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Typos — p. 307: elemantal [= elemental]; p. 319: Hoffmann [= Hoffman]; p. 321: dissiptation [= dissipation]; p. 322: chim [= chin]; p. 323: phsyiognomical [= physiognomical]; p. 326: Scandanavia [= Scandinavia]; p. 327: Britian [= Britain]; p. 328, n. 2: p.. 557–559 [= pp. 557–559]; p. 329: artizan [= artisan]; p. 333: Tol la mora [= "Tol la mora]; p. 338: words great [= words: great]; p. 338: feminity [= femininity]; p. 338: feminity [= femininity] Chapter II The Subject of the Previous Chapter Continued 7. The approach from psycho-analysis and the new psychology. This is the most difficult with which I have to deal, because I think it may be said without unfairness to the whole of the new psychology, that the validity of some of its essential first principles is still sub judice. I cannot enter exhaustively into the teachings of Freud, Adler and Jung, and shall attempt only to give the reader some idea of their importance in regard to characterology. Starting out from pathological states, the new psychology, with psycho-analysis, attempts to describe the leading unconscious conditions which, in conjunction, and often in conflict, with the conscious, act formatively on conduct and adaptation, whether in the healthy or the unhealthy. In the hands of its chief exponents, this science has discovered a number of new facts concerning the human mind, although the object with which it set out — the discovery of a reliable psychotherapy, has not been altogether achieved. Stated briefly, the psycho-analytical, or Freud's position, is this: We all have two levels to our minds — a conscious and an unconscious, the former being to the latter much as the part of an iceberg that protrudes from the water is to the part that is submerged, i.e. in a ratio of one to ten. The unconscious consists of various ingredients — racial memories and impulses, and individual experiences which have been repressed (i.e. desires, appetites and impulses that have been involuntarily driven back into the unconscious) either because their expression was impossible, or because it or they led to painful or intolerable situations. As, however, desires, appetites and impulses have instinctive energy behind them, they are not quiescent in repression. They are much more in the nature of fermenting liquors, constantly sending up bubbles to the surface and trying to express themselves in spite of everything. The guardian or censor at the door between the unconscious and the conscious is very severe, Completely forgotten consciously, these repressed memories, experiences or desires, nevertheless bring to bear on consciousness all kinds of influences, direct or indirect, which consciousness as frequently misinterprets, although it acts in some way upon them. Suppose, for instance, a female child has an unpleasant experience connected in some way with sex and hair, the memory of which becomes submerged in the unconscious. Although, as an adult, she may not be able to recall the incident, its survival as a repressed memory may influence her conscious life in ways she cannot understand, and always misinterprets. Thus, it may cause her constantly to mislay or lose her muff or fur stole. It may make her vaguely disinclined to wear furs at all. This disinclination probably appears to her consciousness in the form of a dread of being too hot, or looking too bulky in furs. The fact that when, possibly out of regard for the fashion of her day, she wears a muff or fur stole, she constantly loses it, she will explain in various ways that have nothing whatsoever to do with the real cause. One day her excuse will be that she witnessed an accident from her taxi-cab, another time that she had unexpectedly met a long-lost friend; or, again, she will blame a shop assistant for having been rude to her. It will never occur to her that she constantly loses her muff or stole because a shameful or forbidden experience connected with hair has long lain repressed in her unconscious mind, causing her to try to forget about hair as urgently as she forgets about the associated shameful experience itself. And the reason why this will not occur to her is that her conscious mind is actually unaware of it. 2 Similar eccentricities of conduct, misinterpreted by consciousness, such as slips of the tongue and of the pen, 3 are constantly being caused by such unconscious memories, and from their 1 For Freud's own description of this censor, see GENERAL INTRODUCTION TO PSYCHO-ANALYSIS (New York, 1920, p. 256). 2 For innumerable similar examples, see Freud's PSYCHO-PATHOLOGY OF EVERYDAY LIFE (London, 1914, Chap. IX). 3 Ibid., Chaps. V and VI. When the repression is of a more serious character, as, for instance, when it represents the incestuous desire of a boy for his mother (Freud's "Œdipus Complex"), or of a girl for her father (the "Electra Complex"), its effects on the life of the adult may be serious. He or she may hate the parent who stands in the way of reading the unconscious incestuous desire, without knowing exactly why. Thus a boy may hate a perfectly kind father and a girl a perfectly good mother, and explain the hatred by referring to utterly insufficient reasons — such as the father's way of coughing, or eating, or laughing, or his conceit, or his conversation, or his attitude to mother. The girl may try to account for her hatred of her mother by saying vaguely that she is too "self-centred", or too "short" with father, or too fond of Mrs. X, and so on. These examples must suffice to show the far-reaching effects which a buried or unconscious memory may have on adult behaviour. And, as Freud claims that these repressions occur in very early childhood, when the child first learns that some of its desires or experiences are shameful or forbidden, it is not difficult to see how onerous is the task of unearthing these memories and bringing them to consciousness, more particularly when we remember that consciousness resists the process. Bringing them to consciousness, however, and causing the patient to re-enact the whole complex of emotions associated with them (hence the word "complex"), constitutes Freud's alleged cure of the distressing or awkward symptoms to which they may give rise. 1 The attacks on Freud have come chiefly from an outraged public and a group of outraged scientists, who resented the notion that the sex instinct played such an important part in the lives of children whom hitherto the world of sentimentalists had 1 See PAPERS ON PSYCHO-ANALYSIS, by E. Jones, M.D. (London, 1918, p. 128): "The mode of action of the treatment . . . which is the overcoming, by means of psycho-analysis, of the resistances that are interposed against the making conscious of the repressed unconscious material, gives the patient a much greater control over the pathogenic material by establishing a free flow of feeling from the deeper to the more superficial layers of the mind, so that the energy investing the repressed tendencies can be diverted from the production of symptoms into useful, social channels." When Freud says: "The mother would probably be terrified if it were explained to her that all her tenderness awakens the sexual impulse of her child and prepares its future intensity. She considers her actions as asexually 'pure'", 1 he is really guilty of understatement. The fact is that the mother, when this was explained to her, was not only terrified, but outraged and angry, and she and her friends, both male and female, accused Freud of exaggerating the sex-factor in human life, of being obsessed by sex, and of polluting many of the most idyllic situations of life. Such people, relying more on their outraged feelings than on their reason, forgot to inquire into the nature of Freud's researches. Freud dealt with repressions. Now there are not necessarily any repressions about harmless pastimes like playing the piano, toasting a slice of bread at the fire, or playing patience, unless some past shameful experience happens to be correlated with them. Why should there be? The very nature of Freud's inquiry inevitably led him to sex, because sex in civilized life happens to be a department about which there are many severe tabus. 2 The child at a tender age learns that it must not expose itself, must not talk of the functions connected with its anus and genitalia. Very early, therefore, a civilized child gathers that the region of the pubis in its body is a shameful, or at least a secret affair. It is not taught that it is shameful to handle a chair, or a toy or a ball; but it is taught that it is shameful to handle its genitalia. When dealing with repressions, therefore — and Freud made if quite clear that this was his province — he inevitably lighted upon a mass of sex and water-closet material in the unconscious, and very rightly said so. 1 THREE CONTRIBUTIONS TO THE THEORY OF SEX (trans. by A. Brill, New York, 1918, p. 82). 2 Freud points this out repeatedly, and puts it very plainly in his little monograph on DREAMS (trans. by Dr. Eder, London, 1924, p. 101), where, speaking of the sex instinct, he says: "No other class of instincts has required so vast a suppression at the behest of civilization as the sexual, whilst their mastery by the highest psychical processes is in most persons soonest of all relinquished." My own suspicions regarding the validity of the new psychologist's therapeutical claims were first aroused in the years 1918–1920, when, under my own eyes, a girl I knew very well steadily overcame certain distressing neurotic symptoms without psycho-analytical help and apparently merely by improving bodily functioning. The neurotic symptoms in question were as follows: She would awake suddenly at night in the middle of a dream which always had the same content. She would be lying at the bottom of a deep well, the walls of which were closing in about her. This made her jump out of bed and thrust head and shoulders out of the nearest window for free air and for the experience of freedom. Obviously there was danger here. Given a window difficult to open, or actually fixed, and the sleeper, still only semi-conscious, might have thrust head and shoulders through a pane of glass and been badly cut. Other symptoms were these: She could not sit in a close or stuffy restaurant, or room, or theatre, and could not make a journey in a closed carriage or cabin. I had read two or three works of Freud at that time, and I diagnosed a hidden birth memory in the case, i.e. a repression of the experience of being born too arduously and slowly, with all the accompanying sensations of a high carbon-dioxide content in the blood. 