THE VALUE OF MODESTY
I have said that it is not your fault that you were not born in the purple. Neither is it of your merit and to your honor that you now walk in silk attire, and may freely gratify dreams you would once have considered wildly impossible. A certain steadiness of attitude should be striven for. Don’t be like a bell, answering helplessly to every contact. Imitate in your manner that large nobility of Horatio of whom Hamlet said,
“A man that fortune’s buffets and rewards
Hast ta’en with equal thanks.
They are not a pipe for fortune’s finger
To sound what stop she please.”
The best of all books enjoins on the suddenly-exalted to be mindful of the pit from whence they were digged. Purse-pride is contemptible in its meanness and folly. You are safe from ridicule if you keep this fact in mind. Set up “me” and “mine” in “pearl” type, and not in capitals.
A final injunction: do not assume knowledge of what you are really ignorant. To do this is to lay traps for yourself and to multiply embarrassments. Try to forestall the situation by private questioning; if you can not do this say frankly that you do not know.