Young people who have quick abilities, and who happen to live with those who are inferiour to them either in knowledge or incapacity, are apt to become positive and self-willed; they measure all the world by the individuals with whom they have measured themselves; and, as they have been convinced that they have been in the right in many cases, they take it for granted that their judgment must be always infallible. This disease may be easily cured; it is only necessary to place the patient amongst his superiors in intellect, his own experience will work his cure: he liked to follow his will, because his judgment had taught him that he might trust more securely to the tact of his own understanding, than to the decision of others. As soon as he discovers more sense in the arguments of his companions, he will listen to them, and if he finds their reason superior to his own, he will submit. A preceptor, who wishes to gain ascendency over a clever positive boy, must reason with all possible precision, and must always show that he is willing to be decided by the strongest arguments which can be produced. If he ever prophesies, he sets his judgment at stake; therefore he should not prophesy about matters of chance, but rather in affairs where he can calculate with certainty. If his prophecies are frequently accomplished, his pupil's confidence in him will rapidly increase; and if he desires that confidence to be permanent, he will not affect mystery, but he will honestly explain the circumstances by which he formed his opinions. Young people who are accustomed to hear and to give reasons for their opinions, will not be violent and positive in assertions; they will not think that the truth of any assertion can be manifested by repeating over the same words a thousand times; they will not ask how many people are of this or that opinion, but rather what arguments are produced on each side. There is very little danger that any people, whether young or old, should continue to be positive, who are in the habit of exercising their reasoning faculty.
It has been often observed that extremely good humoured, complaisant children, when they grow up, become ill tempered; and young men who are generally liked in society as pleasant companions, become surly, tyrannical masters in their own families, positive about mere trifles, and anxious to subjugate the wills of all who are any wise dependent upon them. This character has been nicely touched by de Boissy, in his comedy called "Dehors trompeurs."
We must observe, that whilst young people are in company, and under the immediate influence of the excitements of novelty, numbers and dissipation, it is scarcely possible to form a just estimate of the goodness of their temper. Young men who are the most ready to yield their inclinations to the humour of their companions, are not therefore to be considered as of really compliant dispositions; the idle or indolent, who have no resources in their own minds, and no independent occupations, are victims to the yawning demon of ennui the moment they are left in solitude. They consequently dread so heartily to be left alone, that they readily give up a portion of their liberty to purchase the pleasures and mental support which society affords. When they give up their wishes, and follow the lead of the company, they in fact give up but very little; their object is amusement; and this obtained, their time is sacrificed without regret. On the contrary, those who are engaged in literary or professional pursuits, set a great value upon their time, and feel considerable reluctance to part with it without some adequate compensation; they must consequently be less complaisant companions, and by the generality of superficial observers, would be thought, perhaps, less complying in their tempers, than the idle and dissipated. But when the idle man has past the common season for dissipation, and is settled in domestic life, his spirits flag from the want of his usual excitements; and, as he has no amusements in his own family, to purchase by the polite sacrifice of his opinion or his will, he is not inclined to complaisance. The pleasures of exercising his free will, becomes important in his eyes; he has few pleasures, and of those few he is tenacious. He has been accustomed to submit to others in society; he is proud to be master at home; he has few emotions, and the emotion caused by the exertion of command, becomes agreeable and necessary to him. Thus many of the same causes which make a young man a pleasant companion abroad, tend naturally to make him a tyrant at home. This perversity and positiveness of temper, ultimately arise from the want of occupation, and from deficient energy of mind. We may guard against these evils by education: when we see a playful, active child, we have little fear of his temper. "Oh, he will certainly be good tempered, he is the most obedient, complying creature in the world, he'll do any thing you ask him." But let us cultivate his understanding, and give him tastes which shall occupy and interest him agreeably through life, or else this sweet, complying temper will not last till he is thirty.
An ill cured obstinacy of temper, when it breaks out after young people have arrived at years of discretion, is terrible. Those who attempt to conquer obstinacy in children by bodily pain, or by severe punishments of any kind, often appear to succeed, and to have entirely eradicated, when they have merely suppressed, the disease for a time. As soon as the child that is intimidated by force or fear, is relieved from restraint, he will resume his former habits; he may change the mode of showing it, but the disposition will continue the same. It will appear in various parts of the conduct, as the limbs of the giant appeared unexpectedly at different periods, and in different parts of the Castle of Otranto.
[45] Elegy on an old Beauty. Parnell.
[46] Rousseau.
[47] Emilius, vol. i. page 23.
[48] Vol. i. page 59.
[49] Histoire des Membres de l'Académie, par M. d'Alembert. Tome troisieme, p. 24.
[50] Voltaire's Hist. Charles XII. page 13.