“Obviously the crux of the matter was the height of the wall and the fear of hurting myself severely if I missed my leap,” he continued. “Once I had discovered that—and of course it took much less time to do so than it takes now to explain the case—I set about another trial. I made up my mind that I would think nothing of the chance of slipping, and that this time I would accomplish the feat with ease. Yet once more I failed to bring my body up to the effort. Something stronger than my consciousness was at work; and it defeated me.”
He smiled sardonically at some memory or other.
“I practised jumping along a marked portion of the wall where it was lower; and I found that I could accomplish the distance with ease. Whereupon my childish mind formulated the problem in this way; and I believe that it was correct in doing so. The ultimate factor in the thing was the fear of a damaging fall. Within limits, I was prepared to take the risk; as had been shown by the success on the lower parts of the wall. But at the high place beside the gateway, my resolution had given way under a strain of nervousness. And at once there came into my mind the conception of a breaking-strain. Up to a certain tension, my conscious mind worked perfectly; but, beyond that, there was a complete collapse. Something had snapped under the strain. I may say that I finally accomplished the leap successfully; I simply wouldn’t allow myself to be beaten in a thing I knew I could do.”
He halted for a moment as though this marked a turning-point in his thoughts.
“This idea of the breaking-strain remained fixed in my child’s mind, however; and I used to amuse myself by conjecturing all sorts of hypothetical cases in which it played a part. It finally grew to be a sort of mild obsession with me, and I would ask myself continually: “Why did So-and-so do this rather than that?” and would then set to work to discover the factors at the back of his actions and the tension-snap which had driven him into something which was unexpected from his normal line of conduct.
“You can understand, Flint, how this practice grew upon me. It is the most interesting thing in the world; and the materials for applying it are everywhere about us in our everyday life. I extracted endless amusement from it; and as I grew up into boyhood I found its fascination greater than ever. I took a never-failing interest in probing at the hidden springs of conduct and trying to establish these breaking-strains in the people before me.
“Then, as I grew older I discovered the Law Courts. There you see the philosophy of the breaking-strain brought into touch with real life in a practical form. I used to go and watch some well-known barrister handling a hostile witness; and suddenly I understood that all these men were merely fumbling empirically after the thing that I had studied from my earliest days. What does a barrister want to do with a hostile witness? To break him down, to throw him out of his normal line of thought and then to fish among the dislocated machinery for something which suits his own case. It afforded me endless interest to follow the methods of each different cross-examiner. I learned a great deal in the Courts; and I came away from them convinced that I had found something of more than mere academic interest. This breaking-strain question was one which could be applied to affairs of the greatest practical importance. It was actually so applied in law cases. Why not utilise it in other directions also?”
I found him watching me keenly to see if I followed his line of thought. After a moment, he went on:
“It sounds so obvious now, Flint; but I believe that I alone saw it as a scientific problem. Your blackmailer, your poker-sharp, all those types of mind had been working on the thing in a crude way; but to me it appeared from a different angle. Everyone else had looked on it in the form of special cases, particular men who had to be swayed by particular motives. I began as a youth where they left off. I spent some years on it, Flint, examining it in all its bearings; and finally I evolved a system of classification which enabled me to approach any specific case along general lines. I can’t go into that now; but it suddenly gave me an insight into motives and actions such as I doubt if anyone ever had before.”
He paused and watched the smoke curling up from his cigar. Again he seemed to be deep in the consideration of some problem connected with and yet alien to what he had been saying. For a time he was lost in thought; and I waited to hear the rest of the story.