
the thing that varies while the eyes and lips, forehead
and chin, cheeks and temples appear almost the same.
In the same manner, there are no duplicates among
fingers, whose loops and whorls are so arranged and
inter-arranged that nature has enough  varieties  for
all the people upon the planet.
  Nature  loves variety among her forms, and she is
rich enough to provide  for special  characters in the
leaves of  the tree and the faces of men.  Each in-
dividual receives a special seal, or coat-of-arms, upon
the  thumb, so that he is easily identified.  What  are
we  to  think of industrial  and  social  systems which
strive to make all men appear and act alike?   Nature
believes in individualism.
  It is only when  men congregate that  imitation be-
gins,  and  those  who  are unlike  in their faces  and
fingers attempt to resemble  one another in their words
and acts and habits.  There is such a dread of differ-
ence, such an abhorance of the odd, that do as others
do;  thus arises conventionality.   If one would only
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counsel with one's thumb and not with his neighbor,
one might realize nature's idea of individuality.
   One cannot be as different from his  neighbor when
one adopts some eccentric style of dress or gait,  and
it is pathetic to see how people seek such exterior in-
dividuality.  The  true distinction between  man  and
man,  as between finger and  finger,  is something in-
grained  in  the  essential nature of  that man.   The
difference is a systematic one.
   Just as fingers differ in their finger-prints, so hands
differ in the various things which they  can  do.   This
man is clever  at  wood-work,  another can paint, a
third  can play the piano.   It is in the brain, with
its countless cells,  that we try to be like others, when
it is in that same brain that we should  show original-
ity and difference.
   For the purpose of personal individuation, nothing
is more important than the recognition of  your own
mental type.  Your memory  may be  of the  visual,
auditory, or tactual kind; your temperament may be
swift or slow, strong or weak; your feelings may turn
to either passion or sentiment.  It is for you to  dis-
cover the difference.
   Then, one has the right to act upon his own initia-
tive.  For practical purposes, one may act as a mem-
ber of a party or a  denomination, but he may still
preserve his personality.  The individual initiative is
the train-dispatcher of the mind; once the train starts,
all tracks are open to it,  open to the  self-propelled
individual.
                       168 
LXXXV
               MENTAL OVERTONES

    THE real tone is not a tone by itself, but the funda-
     mental with a  full series  of overtones, which
blend with the pitch of the string.  If music had no
overtones, it would have none of its present richness;
if all it were  all overtone,  it would be shrill and
falsetto.   It  is the  fusion of high and low which
makes the proper pitch of the note.
   The music  of the mind is arranged in  the same
way, so that the presence of  the mental overtone is
desirable if not imperative.   In order to perceive the
particular object, one  should  see the full landscape
of  overtoned  sensations.  To think  of  the  present
and understand demands the many overtones of his-
tory. Every chef is a kind of chemist, every farmer
a botanist, every business man an economist, every
politician a statesman.  Those  who  succeed  do so
by means of the way in which they combine the over-
tones with  the  fundamental.
  The true teacher  of modern languages is familiar
with the  modes of ancient speech.  The true  orator
possesses and employs the overtones of conviction;
so that the  orations  of Webster recited by the sopho-
more are not  orations at all.  The "speaker" may
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SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
have  the words of the  orator, but the overtones  of
thought beneath the brow are  lacking,  and the result
is largely words, words, words.
   To cultivate the overtone,  you will have to pay
heed  to what  is called  the "useless."   In business,
the details of courtesy and tact are so many overtones
which enrich the fundamental of profit  and influence.
In work with  the hand, the overtone of rhythm and
the artistic touch make the work finished,  so that the
hand  is ever superior to the  machine.  In writing,
the overtone of style is necessary to make the main
idea convincing.
   Our  contemporary education makes the mistake
of ignoring the pedagogical overtone.  The School
argues that the  boy  or  girl is preparing  to do just
this or that, so that the  fundamental concern should
be for the  main thing minus  the overtone; but  the
mind  does not conduct its affairs in that  way any more
than a tree grows straight up without spreading forth
its branches.
   The cultivation of the overtone begins as soon  as
one realizes that his thoughts and acts occur in a
great  series of relations, none of which can well be
ignored. The engineer whose train runs  on  tracks
may be able to  fix his gaze straight ahead, but  the
sailor whose ship sails in the free ocean must keep his
eyes to windward, must scan the full horizon.
   The overtone is not loud, but it has its place in the
note.   So the  full  music of the mind demands these
pianissimo  tones to produce its ultimate harmony.
                       170 
LXXXVI
     THE CREAM SEPARATOR OF THE BRAIN