1 He has recently said: "The future will probably attribute far greater importance to psycho-analysis as the science of the unconscious than as a therapeutic procedure" (E.B., 14th Ed., XVIII, p. 673). I explained all this to her and she checked my diagnosis by questioning her mother, who confessed that her birth had been a very difficult one. But now observe what followed. Her symptoms continued as before. Meanwhile, however, she received help in tackling the trouble of constipation from which she had suffered for years, and ultimately succeeded in overcoming it without the help of daily aperients. As it dated from an attack of peritonitis many years previously, it took a long time to cure. But, as it gradually vanished, the symptoms of claustrophobia declined as well, until with its total suppression, no trace of claustrophobia remained. I was not then, and am not now, sufficiently expert to explain all that happened. But, at the time, I strongly suspected that the distress caused by the long history of constipation, with the daily use of Irritant aperients, might have been an important factor in the genesis of the neurosis, and that probably other neuroses, which psychiatrists like Freud, Jung and Adler, describe as of purely psychogenic origin, have a similar history, i.e. they begin with a long period of psycho-physical distress. I object, in any case, to this subdivision of mind and body, and to the practice of diagnosing so-called "mental" and so-called "physical" trouble. And when I hear and see that psycho-analysis is itself beginning to be less triumphant as a therapy than as a contribution to the science of the unconscious, 1 I ask myself whether perhaps my instinctive feeling that neuroses 1 The only purely objective and unbiassed study of the therapeutic results of psycho-analysis, that I know, is the review made by Drs. Leo Kessel and H. T. Hyman of 33 cases completely and competently analyzed. Of the "results, 16 were classified as failures, 17 were helped, and in 5 instances it is no exaggeration to say that the cure was specific." Of those that were merely helped, the report says: "The results were good, hut not startling, and at times the result was not specific but due to the modified circumstances" (normal sexual intercourse, etc.). The authors sum up the limitations of psycho-analysis as follows: (1) Its practice is limited to a small group of adequately trained physicians, who cannot possibly handle more than a small number of patients annually. (2)Where the need is greatest, in true psychoses and drug addictions, there is the least expectation of assistance. (3) Favourable results cannot be obtained in patients beyond the age of 40, or who are not well-to-do and unusually intelligent. "The average man in the street is totally unable to grasp or utilize this form of therapy", which "requires attendance from 3 to 6 hours a week for well over a year." The authors conclude by saying, "Despite our receptive attitude towards psycho-analysis as a form of therapy, in 12 years we have seen only a handful of patients who have benefited from the experiences" (J.A.M.A., 18.11.33, pp. 1612–1615). This is by no means the first and only valuation of this form of therapy. In 1930 the Berlin Psychoanalytical Institute published a review of 721 cases, and in 1929 the B.M.A. instituted Before I do this, however, I should like to state precisely the extent of my doubts concerning the psycho-analytical position. I do not question the validity of Freud's science of the unconscious, nor do I doubt the reality of the complexes of which he speaks. Though I do not believe I have a conscious knowledge of more than one of these complexes — the Œdipus — I know all too well the nature of this complex and the great influence it has had on my life, to hesitate in acknowledging its possibility and power. I, therefore, accept Freud's claim that a complex may lead to a peculiar or faulty adjustment to the problems of life, although I doubt whether it often does so alone or single-handed. Consequently, what I venture to doubt is that the difficulties arising in adult life as the supposed result of a complex, whether neuroses, or psychoses, or functional disorders of the organs, are as often of a psychogenic nature as the psycho-analysts allege, and whether we should not rather assume as more probable that all human beings have some, if not all, of the complexes, and that these, as a rule, become of importance in relation to neurotic behaviour or functional disorders, only when something else, some mechanical distress of long standing, has reduced the average nervous health to a low ebb. The alert reader will say that I am here guilty of a dualism similar to that of the psycho-analyst himself. For I am really saying that almost all neuroses and functional disorders are of an organic or somatic nature, i.e. they originate in some congenital or acquired peculiarity or disorder of the body, which, by harassing the nerves for a long while, at last allows the complexes, otherwise inoffensive and latent, to assert themselves and crown the nervous irritability. But even if I assume what seems to be a dualistic position here, surely it is one more justified than the psycho-analyses. The mind, as we know it, is a more recent acquisition than the body. In other words, the thoracic and abdominal viscera of Man do not differ nearly as much as does his brain from the correspond- an inquiry into psycho-analysis as a medical theory and procedure. But this review of Drs. Kessel and Hyman is the first impartial examination of results in definite cases. If we are to suppose that one moves the other, or that trouble in one affects the other, it seems to me that the genesis of the trouble is likely to start very much more often in the older than in the newer mechanisms. In this sense I would suggest that only a small percentage of neuroses and psychoses and functional disorders of the organism, can have a purely psychogenic origin, and can be approached and removed by the psychological method — hence possibly the disappointments that have attended psycho-therapy based on this approach. Now let us see what has been said and done to confirm this view, so important from the standpoint of character. In the first place, Drs. G. R. Wilson and H. C. Marr make this significant remark: "Speaking generally, nearly every case of insanity is attended by a more or less profound disturbance of all the important bodily functions; and the more grave the insanity is going to be, the greater that disturbance is." 1 Secondly, Dr. Henry Devine writes as follows: "It is recognised that the psychoses must be the outcome of a malfunctioning organism." 2 But these statements, however authoritative, are too general. In an article on BIOCHEMISTRY AND MENTAL DISORDER, Dr. J. H. Quastel, Director of Research, Cardiff City Mental Hospital, says: "Mental disease is a symptom of underlying disease or physiological disturbances, the sites, the details, and the courses of which, in the majority of instances, are either unknown, or far from clear." And, "the clinical state 'insanity', whilst immediately referable to the brain, has to be considered as ultimately dependent upon the malfunctioning of various other organs and systems in the body." 3 1 E.M., VI, p. 595. 2 E.B. (14th Ed., XVIII, p. 722). I point out that I am deliberately neglecting the published attacks on psycho-analysis by medical men (Dr. MacBride's, for instance) in order to state my own personal doubts, supported by facts personally collected. 3 LANCET, 31.12.32, p. 1417. He then proceeds to describe the mental symptoms accompanying lack of oxygen in high altitudes. Such are, loss of judgment and memory, irritability and emotional instability. And he adds, "there seems to be little question that anoxæmia of the brain leads to irrational behaviour". Hence the psychological effects of narcotics which diminish "the rates of oxidation brought about in the brain". This they do, not by interfering with the access of oxygen to the brain, but with the mechanisms which result in the activation of lactic acid or pyruvic acid. 2 Then, speaking of the normal detoxication of tyramine by the liver, and of the liberation of this substance in the blood, if the detoxicating process becomes faulty, he adds: "It seems not impossible that many of the toxic confusional cases, so commonly encountered in mental hospitals, owe their disability to a phenomenon of this description." 3 The whole article should be read, but the following passages are surely most important: "It is evident that in manic-depressive disorders, a disturbance, most probably of the endocrine system occurs, which upsets the normal carbo-hydrate metabolism of the patient." 4 Dr. Quastel also refers to the successful thyroid-feeding of schizophrenic patients of "poor prognosis and of the chronic class", and to Zondek's recent work on the bromine content of the blood in manic-depressives, which he found to be 40 per cent lower than in normal cases, and present in all phases of their illness. This change in bromine level is supposed to be consequent on an endocrine disturbance. Finally, speaking of the hydrolytic enzymes, affecting endocrine glands and cerebral cortex, in the blood of psychotics, he says: "Apparently the sera of manic-depressive cases show none of these enzymes, whereas those of schizophrenic and frankly organic psychoses contain the enzymes in variable quantities." 5 Another worker in this field. Dr. T. Stacey Wilson, claims that 1 Ibid. 2 Ibid. 3 Ibid., p. 1418. 