I
think that men and women ought gaily and delightedly to choose the
things that minister to their vigour and joy, and to throw
themselves willingly into these things, so long as they do not
interfere with plainer and simpler duties.
Another way of escape from the importunities of fear is to be very
resolute in fighting against our personal claims to honour and
esteem. We are sorely wounded through our ambitions, whether they
be petty or great; and it is astonishing to find how frail a basis
often serves for a sense of dignity. I have known lowly and
unimportant people who were yet full of pragmatical self-concern,
and whose pride took the form not so much of exalting their own
consequence as of thinking meanly of other people. It is easy to
restore one's own confidence by dwelling with bitter emphasis on
the faults and failings of those about one, by cataloguing the
deficiencies of those who have achieved success, by accustoming
oneself to think of one's own lack of success as a sign of
unworldliness, and by attributing the success of others to a
cynical and unscrupulous pursuit of reputation.
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