   THE humble, cud-chewing cow has done her best
    for mankind,  which she has gradually turned
into  a  fatted calf.  Within recent years, the cream
of the cow's milk has not been allowed to rise by its
lightness, but has been thrown off by man's device—
the cream-separator.  This device saves  time and
cream, and makes the cow more valuable.
   In the milk  of human thought, it  is  a question
whether the cream should be allowed to rise of its
own  accord, or be thrown off artificially by means of
some educational separator.  Cream will rise  of it-
self in time, but we are impatient and want the rich
results at once.
   A mental cream-separator may be a good thing in
the bland milk of human thought and feeling.  With
the product of the human brain, it is doubtful whether
the thought-cream will rise of itself; perhaps it must
be thrown  off  by some sort  of  thought-separator.
Then we shall have thought at  its best.
   Our mental products, which come  from milking
the brains,  are  not pure.   In the midst  of our true
thoughts, we have the heavy milk of whim, personal
feeling, private opinion, and it is difficult to  make
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men feel the need of a separator.  One is more anx-
ious to say what he thinks than to think what he says.
We have the  superstitious feeling that what's in the
mind is to be prized and given out simply because it
is  there.  Carry this a few steps farther, and you
have the disordered mind of the maniac.
   The  mental separator is of use of preventing, or
inhibiting, impulses  which have no right to  self-ex-
pression simply because they exist.   As well assert
that weeds have a right to grow in the garden because
they spring up in its fertile soil, or that a gun has a
right to be  discharged anywhere and it  any time
simply because it is loaded.
   The  will-separator selects from among the mass of
tangled impulses those  that are worthy  of  rising
as deeds of the mind.   To do  everything is to  do
nothing, so that to act is to choose among  the lively
impulses which writhe  after  expression.   The will-
separator  has  work  on its hands, or cogs, when  it
comes  to sifting the impulses.
   Then there  are emotions which will  be  more ap-
propriate if they are put into the separator for treat-
ment.   We are not  too emotional, but we are too
likely to give vent to the wrong kind of heart-throbs.
To have appropriate emotions, impulses, ideas—use
the brain separator.
172 
LXXXVII
        DO NOT MAKE YOURSELF SCARCE

  IT is often advisable for one to make himself scarce
   by getting out of danger's way, or by keeping out
of unnecessary  trouble.   But there is  a danger in
making one's self  scarce, since  selfhood is all too
scarce now.  There are plenty of persons but few
personalities; many there are who are selfish, but few
are themselves.
   The scarcity of selfhood is due in part  to man's
natural timidity.   Let others exist if they will, so we
say,  but do not call upon us to  show what we are.
Let others write the poems, lead  the armies, or  hold
the offices;  we will make ourselves scarce.
   We make ourselves scarce because  a great deal of
popular morality consists in scaring  the self out  of
its selfhood.  We call this "altruism," or the art of
letting  other  people  live  our  lives,  express  our
thoughts, and do our work.   We think that we are ex-
pected to "live  for others"  when  these mysterious
"others" are just the same kind of people that we are.
For the sake of having our neighbors live their own
lives and do their own work, we make our  precious
selves scarce.
  There is a pathetic scarcity of selfhood  in our great
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 industries.  The man who tends a machine so faith-
 fully that he becomes a cog in the wheel is making
 himself decidedly scarce.  The man who figures up
 his employer's  profits  is making himself about  as
 scarce as a human  soul  can be.   Laboring people
 who dress, and act alike make their selves as scarce
 as radium or platinum.
   The self is the scarcest thing in the world to-day.
 There are  soldiers, workers, and functionaries, but
 there are not as many independent selves.  In war-
 times, we have  to indulge a great deal of our power
 to make  the self scarce, but no one would speak of
 such times as the normal ones; even now, under dis-
 tressing conditions, those who are themselves show just
 what  a  self-propelled   individual  can  be  and  do.
 They flash forth beyond  themselves like  guns.  They
 recoil when they act as a powerful gun recoils.  They
 may  not  make  much  noise—true  individuals  are
 usually silent—but they whistle like  bullets in the
 air.
  To overcome  the scarcity  of self-metal,  learn to
 act upon your  own initiative.  To have  the  self,
 provide a harbor for the  little craft in your brain.
 To express yourself,  see that there is the powder of
thought behind  the word  which  springs from your
lips.
  There  is no substitute for the  human self.  The
Germans are trying to produce synthetic selfhood, a
spurious product of the soul.   The self is scarce, but
can be made plentiful.
                       174 
LXXXVIH
     SAVING DAYLIGHT—BURNING DAYLIGHT

