VIII

EGOTISM

I had an experience the other day, very disagreeable but most wholesome, which held up for a moment a mirror to my life and character.  I suppose that, at least once in his life, every one has known what it is, in some corridor or stairway, to see a figure advancing towards him, and then to discover with a shock of surprise that he has been advancing to a mirror, and that the stranger is himself.  This happened to me some short while ago, and I was by no means favourably impressed by what I saw!

Well, the other day I was conducting an argument with an irascible man.  His temper suddenly boiled over, and he said several personal things to me, of which I did not at once recognize the truth; but I have since considered the criticisms, and have decided that they are mainly true, heightened perhaps by a little tinge of temper.

I am sorry my friend said the things, because it is difficult to meet, on cordial terms, a man whom one knows to hold an unfavourable opinion of oneself.  But in one way I am glad he said them, because I do not think I could in any other manner have discerned the truth.  If a friend had said them without anger, he would no doubt have so gilded the pill that it would have seemed rather a precious ornament than a bitter remedy.

I will not here say in detail what my friend accused me of, but it amounted to a charge of egotism; and as egotism is a common fault, and particularly common with lonely and unmarried men, I will make no excuse for propounding a few considerations on the point, and how it may perhaps be cured, or, if not cured, at least modified.

I suppose that the egotist is the man who regards the world as a setting for himself, as opposed to the man who realizes that he is a small unit in a gigantic system.  The characteristic of the egotist is to consider himself of too great importance, while the danger of the non-egotist is not sufficiently to realize his significance.  Egotism is the natural temptation of all those whose individuality is strong; the man of intense desires, of acute perceptions, of vigorous preferences, of eager temperament, is in danger of trying to construct his life too sedulously on his own lines; and yet these are the very people who help other people most, and in whom the hope of the race lies.  Meek, humble, timid persons, who accept things as they are, who tread in beaten paths, who are easily persuaded, who are cautious, prudent, and submissive, leave things very much as they find them.  I need make no attempt at indicating the line that such people ought to follow, because it is, unhappily, certain that they will follow the line of least resistance, and that they have no more power of initiative than the bricks of a wall or the waters of a stream.  The following considerations will be addressed to people of a certain vividness of nature, who have strong impulses, fervent convictions, vigorous desires.  I shall try to suggest a species of discipline that can be practised by such persons, a line that they can follow, in order that they may aim at, and perhaps attain, a due subordination and co-ordination of themselves and their temperaments.