4 Ibid. 5 Ibid., p. 1419. Among the mental symptoms of colon hardening which he mentions are — mental depression and unhappiness, worry over some imaginary trouble (anxiety), phobias and obsessions, neurasthenia, visual hallucinations, suicidal impulses, etc. And among the possible causes of nerve strain and neurasthenia, he mentions: "errors of refraction . . . dropped kidneys . . . uterine displacements . . . labyrinthine vertigo of a moderate degree . . . dilated deep-thigh veins", etc. 2 Dr. R. C. Rutherford, Medical Superintendent of Farnham House, Finglas, Co. Dublin, also contributes to the subject. In an interesting article, he says: "There can be no question about the exceeding frequency with which subthyroidal symptoms are met with in a mental hospital. . . . For this reason I believe that every symptom of subthyroidism should be regarded with concern as to the mental future of the patient." He also points out how often goitre is associated with psychosis, and says: "In a mental hospital receiving no cases of idiocy, one patient in every eight has some thyroid enlargement." And he adds: "I have noted for many years the frequency with which patients suffering from mental trouble can be found to have mothers or maternal aunts who suffer from goitre." He then considers chronic sepsis as a factor in mental illness, and says of Dr. Graves, of the Birmingham Mental Hospital: "He has published the results of 1000 cases that have been examined by the Watson-Williams technique of sinus puncture and wash-out, with the result that 818 were found to show evidence of nasal sinus infection." 3 1 B.M.J., 6.5.33, p. 804. 2 TONIC HARDENING OF THE COLON (Oxford, 1927, pp. 25–27 and p. 36). For cases cured, see pp. 119–139. For treatment: pp. 35–52. 3 B.M.J., 29.7.33, pp. 188–189. See, however, INFECTION OF THE NASAL SINUSES AND TONSILS IN THE PSYCHOSES, by Dr. P. K. McCowan (LANCET, 14.10.33, pp. Dr. Rutherford, bearing out the claims of an investigator like Dr. Stacey Wilson, points to the frequency of gastric disturbances and constipation as factors in the etiology of mental disease, "especially melancholia", and he adds, "I have known some patients make a complete recovery within a few days following the administration of an enema." 2 Another writer. Dr. Sara M. Jordane, of Boston, U.S.A., in a recent article on "The Unstable Colon and Neurosis", says among other things: "Since there is a definite percentage of patients . . . who show clear-cut improvement in their neurogenic symptoms, it is assumed that the condition of colonic dysfunction may precipitate in a fatigued patient symptoms of neuroses, and that when the normal physiological condition is restored the associated symptoms are relieved." 3 Dr. K. Platanow, of Leipzig, in a recent article, rejects Stekel's view that vomiting in pregnancy is necessarily of psychogenic origin, i.e. anxiety neurosis in Freud's sense. Dr. Platanow treated 62 cases by simple suggestion in the waking state or under hypnosis, and in 80 per cent of cases with success. He concludes that the symptom is a somatic rather than a psychic manifestation, and since such a minor psycho-therapeutic measure as suggestion is capable of influencing these cases, he claims that resort to psycho-analysis is not necessary. 4 Platanow's claim is less significant from the standpoint I am advancing than from the standpoint of the thorough-going anti-Freudian who rejects psycho-analysis altogether. But at least it adds to the evidence which shows that many disorders claimed 853–855), in which, out of 807 cases at the Cardiff City Mental Hospital, only 24 had sinusitis. 1 Op. cit., p. 189. 2 Ibid., p. 190. 3 J.A.M.A., 31.12.32, p. 2236. 4 Ibid., 11.2.33, p. 462 (in a report on the ZENTRALBLATT FÜR GYNÄKOLOGIE, Leipzig. Dec., 1932). Turning now to Pavlov, of Leningrad; in a recent letter he writes: "First of all, one sees that neuroses are possible to obtain and without difficulty [in dogs], if only one has an animal in whose make-up there is not a proper balance between its fundamental reactions of nervous activity — as yet not further analysed physiologically — that is, between the excitatory and inhibitory processes." And he concludes: "what my associates and I have found with our animals is elemantal physiological phenomena — the limit of physiologic analysis (in the present state of our knowledge). At the same time it is the prime and most fundamental basis of human neurosis and serves as the truest interpretation and understanding of it." 1 Now it is important for the reader to distinguish sharply between neurogenic and so-called psychogenic origins to neuroses and dysfunctions. The fact that Pavlov points out that a neurosis may be due to a faulty balance between the excitatory and inhibitory processes of the nervous system, is no argument in favour of the psycho-analyst's claim; for according to the latter, a mass of shameful, or painful experiences, unexpressed desires, ideas, buried memories, etc., which he suppressed in the unconscious, is quite sufficient to account for a whole process of disturbances ending in neuroses, psychoses and somatic dysfunctions, and they claim that these morbid phenomena, which the individual has been forced through repression to store up in the unconscious, are curable by the technique of deep analysis. When, therefore, Pavlov speaks of congenital imbalance between the excitatory and inhibitory processes in a dog, he is not concerned with this unconscious material of the psycho-analysts, although he is speaking in the terminology of nerves and nerve systems. In a word, while the psycho-analysts may be said to emphasize ideological matter and experience, Pavlov stresses an abnormality in the functioning or actual structure of the nerves — a very different matter. I hope the distinction is clear, for it is extremely important. To the modern psycho-physiologist, the central nervous system is as much the individual organism as his visible nose or eyes. His psyche is merely an invisible and his body a visible 1 J.A.M.A., 17.9.32, pp. 1012–1013. Finally, in this all too brief summary of the more salient facts against the too-sweeping acceptance of a psychogenic origin to neuroses, psychoses and organic dysfunction, there are the conclusions of Dr. Trigant Burrow, who, in "A Phylogenetic Study of Insanity in its Underlying Morphology", says:— "A laboratory study of man and his reactions as a total process gives indication that the false ideas, the delusions and phobias, the mood-alternations of elation and depression, the emotional conflicts, the repressions and over-accentuations characteristic of mental disease, all are but reflections of an impairment that is deeper seated within the organism. This impairment consists in tensions, alterations and disturbances that affect definite body processes. In a word, the conflict or disparity present in mental disorders consists in a discrepancy between those feelings and sensations which belong to that circumscribed segment of the organism located in the cephalic region with its secondarily acquired ideas and images. As this conflict consists in a disparity between two clearly denned body zones, it is a physiological disparity. Such a condition is perceptible and remediable only through recourse to physiologic methods of repair and not through a program which attempts to exchange ideas for ideas and images for images." 3 I therefore deprecate the dualistic standpoint of the new psychologists, when they speak of a "psychogenic" origin to neuroses, etc., and when they claim that these can be removed by a one-sided concentration on the psyche. I suggest that this is a heresy, and should like to sum up my argument as follows:— (1) Because the human organism is one psycho-physical whole, it is unlikely that an abnormality which appears as merely psychological can have only a psychogenic origin. (2) It is even more unlikely that an abnormality which appears 1 T.M.B., p. 14. 2 B.M.J., 27.1.34, p. 133. A paper on BODILY DISEASES IN MENTAL DISORDERS. 3 J.A.M.A., 4.3.33, p. 651. See also same writer's remarks on p. 650. The whole article, in fact, supports my thesis. (3) A more acceptable point of view would be that disorders of any kind are psycho-physical, i.e. they originate in a joint disorder of soma and psyche — the two being distinguished only methodologically — and that anxiety exhibited in the mind is always an expression of an anxiety already existing in the tissues owing to some long-existing dysfunction. The fact that the anxious person soon finds purely psychological factors to account for his anxiety — grief over a family death, or over loss of money, or over fear of the future owing to loss of money, etc. — has nothing to do with the point. I should doubt whether continued anxiety in any man, no matter how severe a "mental" blow he may have had, is ever possible unless his organism is already suffering from some obscure and well-established dysfunction. (4) But an even more acceptable point of view would be to say that disorders of the psychosome, although simultaneously psychological and physiological, do not become apparent in any neurosis, psychosis or well-established dysfunction until they are of long standing, at which time it is preposterous to look for the source in only one side of the organism, because:— (a) Small beginnings in somatic disturbances are rarely perceptible, although there are innumerable agencies eminently calculated to produce them. These may be congenital anomalies such as a slight though unusual disproportion between certain important organs; abdominal bands now so frequently found at autopsy in different degrees in different people, causing intestinal stasis; endocrine imbalance; mechanical faults caused by faulty co-ordination of the organism in action and inaction; 1 neurological faults caused by the neglect of the inhibitory process of the nervous system and the over-stimulation of the excitatory process; faulty hygiene and forms of exercise and so on. (See also a few obscure causes of dysfunction and neuroses suggested by Dr. Stacey Wilson above, p. 305, and Dr. Burrow in his conclusions, p. 308.) The onset of the physical symptoms is usually slow and obscure in most of these conditions. When the symptoms are well-established and result from some mechanical fault in the body (such as visceroptosis, often caused by faulty use of self) they have usually had a long history, which must have had an exasperating influence on the psyche. 