   THE sun  has  done no more for  us  than give us
     existence, light,  and heat.  The time will come
when the  excess power of the sun will be taken up
by the earth when the earth has used up its supply
of coal and wood.   Then we  shall be  able to burn
daylight and save it too.
  Ever since the time that Adam and Eve were driven
from the garden, man has been carrying on experi-
ments  with  the  sun.  What's  to  be done with the
day?  How shall labor adjust itself to  light?  How
may precious daylight saved from fiery daylight be
burned?
  Benjamin Franklin calculated that, in his day, if
each able-bodied individual were  to work two-hours
out of the four and  twenty the work of the country
could be done up in short order.  We have made
other arrangements,  and we see the result.   Labor
is unhappy, and the  work of the  world is not done
with speed or satisfaction.  We do not  know how to
save daylight.
  Daylight  is saved  and burned  by concentration.
As the burning-glass gathers  the  rays  of light  into
a fiery focus, so the  man who  concentrates can save
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

and burn his daylight.  A  locomotive engineer does
a day's work and a good one when he pilots his train
for a  couple of hundred miles.  His skill burns the
daylight as thoroughly as his engine consumes coal.
  Time is long and art  is  fleeting.  Shakespeare
worked but a few years putting eternity into his plays.
In a life of less than fifty years, Balzac wrote a whole
library of novels.   Raphael laid down his brush at
the age of thirty-seven, and  in the same period Byron
had written his poems.  Shelly penned his poems be-
fore he had passed thirty;  Keats  was  done  even
earlier.
  All people are active, many are  busy, and some
work.  The difference depends upon the ability to
burn the daylight.   You save the daylight when you
keep the  details  from interfering with the  complete
plan.   You burn the daylight when you turn the fire
of thought upon what you are doing.
  Meatless days may be good, but sun-less days, or
days when daylight is not  burned, are bad.  An in-
calculable  amount of the  sun's power has gone to
waste.  Some of it may be saved if it be burned.
176 
LXXXIX
         THE PSYCHOLOGY OF MANNERS

     WE Americans are in the habit of associating man-
      ners with the old world and an older genera-
tion.  With  Pilgrims in our East and pioneers in our
West, we have connected the idea of something more
essential—the  subduing of the land to the needs of
living men and women.  Manners  we associate with
aristocracy;  the coming of democracy seems to mark
the end of the era of etiquette.
   If old manners have passed  away with princes,
new manners are coming with the era of the people.
We are beginning to learn that as oil to machinery so
is style to a person; oil and  style  eliminate friction
and promote ease and  silence.  "A lady is serene,"
said Emerson, "a gentleman makes no noise."   Now
these are the ideals which we try to inculcate with a
machine, a  serene,  silent  six.  W^hy should we not
be as wise with ourselves as with our cars?
   The training of the soldier was in larger measure
a training in those  manners  which would  prove  ef-
fective when the dough-boy came to the  ill-mannerly
work of the trenches.   Why was all this saluting, this
immediate response to command when the soldier was
drawn up in line?  If fighting was such rough  busi- 
SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
 ness, why  was the training of the soldier made to
 promote such smoothness?
   The military  manner  of the  drill  was meant to
 promote swift and unthinking response on the part
 of the boy in  khaki.  The better he behaved on or-
 derly parade,  the harder he fought in the tumult of
 battle.  From being a perfect gentleman on the ave-
 nue  he became a  terror  to the Hun when the fight
 was  once on.  Manners won the war.
   The era  of  effective manners  shows its fair head
 again  in the realm  of business courtesy.  We  are
 not so young that  we have forgotten the time when
 salesmen and officials of all kinds paid  no attention to
 our feelings or their manners.  In the course of time.
 it  came to  be seen that  courtesy was an asset and
 politeness profit.   Never  mind whether the customer
 bought at this  one  time or the traveller took this one
 train, the salesman and official were taught by man-
 ners to sell for the future.   Courtesy became  as  im-
 portant as goods and rolling-stock.
  The new  manners have  about  them a  depth  un-
known in the  old  age of bowing and scraping.   It
has been discovered that politeness on the  outside
must unite  with kindness on the inside.   The  union
of the two makes perfect manners.   It may be  better
to  have kindness than manners,  but manners which
express real kindness and genuine interest are  omni-
 potent.  This age of courtesy is coming in.
178 
xc
         THE PSYCHOLOGY OF CITY LIFE

