The Foundations of Personality [169]
at all times to demonstrate this, he "knows enough" to camouflage, to disguise and modify its manifestations. In this way he manages to be popular, just as W. is decidedly unpopular, and many mistake him for modest. When he wishes to put over his own opinion he prefaces his statements by "they say," and though whatever organization he enters he wishes to lead, he manages to give the impression that he is reluctant to take a prominent part. A man of ability and good judgment, the narrow range of F.'s sympathies, his lack of sincere cordial feeling, is hidden by a really artistic assumption of altruism that deceives all save those who through long acquaintance know his real character. One sees through W. on first meeting, he wears no mask or disguise; but F. defies detection, though their natures are not radically different except in wisdom and tact. Half and more of the actions, poses and speech of men and women is to demonstrate superiority or to avoid inferiority. There are some who feel inwardly inferior, yet disguise this feeling successfully. This feeling of inferiority may arise from purely accidental matters, such as appearance, deformity, tone of voice, etc., and the individual may either hide, become seclusive or else brazen it out, so to speak. A famous Boston physician was a splendid example of a brusque, overbearing mask used to hide a shrinking, timid, subjectively inferior personality. Always very near-sighted and unattractive, he was essentially shy and modest but decided or felt that this was a rough world and the way to get ahead was to be rough. Towards the weak and sick he was kindness itself--gentle, sympathetic and patient--but towards his colleagues he was a boor. Distant, haughty, quick to demand all the consideration due him, he was noted far and wide for the caustic way he attacked others for their opinions and beliefs and the respect he required for his own. The general opinion of physicians was that he was a conceited, arrogant, aristocratic man, and he was avoided except for his medical opinion, which was usually very sound. Those admitted to the sanctum of this man's real self knew him to be really modest and self-deprecatory, anxious to do right and almost obsessed by the belief that he knew but little compared to others. One day there walked into my office a lady, head of a large enterprise, who had been pointed out to me some time previously as the very personification of self-assurance and superiority. A dignified woman of middle age, whose reserve and correct manners impressed one at once; she bore out in career and casual conversation this impression of one whose confidence and belief in herself were not misplaced, in other words, a harmoniously developed egotist. What she came to consult me about, was--her feeling of inferiority! All of her life, said she, she had been overawed by others. As a girl her mother ruled her, and her younger sister, more charming and more vivacious, was the pet of the family. Brought up in a strict church, she developed a firmness of speech and conduct that inhibited the frankness and friendliness of her social contacts. Because of this, and her overserious attitudes generally, girls of her own age rather avoided her, and she became painfully self-conscious in their company as well as in the company of men. She wanted to "let go" but could not, and in time felt that there was something lacking in her, that people laughed at her behind her back and that no one really liked her. Her reaction to this was to determine that she would not show her real feelings, that she would deal with the world on a basis of "business only" and cut out friendship from her life. Her intelligence and her devotion to her work brought her success, and she would have gone her way without regard for her "inferiority complex" had not chance thrown in her way a young woman colleague who saw through her elder's pose and became her friend. My patient drank in this friendship with an avidity the greater for her long loneliness, and she was very happy until the younger woman fell in love with