1 See my HEALTH AND EDUCATION THROUGH SELF-MASTERY (London, 1933). (b) The complexes, whether of Freud, Jung or Adler, must be present, according to their hypothesis, with but very few exceptions, in all men and women. If, therefore, they become exhibited in neuroses and psychoses, etc., only in a minority, it must mean that something else, not common to all, determines their appearance. The complexes would thus form a parallel to the bacteria of infectious and contagious diseases, which have no pathogenic power in themselves, and are found in most healthy people's saliva, but which appear to cause disease only after something else, not common to all, in the organism, has laid the foundations of the trouble. We are, therefore, forced to ask the question, what factor, besides the complex, operates in inducing morbid psychological or other symptoms? My reply is that, much more often than the psycho-analysts and new psychologists seem prepared to admit, this factor is some dysfunction of obscure origin, which may usually be assumed to be intractable, because it has eluded treatment. The few facts adduced above point to this as highly probable. Consequently, disorders of so-called "psychogenic" origin are probably much more rare than is generally admitted. The general conclusion of this argument is simply the old adage, mens sana in corpore sano; if you have a healthily functioning organism your complexes take care of themselves. A further conclusion would be that no psycho-analytical therapy should be undertaken until everything had been done to identify and remove the organic dysfunction probably lying behind the neurotic or other morbid symptoms. I must now add a few words about Adler and Jung. Adler, a former pupil of Freud, emphasizes the fact that no two people are alike and that every case of abnormal behaviour must be faced on its own merits — hence the term "Individual Psychology", given to his method. He claims that the style or pattern of a man's life is formed in the first eight years of child- 1 See COLLECTED WORKS, VIII, p. 349, and X, p. 445. Also VIII, p. 350, where he declares that sanity of judgment depends on good digestion. Assuming, as Nietzsche did, that each of us is out for personal aggrandisement and power, Adler measures each man's neurosis by asking what are his peculiar obstacles to power? Has he a deformity, a physical disability, or an organic inferiority? How has he faced his disadvantages? Has he shown courage and common sense, or a childish effort to circumvent his disadvantages or to compensate for them, by retreating from the problems they present, by dependence, by inspiring pity, by invoking help, etc.? He assumes that the feeling of weakness is common to all children, but that in some it is greatly accentuated by the sense of the disabilities which, over and above their relative weakness, result from the possession of inferior organs, or inferior endocrine secretions, or what not. 2 And he argues that much the commonest form in which a child tries to escape the display of its feelings of inferiority, consists "in the erection of a compensatory spiritual superstructure, which aims at recovering superiority in life". This structure is carried into adult life, and becomes the "secret life-goal" of the individual, which, as Philippe Mairet says, "must be conceived as having been elaborated to compensate the chief inferiority." 3 In the normal and healthy, the desire for ascendancy assumes a more or less useful expression, and makes them co-operate in the life of the world. In the neurotic, it tends to take the form of non-co-operation, with a corresponding fantastic effort to retain the sense of superiority. So that the sexual aspects and memories of a man are only a part of his life-style, and not, as in Freud, the chief factor in the neurosis. 4 And Adler achieves his cures, or his alleged cures (I do not mean this disparagingly, but merely because I have seen no unbiased statistical records), not by a laborious process of unearthing hidden memories, but 1 P.T.D., I, p. 42. He says, "The origin of a neurosis can always be traced to the first or second year of life." 2 Ibid., pp. 9–12. 3 Ibid., p. 22, and A.B.C. OF ADLER'S PSYCHOLOGY (London, 1930, pp. 27–28). 4 Freud too speaks of "inferiority feelings", and their effect on the neurotic's adaptation; but he traces them to sexual experiences, to loss of love and love-failure in infancy, which "leave behind a lasting limitation of self-esteem as a narcissistic scar; and according to my own and Marcinowski's experiences, make the most important contribution to the 'inferiority feelings' of neurotics." (JENSEITS DES LUSTPRINZIPS, 3rd Ed., Vienna, 1925, pp. 23–24). Thus the "inferiority complex" is the Adlerian devil which the therapy of Individual Psychology drives out. It is an important contribution to psychology and as a psychotherapy it has more plausibility than the psycho-analytical position, if only because it at least pre-supposes an organic basis to the inferiority feelings. Nevertheless, its claims to correct a "faulty attitude to the problems of life" seem to me to be more securely founded than its attempts to cure functional disorders as the outcome of this faulty attitude. For Adler's position, like Freud's, has to be cleared of the suspicion that long-standing dysfunction of some sort may not have been the ultimate cause of a "faulty attitude to the problems of life". In Jung, Freud's libido, from being purely sexual, becomes psychic energy in general, 2 expressing itself in desire, instinct and function. In the listless person, who turns away from life, the libido has turned inwards, satisfying itself upon fantasies. A man's psyche consists of persona and anima, the former being in contact with the external, and the latter with internal reality. The psyche has four activities — thinking, feeling, sensation and intuition. And everyone belongs to one of four different types, according to the predominance of one activity in him or her, and further according to what Jung terms the extraverted or introverted tendency of each activity. So that in all we get eight types. "But every individual possesses both mechanisms — extraversion as well as introversion, and only the relative predominance of the one or the other determines the type." Thus Jung adds: "A typical attitude always signifies the merely relative predominance of one mechanism." 3 1 P.T.D.I., pp. 25, 35. Thus Dr. Franz Alexander of Chicago, says: "Every neurosis, no matter whether it is expressed merely by psychic processes or by bodily disturbances of functional nature, is the result of a defect of the individual in his psychic relation to the environment, in his foreign politics." (J.A.M.A., 18.2.33, p. 473.) 2. P.T., p. 571. 3 Ibid, pp. 10–13. He says: "When the orientation to the object and to objective facts is so predominant that the most frequent and essential decisions and reactions are determined, not by subjective values, but by objective relations, one speaks of an extraverted type". Such a man's "inner life succumbs to the external necessity, not of course without a struggle, which, however, always ends in favour of the objective determinant. His entire consciousness looks outward to the world, because the important and decisive determination always comes to him from without". But this it does only because he expects it to. 1 Thus the extravert "owes his normality to his ability to fit into existing conditions with relative ease." 2 "Introversion," on the other hand, "means a turning inwards of the libido, whereby a negative relation of subject to object is expressed. Interest does not move towards the object, but recedes towards the subject. Everyone whose attitude is introverted thinks, feels, and acts in a way that clearly demonstrates that the subject is the chief factor of motivation while the object at most receives only a secondary value." 3 Thus the extravert constantly feels urged "to spread and propagate himself in every way, and, on the other hand, the tendency of the introvert" is "to defend himself against external claims, to conserve himself from any expenditure of energy directly related to the object, thus consolidating for himself the most secure and impregnable position." 4 Jung says his eight types are to be found in all classes, and in both sexes. 5 To make the matter clearer, let us take as an example the extraverted feeling type in woman. He says feeling "is a more obvious peculiarity of feminine psychology than thinking", and that"the most pronounced feeling types are also to be found among women". This type reveals herself in her love match. She tends to love, not the man who is fundamentally most like her in inner life, habits of thought and secret feeling, but him who is her most perfect counterpart in social standing, in the age-relationship, in practical capacity, in relative height, family respectability, and so on. 6 "Such women are good comrades and excellent mothers", provided that both husband and children "possess the con- 1 Ibid, p. 417. 2 Ibid, p. 419, also p. 542. 3 Ibid, p. 34. 4 Ibid, p. 414. 5 Ibid, p. 413. 6 Ibid, pp. 448–449. This is also true of the male feeling-extravert. The introverted feeling type would attach far greater importance to the inner life of her mate, and its suitability to her own inner life, and would care less about his correctness. The male would act similarly. "The emotional life of the introvert," says Jung, "is generally his weak side; it is not absolutely trustworthy. He deceives himself about it; others also are deceived and disappointed in him, when they rely exclusively upon his affectivity. His mind is more reliable because more adapted. His affect is too close to sheer untamed nature." 