    THE rise of cities marked the beginnings of modern
     civilization just as it saw the coming of what the
 socialists call  the "Bourgeoisie."  The  growth  of
 cities was one of the features which stamped the nine-
 teenth century, just as the over-growth of cities is des-
 tined to  become the  peculiarity and problem of the
 twentieth century.   New York is preparing to accom-
 modate ten millions of people.
   There are numerous disadvantages of city-life, and
 the stream of automobiles bearing the urbanites away
 is sufficient proof  of  this.   The week-end is another
 evidence of the fact that, like seals under the ice, man
 must come forth from time to time and breath.   That
 which  the city  lacks and cannot by any artificial de-
 vices secure is light  and air;  illumination and ven-
 tilation are poor substitutes  for these natural  bless-
 ings.  But the chief need of the city is the sky; those
 who live in cities know little about sun and stars.
   The advantages of the city are chiefly psychological.
 Its food it draws from far-off grain-fields and near-by
 farms; its water flows in from mountain-streams; its
 clothes it takes from the  sheep upon a thousand re-
 mote hills.   All its material advantages are imported.
 Its chief asset is found in the state of  mind which it
produces.
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SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
  The shut-in city is a  stage where many a comedy
or tragedy is  enacted before one's eye.   Hence  the
city gives the entertainment of novelty and change.   It
might seem as though,  with the hurly-burly of city
life, the annoyance of crowds and noise, and the in-
conveniences produced by what are called modern  im-
provements  would  drive one  mad,  but it  is  rural
monotony which is more likely to fill the insane asy-
lums.  The city takes one out of himself and refreshes
his  life every moment;  it works upon us psycholog-
ically.
  In  spite of the healthy  stimulation which comes
from  city-life, it must be  admitted that  a certain
nucleus of quietude is  necessary for sanity and  ra-
tionality.   This amounts to saying that the wise city-
dweller keeps a kind of rural heart within his breast,
so that he may be his private self in the midst of such
exciting publicity.  To have such rural  tranquility
within and a corresponding degree of excitement with-
out is the secret of sane living; it  may be likened to
a park or garden in a great town.
  The city can be and is the loneliest of places, for of
the thousands who congregate  there  are  found  few
whom one knows.   It is the place  of Man, not men;
the location of people,  not folks.  It can press man
in upon himself so that he shall find his own soul as
he could not discover it in the fields.   If you live in
the city, cultivate a country-soul; if yours is country
life, try to arouse a city-brain.
180 
XCI
                    GIANTISM

   GIANTS look to us as so many towers of strength,
     when in reality they are so many sick men; their
disease is in their brains, where the gland which con-
trols the  growth of the body is in some way affected.
The  larger they are  in appearance, the smaller they
are in all that goes to make up greatness of mind or
body.
  Just as there is a bodily giantism, which comes
from some wrong  condition of the brain, so is there
a mental giantism, for which the same  brain  is re-
sponsible.   In either case, we might refer to it as the
"big head."  Such a mental malady makes the indi-
vidual feel big both  in body and mind;  his features
enlarge until he looks and acts as a freak.
  Giantism is a brain-trouble which may afflict both
individuals and nations.  In the case of ancient mon-
archies,  it is easy to point out how the  idea of po-
litical greatness made the nation over-reach itself and
go beyond the limits  of justice.   In our own day, the
most  flagrant case of national giantism appeared  in
the form of Prussianism, with its  over-sense of na-
tional destiny.   Not only the imperial head of that
ruined nation,  but almost  every other brain in the
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SHORT TALKS  ON PSYCHOLOGY
Fatherland suffered from the over-enlargement of
ideas, with the result and the bill so well known to
us now.
   A fruitful source of glandular greatness is found
in the position which a man may occupy.   In the old
world, a person "prince" or "count" is bound to ap-
pear great no matter how ordinary his personality may
be; in the new world, one who is elected to office, gov-
ernor, senator even president, is likely to be consid-
ered a great man simply because the title of "honor-
able" is attached to his name.  We know, and for-
eigners  do too, that the untitled Shakespeare, Goethe,
Franklin, Emerson  is really the great man; but there
is still the giantism which is sure to attach itself like
a hook-worm to the man who happens to hold office.
Such giantism is a disease for which there is no sim-
ple remedy.
   It is  the business of psychological analysis to re-
move these troubles from the  brains of all concerned,
for a little consideration as to what makes for great-
ness will save us from praising others or ourselves
who happen to be in a fortunate position.  The great-
est man is not the most fortunate or the most highly
praised, but the one whose personality counts for what
it is, for a soul-force in art, religion, morals, politics.
   If the phrenologist assumes  to  know  something
about the brain from what he feels on the skull, there
may be a more critical phrenology which will detect
the unfortunate swelling whence springs false giant-
ism.
                       182 
XCII
            THE MENTAL DRY DOCK

  IT is easy enough to push ahead in one's work, just
   as it is not hard  for the  full-rigged ship to sail
along under the power of the  winds, or under its own
power; but  to  turn aside to  the dry dock for over-
hauling seems to be  a waste  of time, an occasion of
lost  opportunity.  Nevertheless, the  dry  dock  may
mean more  to  the ship than the  dock into  which it
carries its cargo.
  Every individual is expected to carry his own cargo,
so that no amount of altruism should cause him to un-
load his life's goods into the hold of another.   You
have your talents, tastes, ideas; they are to you what
the  load is to the ship which  sails from port to port.
It is usually those who  have  made a  mess of life or
lost  courage who begin to  talk about  "living for
others."
  In order to carry  one's proper freight,  it is neces-
sary to turn aside from  time to time for dry docking.
Some wait until the doctor sends them to a sanitarium,
but it is better to take charge of one's own welfare,
and  thus submit to some self-criticism.  What is the
real meaning  of this eating,  working, sleeping; this
rushing to  and fro—what is it  all  about?  Such
questions  put your brain in the dry dock, where the 
         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

