He becomes plain only with
years. In youth, even in the thirties, he has fanciful capricious
qualities which prevent him from being classed with the average
sagacious plain man. He slowly loses these inconvenient qualities, and
develops into part of the backbone of the nation. And then it is too
late to tell him that he is not perfect, simply because he has
forgotten to cultivate the master quality of all qualities--namely,
imagination. For imagination must be cultivated early, and it is just
the quality that these admirable plain men lack.
By imagination I mean the power to conceive oneself in a situation
which one is not actually in; for instance, in another person's place.
It is among the sardonic humours of destiny that imagination, while
positively dangerous in an ill-balanced mind and of the highest value
in a well-balanced mind, is to be found rather in the former than in
the latter. And anyhow, the quality is rare in Anglo-Saxon races,
which are indeed both afraid and ashamed of it.
And yet could the plain, the well-balanced Anglo-Saxon male acquire
it, what a grand world we should live in! The most important thing in
the world would be transformed. The most important thing in the world
is, ultimately, married life, and the chief practical use of the
quality of imagination is to ameliorate married life.
Pages:
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73