2 The introverted thinking type, of which Kant is, according to Jung, a normal, and Nietzsche an abnormal example, is chiefly characterized by his subjectivation of consciousness. He usually displays a lack in practical ability. If he appreciates what he produces as correct and true, he does not try to convert people to his view, they have simply got to bow to its truth. He has an awkward relationship with his colleagues, and does not know how to win their favour, and "as a rule only succeeds in showing them how entirely superfluous they are to him". He is more subject to misunderstanding than the extraverted thinker, because "the style of the epoch in which he himself participates is against him". If he tries, as he now must, to adapt himself to the correct prevailing orientation "with its almost exclusive acknowledgment of the visible and the tangible", he undermines his own foundations, and tends, I take it, to become neurotic. 3 Thus Jung classes Darwin among the extraverted, and Kant and Nietzsche among the introverted thinking types — Darwin turning to the outside world of fact, and basing his thesis on objective data, and Kant turning to contemplation and meditation, and basing his thesis on the logical necessities of rationalism. 4 It is impossible to give an adequate survey of Jung's profound and highly complex work, with all its reservations, subtle differentiations, etc. 5 1 Ibid p. 449. 2 Ibid, p. 195. 3 Ibid, pp. 477–497. 4 Ibid, pp. 477–484. 5 See a useful summary of Jung's teaching in the MED. PRESS, 11th and 18th of January, 1933, by Dr. Hankin. Miss Joan Corrie's A.B.C. OF JUNG'S PSYCHOLOGY (London, 1927) is also useful. I think it does. But I also think that he and others are inclined to make too much of it. I believe the two fundamental types exist and that they run through all classes and both sexes. But are the manifold distinctions helpful? I will try to put the matter simply. There are men and women who, like moderately sensitized photographic plates, require long exposure before they take in the outside world. And since long exposure means long attention directed to the object — the outside world — such men and women may be regarded as objectively orientated (extraverted). Conversely, there are men and women who, like very highly sensitized photographic plates, not only require snap exposures, but also feel even these short snap exposures as stabs and wounds, because they are so sensitive. And since short exposure and even reluctance to be exposed, means scant attention directed on the object — the outside world — these people may be said to be subjectively orientated (introverted). We have, therefore, in the first place, men and women (and undoubtedly they are numerous) who, moderately sensitized, and habitually requiring long exposure, are more or less eagerly attentive to the outside world. Their libido, therefore, becomes directed outwards, whether in feeling, thinking, sensation or intuition. Their attention is not directed preponderatingly inwards, because, if it were, their true adaptation to the outside world, which is one of long exposure, would be interfered with. They would not be able to attend. Secondly, we have men and women (also numerous) who, very highly sensitized and habitually requiring only the most rapid exposure before complete sensitization (amounting almost to pain in the morbid cases) are inclined to shun the outside world, and perforce to turn their attention inwards. Their libido, therefore, becomes directed preponderatingly inwards, whether in feeling, thinking, sensation or intuition, often out of sheer self-protection, and their attention follows suit; because if it did not they would interfere with their mechanisms for rapid exposure. If they exposed themselves or attended to the outside world as long as the extraverts, they would become, as it were, over-exposed (to abide by the analogy), i.e. confused, blurred, over-printed, and thus lose their clarity (sanity), and their personality. It is these people who are, as Professor Stockard puts it, "most constantly In this form, I hope Jung's classification is seen to be both real and useful, and that mixed types are recognized as possible. For instance, a man may be highly sensitive to one order of impressions, i.e. introverted regarding these — and of low or slow sensitiveness to another order, i.e. extraverted regarding that order. Confirmation of my reading of Jung's meaning is to be found in at least two quarters, if not more. Dr. F. G. Crookshank, for instance, a great authority on human types, classified the introverts among the asthenics, the schizophrenes, the linear and thyroidal types, 2 which, as we shall see, are the leptosomes of Weidenreich, i.e. the thin, nervous people, in whom the skin lies close to the muscles and viscera, without any fatty insulation, and who are consequently fitted to receive rapid impressions. He also classified the extraverts among the pyknics, the laterals, the hypothyroidal and the manic-depressives, 3 which, as we shall see, are the eurysomes of Weidenreich, i.e. those people who tend to be protected by adipose insulation, and therefore designed tor slower impressions. Dr. Emanuel Miller, too, places the extraverts among Kretschmer's syntonics, 4 which, as we know, are a subdivision of the pyknics. Implicitly, therefore, he too places the introverts among the asthenics. There is, thus, some warrant for my analogy and for the conclusions drawn from it. 5 1 See Note 3, p. 247 supra. 2 THE MONGOL IN OUR MIDST (London, 1931), pp. 458–459 3 Ibid. 4 T.M.B., p. 83. 5 Independent light is also shed on the question by Dr. Christopher Howard, who asks: "Is it better for the progress of the human race that men should die from fatty infiltration of the myocardium between the sixth and seventh decades of life, or that to obviate (his, numbers of human beings should be deprived of fat insulation and as a consequence suffer from such modern complaints as neurasthenia and lack of emotional balance?" And he adds: "When I am fat I can face the (a) The unconscious can mould the individual's life, and when its repressed material leads to "a faulty attitude to life's problems" it may help to create abnormal behaviour, neuroses and psychoses. And, unless the adult can abandon a childish adaptation to life and bravely face the world realistically, his complexes may interfere with normal relationships to his fellows, and alienate him from society. It is unlikely, however, that these results will supervene, or that abnormal functioning of any organ will follow from psychogenic origins alone. It seems more probable that, as a rule psycho-physical aberrations occur only in people with a long history of dysfunction, the cause of which may be obscure. To reply to this that children can display neuroses is not effective, because they, too, may have relatively long histories of dysfunction. (b) Though it may be sound to deny a purely psychogenic origin to neuroses, etc., this does not mean that so-called healthy and normal people may not have their lives coloured and influenced by the unconscious, because the latter invariably does exercise such an influence. The healthy youth with the claustrophobia complex, for instance, may show a predilection tor life out of doors, just as the healthy girl with the castration complex (i.e. a repressed horror at having been deprived of the male's external genitalia) may invariably display timidity (quite distinct from prudery) about exposing her person even to females. But from these signs of an unconscious influence, to the display of neuroses, psychoses and organic dysfunction, is a far cry, and we must be on our guard against concluding with Philippe Mairet that "There is no perfectly healthy mind". 1 (b) We have seen that the inferiority complex may lead to asocial conduct and a refusal to co-operate. In this case Adler changes the life-style to restore the capacity for co-operation, and by one stroke a mischievous influence is removed and a good citizen gained. But in this book we are less concerned with the therapy of the new psychology than with its characterology. And in the sequel we shall find Adler's insistence on inferiority feelings is most important in regard to the choice of a mate, even when they do not lead to definitely unhealthy conditions. blows of fortune with comparative equanimity, but when I diet myself and lose weight, the necessary pin-pricks of daily life become fraught with almost mortal significance." (LANCET, 2.12.33, p. 1290.) 1 Op. cit., p. 35. (d) Finally we have seen Jung's theory of types, and the importance of distinguishing the introvert from the extravert and of recognizing the physical characters of each. The whole key to this problem will not be held, however, until we discuss the matter of human types below. 8. There is the approach from environment, which attempts to portray a person from the dints, dents, abrasions, or other impressions, ambient conditions have made upon him. This school, to which Dr. Emil Utitz belongs, aims at denning disposition and character in terms of environmental influences. It claims that personality is not all initial endowment. Thus similar physiological traits may indicate different mental attitudes, according to whether they are found in adverse or favourable conditions, etc. Environment need not change the fundamentals in a person, but by picking out, or stimulating, specific traits, it develops peculiar characteristics by provoking persistent similar reactions. Presumably it leaves the other traits dormant or rudimentary. In this way the influence of environment may conflict with the findings of a codified physiognomy and render it invalid. Against this school, however, there is the damaging evidence collected from the study of identical or similar twins by men like Galton, Professor Thorndyke, Nathaniel David Mttron Hirsch, I. Muller, H. H. Newman, J. Lange and Professor Merriman. The results of their work go to show how comparatively small the influence of environment really is, and how paramount is initial endowment in determining the personality and destiny of a human being. Dr. Hirsch, for instance, studied 58 pairs of dissimilar twins living in a similar environment, 38 pairs of similar twins living in a similar environment, and 12 pairs of similar twins living apart. And he concluded as follows: "Neither the extreme hereditist nor the extreme environmentalist 1 P.T., p. 119. Galton, who examined an extensive material, wrote: "There is no escape from the conclusion that nature prevails enormously over nurture when the differences of nurture do not exceed what is commonly to be found among persons of the same rank of a society and in the same country", 2 The work of Heape, Castle and Phillips, Speman, O. Mangold, Stone, and R. G. Harrison, on transplanted fertilized ova and on transplanted ovaries, also adduced results most damaging to the environmentalist's case. Speaking of these experiments, Stockard says: "The results would seem to mean, in the first place, that no organic environment yet employed has the power to alter the specific characteristics of the somatic cells." 