hull may be overhauled, leaks repaired, and the ves-
sel repainted.
  The purpose of  Sabbaths or week-ends  is for dry
docking; the same may be said of vacations.  The
reason why the magazines are full of advertisements
of physical  culture, mental healing, the training  of
will and memory is because the restless worker and
thinker do not know how to put their own bodies and
brains in the dry dock.
  It is natural for one to wonder whether he is sea-
worthy, whether he can make the port of wealth, po-
sition, or success.  He has had his many  trial-trips,
so that his great need is to be lifted out of the waters
of work for  the purpose of discovering how his men-
tal craft is weathering the stress and storm.
  The business of psychology is increasing  all the
time as the active life of men and women call for new
and increasing reactions.  The original purpose  of
psychology was to discover to the man himself just
how his mind was made up and worked.  Psychology
is thus one of the best dry docks, since  in it the indi-
vidual may go to the very bottom of his brain and see
how it is faring.
  Have you sufficient health and strength for this new
enterprise?   Have you the right idea, the proper qual-
ity of ideal?  Have you tested your mind, its power
to receive impressions and react upon  them?  Has
your brain been in the dry dock?
184 
XCIII
        THE HEART  IN THE RIGHT PLACE

rPHE anatomists  will  have  to settle  the question
 ■*-  whether the  heart  is in the right place; mean-
while we  may wonder why the heart should  take its
place so high up the  body and so much  to one side.
So far is the heart from the feet, that the  feet become
cold; so near is it to  the head that we are victims of
apoplexy, but we shall have to  leave it about where
it is.
   Men have talked about wearing the heart upon the
sleeve,  but  it is  still  to be suggested that we place
the heart along side the brain so that there may be a
better  understanding  between thought  and emotion,
between logic and love.   If this is not to be  done in
the body,  it might be  arranged  within the mind.
   The brain stands in need of  the heart, so that one
shall say no longer, "The heart has arguments which
the understanding knows  nothing about."  With the
heart in its right place near the  brain, the heart-argu-
ment will be one with which the brain will  become
familiar.   The difficulty with certain types of argu-
ment, as in the  case of science or politics, is that the
point is missed because the judgment is formed in a
spirit of coolness quite foreign  to the warm ways of
the heart.
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          SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

   Brain-judgment of men, things, events might  be
clearer and more convincing were they warmed by the
influence  of the heart.   We do not judge of music
simply by thinking about it but by listening to it,  by
feeling its effects.  We  cannot pass judgment upon
war unless we allow the heart to express its sentiments
as to war's sufferings; to consider merely the cost of
war is to miss the point.
   If the wish is father  to the thought it is  because
the heart  can take  its place in the brain and there
dictate just what matters shall come up  for discus-
sion.   The cool brain as it works scientifically can
give you facts, but the vital coloring of these  is some-
thing which the heart must supply.
   Apart from the emotional interpretation of facts,
there  will  always be  a kind of color-blindness and
tone-deafness in the brain  that proceeds  in a purely
mental way.   Just as Socrates said he was wise be-
cause he realized his own ignorance, so  psychology
has begun to show  us that the more we  learn about
the intellect the more we are inclined  to limit  its
importance.
   Apart from the practical affairs of life, the func-
tion of heart and will is to clarify the intellect, so that
the heart approaches its rightful place when it begins
to ascend to the brain.
186 
XCIV
               DOUBLE SYMPATHY

 A POET  once  complained that there was  more
■*■ *- sympathy  for  men's  sufferings than for their
ideas, and it must be admitted that the obvious suffer-
ings of the flesh make more appeal than the hidden
ideas of the brain.   At the same  time,  it is possible
for the heart to feel for another's ideas, just as the
brain  can  become  aware  of  another's  ills.   True
sympathy is thus dual; it  feels for both sorrow and
joy-
   When, as is  sometimes  the case, a philanthropist
gives money for the School here and  the Hospital
there, he shows if unconsciously the double sympathy
involved in  the rational action  of the heart and the
emotional  work of the brain.   He expresses sympa-
thy for the intellectual idea which longs to appear as
also for the bodily  suffering  which wishes  to be
abated.
   To sympathize with the  sufferings of other men is
not a difficult matter as far as the  psychology of it is
concerned, since the ills which we have had show us
what greater sorrows may  come to the human heart.
A  man who has been hurt in the  street  is an object
of great interest at least, for the reason that we have
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SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
a ready comprehension of pain.  Our trouble in such
cases is that our feelings flee away without any suit-
able reaction.
   To feel and express  sympathy for the scholar is
not such an easy matter, since his ideas are far re-
moved from  the  everyday workings of  our brains.
If the artist is starving  in the garret, we understand
his pain but are not so enlightened as to his art.   Our
sympathy for him is a  half-feeling;  we feel for his
ills as we do not feel for his ideas.
   The most healthy  sign of contemporary giving is
not the freedom with which the gift is offered or the
amount of the benefaction, but the intelligence of the
philanthropy.   We have made the words of the poet
invalid, for we have begun  to  show sympathy for
something more than human ills.
   It is easy to weep with those who weep, because
they cannot excell or give us competition.   Not so
simple is it, however, to rejoice with those who rejoice,
since they in their power of pleasure  may rival us in
our  work.  The most generous  thing  in  the whole
range of feeling is sympathy for success, for the bril-
liant ideas which another may have.
   Sympathy has always shown a preference for the
shallow waters of life where the waves break in an-
guish. For the silent deeps of the mind we have not
been able to feel such compassion.   The new sympa-
thy is double-tracked.   It cares  for the other man's
heart and brain.
188 
XCV
       THE APPLICATION OF WILL POWER

