CCCCXIX. Exalted station precludes even the exercise of natural affection, much more of common humanity.
CCCCXX. We for the most part strive to regulate our actions, not so much by conscience or reason, as by the opinion of the world. But by the world we mean those who entertain an opinion about us. Now, this circle varies exceedingly, but never expresses more than a part. In senates, in camps, in town, in country, in courts, in a prison, a man’s vices and virtues are weighed in a separate scale by those who know him, and who have similar feelings and pursuits. We care about no other opinion. There is a moral horizon which bounds our view, and beyond which the rest is air. The public is divided into a number of distinct jurisdictions for different claims; and posterity is but a name, even to those who sometimes dream of it.
CCCCXXI. We can bear to be deprived of everything but our self-conceit.
CCCCXXII. Those who are fond of setting things to rights, have no great objection to seeing them wrong. There is often a good deal of spleen at the bottom of benevolence.
CCCCXXIII. The reputation of science which ought to be the most lasting, as synonymous with truth, is often the least so. One discovery supersedes another; and the progress of light throws the past into obscurity. What has become of the Blacks, the Lavoisiers, the Priestleys, in chemistry? In political economy, Adam Smith is laid on the shelf, and Davenant and De Witt have given place to the Says, the Ricardos, the Malthuses, and the Macullochs. These persons are happy in one respect—they have a sovereign contempt for all who have gone before them, and never dream of those who are to come after them and usurp their place. When any set of men think theirs the only science worth studying, and themselves the only infallible persons in it, it is a sign how frail the traces are of past excellence in it, and how little connection it has with the general affairs of human life. In proportion to the profundity of any inquiry, is its futility. The most important and lasting truths are the most obvious ones. Nature cheats us with her mysteries, one after another, like a juggler with his tricks; but shews us her plain honest face, without our paying for it. The understanding only blunders more or less in trying to find out what things are in themselves: the heart judges at once of its own feelings and impressions; and these are true and the same.
CCCCXXIV. Scholastic divinity was of use in its day, by affording exercise to the mind of man. Astrology, and the finding-out the philosopher’s stone, answered the same purpose. If we had not something to doubt, to dispute and quarrel about, we should be at a loss what to do with our time.
CCCCXXV. The multitude who require to be led, still hate their leaders.
CCCCXXVI. It has been said that any man may have any woman.
CCCCXXVII. Many people are infatuated with ill-success, and reduced to despair by a lucky turn in their favour. While all goes well, they are like fish out of water. They have no confidence or sympathy with their good fortune, and look upon it as a momentary delusion. Let a doubt be thrown on the question, and they begin to be full of lively apprehensions again; let all their hopes vanish, and they feel themselves on firm ground once more. From want of spirit or of habit, their imaginations cannot rise from the low ground of humility, cannot reflect the gay, flaunting colours of the rainbow, flag and droop into despondency, and can neither indulge the expectation, nor employ the means of success. Even when it is within their reach, they dare not lay hands upon it, and shrink from unlooked-for prosperity, as something of which they are ashamed and unworthy. The class of croakers here spoken of are less delighted at other people’s misfortunes than at their own. Querulous complaints and anticipations of failure are the food on which they live, and they at last acquire a passion for that which is the favourite subject of their thoughts and conversation.
CCCCXXVIII. There are some persons who never succeed, from being too indolent to undertake anything; and others who regularly fail, because the instant they find success in their power, they grow indifferent, and give over the attempt.