3 9. There is the approach from heredity, so ably represented by Dr. H. Hoffman, which attempts a description of a creature on the basis of his family germ-plasm, and the association of definite characterological and physical traits with specific genes. By this method the psycho-physical structure of each individual child, preferably of a large family, can be observed in relation to that of each parent, and by a study of the various combinations and permutations of the parental traits in each child, certain physical and character elements can be isolated and thus furnish, as it were, the pieces in a family jig-saw puzzle. For this method, however, as Dr. Hoffmann admits, large families are essential; for the more extensive the material the more fruitful the results, The method, though endowed with certain novel features by Hoffmann, is really as old as the hills. It is a very reliable method of estimating the stock value of an individual, as apart from his individuality, and is involved in applying the Rose-among-Thorns and the Black-Sheep rules formulated above. See pages 162–163 supra. 10. There is the approach of the Scientific Expressionists. This dates from Aristotle and his attempt to correlate animal types and their associated mental attributes with human beings reminiscent of them in general expression. Lavater, part of whose Essay on Physiognomy, particularly where it dealt with skull- 1 TWINS (Heredity and Environment), Harvard Univ. Press, 1930, p. 147. See also pp. 244–245 supra. 2 I.H.F., History of Twins. See also J.A.M.A. (24.8.29) for a good report of the work of H. H. Newman and Johannes Lange. 3 P.B.P., p. 198. The method of the scientific expressionists is both plausible and convincing. It attempts by a simple classification to associate certain moulds of countenance with desirable or undesirable mental traits, according to their origin in benevolent or malevolent expression. Except for Lavater, Edmund Burke was probably the first modern who saw in expression the formative agency of features. In a short note on Physiognomy he said: "The manners give a certain determination to the countenance, which, being observed to correspond pretty regularly with them, is capable of joining the effect of certain agreeable qualities of the mind and those of the body." 3 Schiller came next with his essay on the CONNEXION BETWEEN MAN'S ANIMAL AND INTELLECTUAL NATURE. Here he emphasizes the intimate relation between states of the body and the mind, in illness, and in the display of emotion, showing how the very motions of the body harmonise with the emotion of the soul. 4 Then he proceeds: "Should the emotions, which sympathetically provoke these movements in the organism, be frequently renewed, should the peculiar reactions of the soul become habitual, then so too will the corresponding movements of the body. And if the emotions become perfected into lasting characters, then the corresponding features of the organism become more deeply engraved on its surface, and remain, if I may borrow a word from the pathologists, deuteropathically behind and finally become organic." Thus Schiller wisely concludes: "A physiognomy of particular organic parts, dealing, for instance, with the shape and size of the nose, of the eyes, the mouth, the cars, etc., the colour of the hair, the length of the neck, etc., may not perhaps be impossible, but it is unlikely to be warranted at least for the present, no matter through how many quarto volumes Lavater may care to rhapsodise." 5 Schopenhauer, a few years later, said much the same thing, but made this extra point — that the claim that expression is feature in the making, is proved by the fact that "intellectual races only become so gradually, and really reach the maximum 1 E.G.G., Part II, 17.2.1829. 2 Op. cit., pp. 207–244. 3 THE SUBLIME AND BEAUTIFUL (Oxford, 1796, pp. 127–128). 4 Op. cit., X, pp. 25, 35–36, 39–40. 5 Ibid., pp. 40–41. Georg Christoph Lichtenberg says with reference to intelligence in a face: "People who are very much older than they appear are very rarely intelligent; and, contrariwise, those who look old and are really young are people who are approaching the intelligence of age." 2 I doubt, however, whether this could be successfully maintained; for premature age in a face may result from so many influences quite remote from intelligence — dissiptation, vice, illness, suffering, etc. — that the youthful old person, far from being necessarily stupid, may be simply unusually sober, chaste, etc. The greatest of this school of thought is undoubtedly Herbert Spencer, who argued very cogently in favour of the view that expression is feature in the making. He asks, "If expression means something," may we not say, "the form of feature produced by it means something"? 3 He then gives examples "in which the connexion between organic ugliness and mental inferiority, and the converse connexion between organic beauty and comparative perfection of mind, are distinctly traceable ". For instance, he shows the reasons for the relationship between a projecting lower jaw and a certain inferiority of nature, and compares the orthognathous profile of the higher races favourably with the prognathous profile of the savage. He argues in the same way about the projecting cheek bones of inferior races, their wide-spread to the nose, their greater width between the eyes, and unduly large mouths — " indeed all those leading peculiarities of feature which are by general consent called ugly." 4 "When we remember," he says, "that the variations of feature constituting expression are confessedly significant of character — when we remember that these tend by repetition to organise themselves, to affect not only the skin and muscles but the bones of the face, and to be transmitted to offspring — when we thus find that there is a psychological meaning alike in each passing adjustment of the features, in the marks that habitual adjustments leave, in the marks inherited from ancestors, and in those main outlines of the facial bones and integuments indicating the type 1 P.P., II, Chap. XXIX. 2 AUSGEWÄHLTE SCHRIFTEN (Stuttgart, 1893, p. 110). 3 P.B., p. 388. 4 Ibid., pp. 388–391. And he expresses his own conviction in the formula: "The saying that beauty is skin-deep is but a skin-deep saying." 1 It is a convincing and notable contribution to the subject, and should be read in full. Dr. Mantegazza claims that it is always possible to formulate from a face certain judgments on its owner's: (1) state of health, (2) degree of beauty or ugliness, (3) moral worth, (4) intellectual worth, (5) race. 2 Mantegazza showed his pupils a series of photographs and found that their judgments upon them agreed more regarding the moral than the intellectual qualities of each face. He adds: "Feelings leave a more profound and characteristic trace on our faces than thought ". Then he explains that we more readily read the moral than the intellectual value of a face, "because, from our earliest childhood we have directed our observations m this way; for nothing is more important to us than to learn what we may expect of evil or good from a man or woman whom we approach." 3 Mantegazza gives a list of signs, in accordance with the actual state of the sciences, for determining intelligence and stupidity in faces, which, owing to his excessive scepticism and caution, is all the more valuable:—
He adds: "The maximum of will nearly always corresponds 1 Ibid., pp. 392–394. 2 P.E., p. 261. 3 Ibid., pp. 262–264. See, however, P.P., II. Chap. XXIX: "It is much easier to discover by physiognomical means the intellectual capacities of a man than his moral character; for the former are much more prone to outward expression." 4 We have seen the partial error of this. 5 P.E., p. 288. "On the contrary, flaccid will is represented by a small retreating chin, an opened or half-opened mouth." 1 Knight Dunlap, also largely an expressionist, others some confirmation of one or two of Mantegazza's claims. He says, for instance: "On the whole, the development of the chin is concomitant with the development of thought, and hence, in races or large groups, an index of mental development", owing to the connexion between the chin and the tongue, the instrument of language, and between language and thought. 2 He also points out that "The activity of the facial muscles expresses the mental and still more the emotional activity of the individual in a plain way." 3 Finally, we come to Dr. Theodor Piderit, one of the most careful and enlightening of the nineteenth-century writers on physiognomy as the outcome of expression. He states his fundamental principle as follows: "We can expect to find reliable phsyiognomical characters only in those parts which lie under the influence of the spiritual activities. These parts are the muscles and above all the numerous mobile muscles of the face." 4 I cannot now repeat the cogent arguments with which he supports his thesis, but his observations seem, on the whole, to be sound. About eyes, he says:— "When a person habitually, and without any physical cause, looks tired and sleepy, one may infer mental indolence and poverty of thought." "When a person habitually, and without any particular cause, displays a quick lively look, i.e. when the eyeballs habitually move quickly, a lively and alert intellect may be inferred." "When a person shows a tendency to gaze fixedly and steadily, i.e. when the muscles of the eye possess a peculiarly rigid quality, energy in action and thought may be inferred." 