HP HERE need be no doubt about the kinds or degrees
 J-  of power upon this planet; sea and sky, with tides
and  suns  have power aplenty.  The only question is
that  of application.   As soon as we run out of  fire-
wood, coal, and oil, we shall cast about for free forms
of power, and  draw strength  from the skies as  now
we extract nitrogen  from the free air.
   What is true of planets is none the less real with
persons; the power is there, but how to apply it is the
leading question.   We  figure that  "horse-power" is
just  so much per horse, but manpower is ever an  un-
known quantity.  All depends upon the man, his will,
and  the intelligence of his will in  the application of
the potentiality.
   No  one remembers when  the side-wheel steamer
trundled its way  across  the Atlantic, few of us  see
paddle-wheels on steamboats,  all of us  are  familiar
with the centralized form of power applied at the stern
of the ship.   The  side-wheeler  has taken its place
upon the ocean junk-heap.   It is only in  the applica-
tion  of personal power that  side-wheeling still con-
tinues  to act as a propelling force.
  The political  side-wheeler cannot get  his  bill
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         SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY

through the House without a great deal of side-wheel-
ing,  or log-rolling.   The lawyer  is unable to get  a
decision unless he  uses the side-wheels of extra-talk
and  rhetoric.   The salesman cannot sell his  goods
without a due amount of persiflage and camouflage.
The noisy, foaming paddle-wheels continue to operate
among men.
  It is only fair to the men of the day to say that they
are showing less and less faith in  such side-wheeling,
so that law-making and law-applying, advertising and
selling are now more likely to show the direct applica-
tion  of power from one point behind the  idea or the
thing.  The foam of boasting and buncombe is not
as apparent as it used to be.
  Great men are known  by the way in  which they
apply power.  They seem to possess more energy than
the  average  man, but their secret is more than any-
thing else in application.   Such men of  centralized
power drive  away at a single idea—Carthage, or Ger-
many, must be destroyed, the slave must be free, the
canal dug, the poles discovered,  the world made safe
for  democracy.
  Where do you apply your will-power?   You have
dropped the  pen  for the  typewriter, the stove  for
steam-heat, the tedious trip for  the telephone,  the
stage-coach for the limited  train.  Your will  should
enjoy its functioning apart from  the fuss and foam
of side-wheeling.
190 
XCVI
                   KITE SOULS

   THE kite has a fine way of flying above the earth,
    and in the freedom of its movements it might be
mistaken for a self-propelled bird.   But the kite is
able to fly only as it is held down by the string which
the kite-flyer holds  in his hand.  The string may be
thin and imperceptible,  but  it is there, and  it must
stretch out from hand to kite if the kite is to fly.
   The man with a kite-soul is able to fly about in his
work or in his thought only as some stronger hand has
hold of him.  You might  imagine him a  free,  self-
guided individual,  but  a little perception  will show
you that he is held  in by the string of another's will,
by the cord of public opinion.
   The kite-string which holds so many down to earth
in their would-be flying is often ignorance  or fear or
even hunger.  Man with his soul wishes  to fly, and
he feels mat he has an inalienable right to the free
air; but he is unable to rise  and keep his lofty posi-
tion unless  some  other power controls  him.   The
worker, the teacher, the preacher is often just such a
kite on a string.
   The Chinese have  always been  famous for their
kite-flying, and the most advanced forms of kites come
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from the Celestial Empire; but one would hardly take
the civilization of the Mandarins as the type of  the
most rational  social life.   Since the day when Ben-
jamin Franklin flew his kite up into the storm-clouds,
America has been another of the kite-flying nations.
But  the aim of Franklin was different from that of
the old Mandarin.
   Franklin's kite went up for the purpose of finding
out the secret of lightning, which the kite discovered.
Franklin's kite was like Prometheus, who stole  fire
from Heaven  and  learned the secret  of the skies.
Such a kite is a worthy model for the human soul,  for
it showed more affinity for the lightning than for  the
kite-string.
   Man was meant to fly into  intellectual realms,  but
he was not intended to be held down by strings  at-
tached to his intellect  and will.  The strings which
to-day hold men down appear in connection with  la-
bor,  which cannot decide whether  to work or not to
work unless the organization gives its command.  The
air of Russia is full of kites which fly, if at all, only
as the  Soviet may direct.  Although industrial and
political  organizations seem to spring from Democ-
racy, they revert to a time when Democracy was  un-
known.   They represent the  oppression  of the kite
upon the string.
  You were intended to fly,  but your flying is best
done if you proceed under your own power, like an
air-plane, not like a kite.
192 
XCVII
        THE  PSYCHOLOGICAL SEMAPHORE

