In sane and sound health we
realise that we are not, as a rule, the objects of the malignity
and spitefulness of others. We are perhaps obstacles to the
carrying out of other people's plans; but men and women as a rule
mind their own business, and are not much concerned to intervene in
the designs and activities of others. Yet a man whose mental
equilibrium is unstable is apt to think that if he is disappointed
or thwarted it is the result of a deliberate conspiracy on the part
of other people. If he is a writer, he thinks that other writers
are aware of his merits, but are determined to prevent them being
recognised out of sheer ill-will. A man in robust health realises
that he gets quite as much credit or even more credit than he
deserves, and that his claims to attention are generously
recognised; one has exactly as much influence and weight as one can
get, and other people as a rule are much too much occupied in their
own concerns to have either the time or the inclination to
interfere. But as a man grows older, as his work stiffens and
weakens, he falls out of the race, and he must be content to do so;
and he is well advised if he puts his failure down to his own
deficiencies, and not to the malice of others.
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