5 Referring to vertical wrinkles on the brow, over the root of the nose, he says:— "When, in a face, these are prominent, we may infer that the subject has frequent and prolonged fits of bad humour or temper. The causes of these lines may be external or internal. That is why we find these vertical wrinkles in:— 1 Ibid., p. 290. 2 P.B.R.B., pp. 30–32. 3 Ibid., pp. 44–45. 4 M.P., p. 200. 5 Ibid., p. 207. "B. People who are easily depressed, or put out, i.e. peevish, sulky and choleric people. "C. People who are keen thinkers, or whose thinking, though keen and earnest, habitually leads to no satisfactory results. "D. People with sensitive eyes. "E. People with myopia. "F. People whose lives compel them to frown, i.e. who have to face the glow of a furnace, or what not, such as stokers, iron-smokers, blacksmiths, sailors, fisherfolk, agricultural labourers." 1 Referring again to the eyes, he says: "The significance of the drowsily drooping eyelid is the reverse of that of the raised eyelid. Indifferent, apathetic (callous) and indolent people may be known by the fact that a considerable portion of the cornea is concealed by the upper lid." 2 On the other hand, open eyes mean an open heart and nature. Dr. Piderit associates horizontal wrinkles on the brow with:— "(a) Inquisitive and eager people, 3 who like to be astonished and hear new and astonishing facts, and who, anxious to hear something interesting, go about inquiringly, questioningly, and with ears agog. "(b) Contemplative people, who habitually concentrate their attention on definite objects for a long time at a stretch." Horizontal forehead wrinkles with drowsily drooping eyelids, he says, "indicate intellectual limitedness". Moist brilliance of the eye characterizes enthusiastic and emotional people who are easily moved. A dry, gleaming eye characterizes cold rational natures. Lack-lustre eyes may mean sorrow, care, dissipation or illness, but most often indigestion. He says "the fact that men of great intellect possess bright, radiant eyes is well known. Luther, Frederick the Great and Napoleon had unusually bright eyes." Finally, he says that the mouth that looks as if it were tasting 1 Ibid., pp. 214–217. On p. 215 he states on the authority of P. Lindau, that in the police records of Berlin a high percentage of the criminals reveal these vertical wrinkles. 2 Ibid., p. 222. 3 Ibid., p. 220. I have quoted the above, because there is much t-o be said tor the expressionist's approach to physiognomy, and because the logic and careful observation displayed by Dr. Piderit make his conclusions peculiarly valuable. 2 11. The approach from Ethnology and Anthropology. This could be elaborated to produce interesting results, but it concerns the domain rather of world politics and international mating, than of infra-national mating as advocated in this book. Accept the precept, "Marry your like", and most of the findings of ethnologic anthropology become, from the standpoint of mating, quite irrelevant. Nevertheless, as it deals with the origins and characters of the races of Europe and the British Isles, it is important, and must be considered. Our principal questions are: (a) How much is race still recognizable in Europe and the British Isles? (b) How is it recognizable? and (c) What qualities of mind are associated with particular races? (a) As I have already stated, Europe contains three principal races — the Mediterranean, the Teutonic and the Alpine — and the population of the British Isles is a compound of the first two (with whole areas of more or less pure representatives of each) without any Alpine. 3 (b) Roughly, the characteristics of the three races are:— 4
1 Ibid., pp. 223–234. 2 Two other important works, Darwin's THE EXPRESSION OF THE EMOTIONS IN MAN AND ANIMALS, and Dr. Francis Warner's PHYSICAL EXPRESSION, have not been used, because they repudiate any attempt at correlating mould or cast of features with mental traits, and are concerned only with the mental states causing particular expressions. 3 R.E, p. 365. 4 Ibid., p. 121. Merely based on Ripley, not an exact copy of his table. Although tallness is not always associated with blondness, 3 the blond, or Teutonic race, does tend to tallness. 4 If Dr. Beddoe is right, and hair colour "is so nearly permanent in races of men as to be fairly trustworthy evidence in the matter of ethnical descent", blondness is an indication of Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian ancestry, particularly as "the greater part of the blond population of modern Britain — or, at all events of the eastern parts — derive their ancestry from the Anglo-Saxons and Scandinavians". 5 The tall blond of the Teutonic race also has as a distinctive feature a "prominent and narrow nose". Ripley says, ct the association of a tall stature with a narrow nose is so close as to point to a law". 6 The race has also a more athletic and coarser skeleton than the Mediterranean, and the rufous type is only a variant of it. 7 Professor Fleure hints that red hair may be the result of inter-crossing; but he says, "this requires much more study". 8 If then we add blue eyes, a fresh complexion and a long head, 9 we have a fair idea of the appearance of the type. The Mediterranean race, of which Professor Sergi says, "it is morphologically the finest brunet race which has appeared in Europe", 10 is described by Professor Elliot Smith as follows: "long-headed brunets of small stature, glabrous, and with scanty facial hair, except for a chin-tuft; with bodies of slender habit . . . the eyebrow ridges are poorly developed or absent; the forehead is narrow, vertical, smooth, and often slightly bulging. . . . The cheeks are narrow, and their bony supports flattened laterally. The nose is only moderately developed: it is small, 1 Ibid, pp. 121 and 365. (I omit a description of the Alpine race as not relevant). 2 Ibid, pp. 473–474. Prof. Elliot Smith says "their home was certainly Asia" (A.E., p. 68). 3 R.E., pp. 106–107. 4 Miss Fleming found tallness commoner in English than in Welsh boys. (S.G.D., p. 58.) 5 R.O.B., p. 268. 6 R.E., p. 122. 7 Ibid, pp. 206 and 321. 8 R.E.W., p. 104. 9 R.E., p. 467 and elsewhere. 10 M.R., p. 34. Where this type is round with blue eyes, as in the Breton peasantry and the Irish, Ripley says it is the result of a cross. "The opposite combination," he declares, "— that is to say, of dark eyes with light hair, is very uncommon . . . in the British Isles. The normal association resulting . . . from a blond cross with a primitive dark race is of brownish hair and gray or bluish eyes." 2 (c) As regards the long head of both the dark and fair races of Great Britian, 3 it is strange that this should appear to be more a male than a female feature (as if a further development of the head after growth had stopped in the female) and also that it should be a character of two races which have shown such marked superiority in the world. As it also belongs to backward races like the Negroes, Papuans and Australians, it cannot be a specific sign of superiority; but, within the British Isles, variations in head length appear to have a certain significance, for Dr. Venn has shown "that at Cambridge the first-class men have proportionately longer as well as more capacious heads than the rest of students." 4 On the other hand, the Mediterranean race seems to prevail and nourish more in cities than in rural districts, 5 and, strange to say, to reappear more frequently in females than in males. 6 Ethnologists give various reasons for these two facts. The first. Dr. Beddoe suggests, is due "to the perpetual immigration of dark-complexioned foreigners", and also to the fact that "blond children" are "often more difficult to rear amid the many unfavourable influences that accompany city life", while 1 A.E., p. 65. See also R.E.W., p. 76, for confirmation. 2 R.E., p. 64. 3 Ibid, p. 305. Hence the fact that "the cranial type in the British Isles is practically uniform from end to end." 4 A.H.E., p. 185. See, however, R.U.K., pp. 140–146, where brachycephalic head is classed as superior (though only in Germany). J. Deniker thinks it matters not, from the standpoint of mental superiority or inferiority, whether one is dolicho or brachycephalic. (R.O.M., p. 76.) 5 A.H.E., p. 178. R.E., pp. 555–559. See also R.E., p. 70: brunetness "holds its own more persistently over the whole of Europe than the lighter characteristics." 6 R.E., p. 322. See, however, Hrdlicka: THE OLD AMERICANS (Baltimore, 1925, pp. 27–28), who found "women show more blondes than men". Ripley, on the other hand, argues that "it is not improbable that there is in brunetness, in the dark hair and eye, some indication of vital superiority". And he adduces much evidence in favour of this view. 2 We shall see, in a moment, however, that Miss Fleming offers another possible reason, and that is the taste of either race — the fair preferring life away from, and the dark preferring life in, cities. This would be in accordance with the statements of the ancient historians who declare that the Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian peoples loathed cities. 3 Dr. Shrubsall has said there is an adverse selection against blonds in towns, owing to the fact that"blond children in towns suffer more from rheumatism and throat affections than those of dark complexion." 4 This view seems to be widely held. Lord Horder, for instance, has recently said, "Why is the rheumatic child par excellence, a blonde, and why so often a rufous blonde?" 5 Dr. J. S. Mackintosh explains the alleged fact by showing that the natural habitat of the blond is utterly different from any city. 6 These conclusions have, however, been contested recently as the result of a study of 1212 asthmatic and rheumatic urban children, reported on by Dr. Matthew Young. Among the findings, we read: "There is no evidence . . . of any special predilection of rheumatism for the blond type as has been alleged by Shrubsall. . . . The rheumatic children do not differ from the normal, but both the asthmatic boys and girls show a relatively greater excess of the blonde-haired type, and a greater deficiency in the dark-haired as compared with the normal than might be expected to occur as a chance variation." 