   THE old-fashioned  flag-man  who waved his white
    and red  flags is  a thing of the past; after him
came  the man in the signal-tower whose  business it
was to tell the  engineer  when to go ahead, when to
stop.   At last we have the automatic semaphore.   As
it has been with railroads, so has it been with  the
mind; at last we have discovered the psychological
semaphore.
  The interesting thing about the semaphore lies in
the fact that the trains which run along the tracks  tell
themselves  to proceed or stop, as it were.  When a
train enters one block, it closes the same behind it; he
who runs his locomotive may read his own signals.
Such self-signaling is the very acme of individuality.
  It is the business of the individual to be both self-
propelled and self-directed.   One  may strive to be
his brother's  keeper, but  there are some things in the
life of the private individual which he alone can ar-
range.  There is no other force than that  of his own
will to drive  him along, no other means than that of
his  own  intellect to guide.   The brother-keeper  has
his place, but it is a restricted one.
  Self-signaling is one of democracy's fine arts, and
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after employing all sorts of devices for the control of
men,—kings, kaisers, czars, the most advanced States
have installed the political semaphore, the device by
means of which all men who are on the same political
track  signal themselves and one  another.   To have
communism is to have no signals at all.
  But the more that individuals decide to go it alone
without the direction of a superior personality as con-
trolling power, the more must the individual seek to
gain control of himself by thought.   If all men were
supermen there  would be no  need of a State.   As
Emerson  said,  "The State exists for  the education
of the wise man, when he appears the State  disap-
pears."  Until that day of full enlightenment comes,
we shall put our trust in democracy with its principle
of self-signaling  government.
  In  the  same  manner, there must  be  self-control
within any republic which decides to  proceed without
royal  authority.   Just  as we insist that the  self-con-
trolled individual be a  kind of wise man, so we must
have wisdom in  the self-controlled State.  The State
that runs  itself  by  means of  semaphore must be a
State  where there are thinkers, men  who give them-
selves  up to  the political problem.   Once  we have
come  to regard  these men as experts rather than as
rulers, we  can tolerate their presence and  consider
their counsel.   Never before has there been such a
demand  for  intelligence; our  semaphores  must be
made  more perfect.
194 
XCVIII
               A PHANTOM VIEW

"V7"OU have  what is called  a  "phantom" view of a
 -*-   ship when the artist  removes one of the sides
so that you can look into bulk-head, compartment,
state-room, and the hold.   The  phantom view of a
house would  reveal all the rooms and closets, halls
and  stair-ways.   Are there  such phantom views of
the brain?
  We see man from the  outside only and  often a
person is to himself what his  neighbor is to him, a
kind of half-known stranger.   Man  who perceives
everything else in the world is not such a good per-
ceiver of himself  or his  kind.  In perception, it is
only another  case of where unlike poles attract while
like poles repel.   The phantom view of psychology is
for the  purpose of gaining insight, or sight  which
looks in.   Without such an inward view, your fellow-
man masquerades while you are to yourself like the
forgotten image of your face in the mirror.
  When the real motherhood of the babe was hidden
from Solomon, he seized a sword and sought to obtain
a phantom view of the two women who claimed the
child.  Sharper than the  sword  was the view which
saw  that she who would  give up her child for the
                       195 
         SHORT TALKS ON  PSYCHOLOGY

child's sake was the real mother.   Solomon in his wis-
dom laid aside the walls of  the maternal mind and
beheld how the house of motherhood was furnished.
   It is the air of the seer to obtain a phantom view of
man.  Socrates knew the houses of Athens from the
outside, but he wished  to know how men furnished
their brain-houses within.  Thus he taught  men to
analyze and then reveal themselves, to give phantom
views of their private souls.
   The stage, with its dialogue, action, and gesture, is
another means of granting us  a phantom view of life.
On the street and in the house, there are just such
comedies and tragedies as are condensed upon  the
artificial stage,  but the curbs  have no foot-lights, the
houses no wings, so  that for  the purpose of finding
out what people are like we require a Shakespeare to
show us man as he is.
   The X-rays of science, psychology, art are all for
the purpose  of  revealing the phantom-view-point.
The man who is  ill has no such  view of his heart,
lungs,  and  other organs as is enjoyed by the clever
physician.   To cure the man of his ills, the physician
makes use of diagnosis, which is his phantom view of
the patient.
   Every man has the right to  know his own soul just
as the heart has the right to know its own bitterness.
The phantom view of the heart may reveal the sweet
as well as the bitter.   You owe it to your brain to
make an X-ray  of your skull.
196 
XCIX
           THE PSYCHOLOGY OF NEWS

  A  NEWSPAPER  is equal in volume to a whole
 •^■*-  book and might be likened to  a collection of
 short stories.   To tell just what is news requires the
 journalistic taste of the skilled editor, who must put
 before our eyes just what our eyes desire to behold.
 What is "news," and why do we wish to keep informed
 about what is new in the wide world?
   If one were anxious to  read  of battles, he could
 turn to history and read of Caesar's or Napoleon's
 campaigns; if his  interest were in murders, he could
 satisfy his emotions by reviewing the lives of Nero or
 Caesar Borgia; if his longing were for scandals, he
 could satisfy such morbid curiosity by consulting the
 memoirs of French courts.  But what one wants is the
 contemporary event, that which shall  make one  feel
 that the battle was fought, the bit of gossip  aired, the
 murder committed  right under his own nose.   We
 want the  newness of the world's news.
   It cannot be denied that the papers  are  full of
 pessimism, or that the items of interest which have
 real interest for us are so many states of strife  and
 distress.   A paper which should print only  the pleas-
ant things about human  life would soon fail.   We
do not care to know that nations are living happily,
                       197 
SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
but prefer to hear of war and rumors of other wars.
We are not interested in the fact that couples are liv-
ing happily together, but prefer to  learn of matri-
monial distress and the possible divorce.   We  read
with pessimistic eyes.
   The psychological effect upon a brain which can
fill itself with the ills and quarrels  of the world is
still  to be calculated.  Our forefathers had to  be
satisfied with the gossip of the community; we  may
satiate ourselves  with the planetary  troubles of all
mankind.  Our brains may still be  shut in by  their
narrow skulls, but  they  have wires which  extend
along all lines of latitude and longitude.  We listen
in and look in upon all the doings and sufferings of
all our brethren.
   From all this publicity of life there arise certain
responsibilities.   One must have the will to receive
all that goes on in his day, for which he must exercise
a  certain king of mental sympathy.  At  the same
time,  one must exercise the power to react upon the
news of the day, and feel that his own will is involved
in the complete doings of the world.   Each separate
person is made to feel that each is responsible to and
for all men.
   The newspaper with its news is the  creator of  sym-
pathy.  It assembles all  men  under one  roof  and
feeds all at the same table.   It makes one feel that
private life is public and public life private.   If you
can respond to the news of your paper, you have a
heart  which is alive.
                       198 
C
           THE SENTIMENTAL VICTORY

 T^HE use of the term "sentimental" is likely to call
 -*-  forth suspicion in most quarters, but psychology
 is as ready to accept sentiment as is physical science
 to approve of matter.  Sentiment is a  simple matter
 of experience; the sway of sentiment is just what one
 should expect of human nature.
   Without attempting any verbal definition of senti-
 ment, one may understand that the experience is one
 marked by feelings and ideas.  In an emotional way
 however tranquil,  one  dwells upon some fond idea;
 say, home, native land, another person.  The simple
 idea is colored and embroidered by the feelings which
 permeate it.
  The victoriousness  of sentiment is  due to senti-
 ment's make-up,  to the idea-element  within  it.   In
 contrast with passions like hatred or anger, sentiment
 may appear as weak as water, but like water it may
 wear the rock away.   In  the  conflict  between senti-
 ment and passion, we have a weak but  enduring emo-
 tion  on one side, a strong  but temporary emotion on
the other.  Which will win?
  We are always saying that races and battles are not
to the swift and strong, so here we may say that the
                       199 
SHORT TALKS ON PSYCHOLOGY
ultimate victory is not to be on the side of strong pas-
sion, on the  side of hatred or anger.   It is the fate
of these over-strong emotions to surcharge the wire
and  burn the fuse out.   Meanwhile sentiment keeps
asserting its tranquil sway within the mind.
   At the present time, when we have seen passion
show itself in war, re-appear in revolution and general
disorder, we  may have the feeling that the end of all
civilization is in sight, but the situation within all the
minds concerned is an affair of passion-sentiment.
Because sentiment is durable and intelligent it cannot
fail  to achieve  its own victory.
   Even  if one be inclined  to discredit the sway  of
moral, political, and religious influences, he has no
right to doubt the authenticity of man's psychological
nature, in  which there is an arrangement as old  as
man, whereby  the tranquilizing principles of mind
must triumph over the strong but disorganizing ones.
Nature arranges its  forms of matter in symmetrical
ways, tends ever to  synthesize,  keeps  in mind  as it
were the welfare of the total mass, in this case the
human  species.  Nature  does this by emphasizing
social sentiment within the mind of man.
  Just when disorder will cease and anarchism of all"
kinds burn out no one can say,  but the ultimate vic-
tory  will be on the side of sentiment, the triumph of
tranquility.

                    THE END
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