7 Thus there would appear to be adverse selection against blonds in cities, only owing to chest complaints. We must assume, therefore that emigration, peculiar tastes, a certain vital superiority and sexual and other forms of selection, are the cause of the increase in brunetness, and here we seem to have definite evidence. Dr. Beddoe suggests three possible causes — conjugal selection 1 A.H.E., pp. 181–182. 2 R.E., p.. 557–559. See also note 3, p. 328 infra. 3 See Stubbs (op. cit., p. 34 and elsewhere). 4 A.H.E., p. 182. 5 B.M.J., 9.12.33, p. 1059. 6 Ibid, 30.12.33, p. 1232. 7 JOURN. OF HYGIENE, Nov., 1933, XXXIII, No. 4, pp. 456, 461. Mr. Finck agrees that "cupid favours brunettes", because "the brunette complexion, in a word, suggests to the mind the idea of stored-up sunshine, i.e. health, and as health is what primarily attracts cupid, 2 this, combined with the taste for delicate tints and veiled blushes, partly accounts for the preference for the dark type." 3 Was not Schopenhauer perhaps right, therefore, when, without, as far as I know, any knowledge of the tendency of brunetness to increase in Europe, or of the primitiveness of the dark race, 4 he said: "In the love of the sexes, nature strives after dark and brown eyes as the original type"? 5 He had remarkable flashes of vision, and this seems to have been one of them. All these facts point indirectly to the mental and temperamental characteristics of the two races; but a few further details may be added. An examination of the University women of the Eastern States of America, for instance, by Dr. Macdonald, revealed that blondes were less sensitive to pain than brunettes. This apparently accords with Miss Carmon's study of school children in Michigan. In general it was found that "the blondes were physically inferior to the brunettes", which would mean that they were also intellectually inferior. We should, however, remember that the blonde type is nowhere indigenous in America, and therefore reckon with probable maladaptation. Dr. Macdonaid also found the dolichocephalic less sensitive to pain than the brachycephalic, and women more sensitive than men. This last finding accords with Dr. Macdonald's results regarding Washington school children. 6 In his examination of 4000 boys and girls. Professor Karl Pearson found no sign of differentiation in athletic power between fair, brown or dark-haired children, but "some sign of increased athletic power in the red-haired". And he concludes: "The red-haired are slightly more and the blue-eyed very slightly less athletic". 7 "Fair, brown, or dark to jet-black hair," he discovered, "has 1 R.O.P., p. 270. 2 Not in over-Christianized countries, Mr. Finck! 3 R.L.P.B., II, p. 381. 4 R.E., p. 466: "It would seem as if the earliest race in Europe must have been very dark." 5 W.W.V, II, Chap. 44. 6 P.S.M., pp. 39–40. 7 O.R.H.P., p. 31. Miss R. M. Fleming, in her study of 2219 boys and 2073 girls, found in Group Ia, containing children with dark eyes, dark hair and long heads, that "the interests and abilities of the group are æsthetic rather than analytical", that their literary and linguistic record was good, and that they seldom enjoy or excel at mathematics and science. Not many of them showed preference for strenuous physical exercise; but they loved country walks and country life. They were not of the class of "climbers". 2 Among the girls of this group, menstruation was early (11 to 15 years, usually before 15), and the number of those who showed a preference for domestic occupations was greater than in Group Ib. Group Ib contained boys and girls with long heads, blue or light eyes, fair hair and fair skin. This group showed a marked preference for athletics and out-door sports, much less ability for music, more ambition and organizing ability, less interest in æsthetics and literature (except tales of travel and adventure) and in the boys much more inclination to think out a future career than in Group la. Menstruation in the girls came later (14 and 15 years) and fewer girls expressed a preference for domestic occupations than in la, 61.4 per cent expressed a preference for games and physical exercise. In all the female children "the onset of puberty certainly checked enthusiasm for games". 3 If earlier onset of puberty in dark girls is a sign of greater sexual vigour. Miss Fleming's findings are confirmed by various authorities. Dr. Scheuer, on the authority of Dr. Heyn's statistics, claims that dark-haired women are sexually more vigorous than fair-haired. And, on the authority of Dr. Aschner, who held that pigmentation is one of the most fundamental criteria of constitution, he states that frigidity is much more widespread among blondes than brunettes, and that this confirms an old popular belief that fair hair and blue eyes indicate a minus, and dark hair and eyes a plus of primitive sensuality. 4 1 Ibid, pp. 38–42 and 48. For characteristics of popular child, see p. 259 supra. 2 S.G.D., pp. 66, 71–72. 3 Ibid, pp. 68–69, 72–73. 4 B.D.M., p. 26. Marian also believes blondes prone to early menopause and sub-parity of menstrual flow. (S.P.W., p. 188.) Kisch (S.L.W., p. 45) says: "The Various other authorities are mentioned by Scheuer for his point of view, among whom Drs. Rothe and Bergh found hypotrichosis of the pubis (scanty pubic hair), which is also associated with low sexuality, commoner among blondes than brunettes. 1 Dr. Anton Schücker, in a learned monograph, also shows that the more strongly Nordic elements are represented in a people, the more powerful is the movement for feminine emancipation, which, he argues, stands for hostility to man and feminine careers away from domesticity and motherhood, both of which argue a minus of sexual vigour. 2 Dr. Pende, of Genoa, has also recently investigated this question. Among five races of Italian women, he found the Mediterranean, Alpine and Adriatic types, who are dark, much more fertile than the Nordic and the East Baltic, who are fair. Among the former, 85 per cent: were hyperfecund or normal. Among the latter, 68 per cent were either infecund or of low grade fecundity. He also found that 66 per cent of the Mediterranean stock were robust and sthenic, whereas among the blondes only 35 per cent were so. 3 On the other hand. Dr. Bolk "shows that in Holland blondes on the average begin to menstruate two months earlier than brunettes." 4 Ripley makes a point which may indicate greater sexual ardour in the dark than the fair. He says that in France divorce is much more common among people of Teutonic than or Alpine or Mediterranean stock. 5 If ardent sensibilities mean endurance of passion, this would argue a plus in the dark races. If, on the other hand, a strong and irrepressible sexual appetite means conjugal infidelity, the conclusion would be different. An eighteenth-century poet, Lebrun, says of eyes: "Les noirs prouvent un cœur plus vif, mais plus léger; les bleus un cœur plus tendre et moins prompt à changer. Les yeux noirs savent mieux conquerir opinion is general that in girls with black hair, dark eyes, thick skin and dark complexion, menstruation begins earlier than in blondes." 1 B.D.M., pp. 68–69. 2 Z.P.F., p. 10 and elsewhere. 3 J.A.M.A., 9.12.33, p. 1894. 4 B.F.L., p. 163. Prof. Hannover, of Copenhagen, however, claims that in Denmark, which is contiguous to Holland, dark girls menstruate at 15.7 years and fair at 17.5 years. (A., p. 202.) 5 R.E., pp. 517–519. Various authors have also pointed out that throughout nature lack of pigmentation is in inverse ratio to acuteness of the senses. Albino men and animals are usually cited as examples of this, and, on these grounds, blonds have been charged with lower sensitivity than brunets. Deniker, for instance, points out that only 72.4 per cent of individuals were found among blonds whose visual acuteness was "stronger than the normal", and 2.7 per cent in whom it was weaker. The corresponding figures among the dark-haired, however, were 84.1 per cent. and 1.7 per cent. Thus, as far as the eye is concerned, there would appear to be slightly superior acuteness in brunets, 2 and if the other senses are in keeping, a generally lower sensitiveness might be argued regarding blonds, which may account for a good deal. 3 In spite of the weight of evidence, I confess that I have again and again been led to suspect exaggeration in the alleged preponderance of strong sexuality and sensitiveness among English brunettes. We should remember the enormous fascination that fair women have always exerted. From the earliest times, fair or rufous hair in women has had a potent influence on the opposite sex. As far back as about 1700 B.C., Amenhotep III broke the custom of his 1 ANTHOLOGIE DE L'AMOUR (Paris, Ed. by P. M. Guitard, p. 275). 2 R.O.M., pp. 110–111. 3 Regarding the alleged vital superiority of brunets (see p. 328 supra), Baron D. L. Larrey's remarks are of great interest. As Napoleon's Surgeon-in-Chief in Russia, he witnessed the retreat from Moscow, and, speaking of the rigours of the winter, he says: "J'ai remarqué que les sujets bruns et d'un tempérament bilioso-sanguin, presque tous des contrées méridionales de l'Europe, résistaient plus que les sujets blonds, d'un tempérament phlegmatique et presque tous des pays du nord, aux effets de ce froid rigoureux, ce qui est contraire a l'opinion généralement reçue. La circulation, chez les premiers, est sans doute plus active; les forces vitales ont plus d'énergie; il est vraisemblable aussi que leur sang conserve beaucoup mieux les principes de la chaleur animale identifiés avec sa partie colorante." (MÉMOIRES DE CHIRURGIE MILITAIRE ET CAMPAGNES, Paris, 1817, IV, p. 125. See also p. 126 for instances.) Thus, here again, there would appear to be evidence of superior vitality in brunets. Other evidence of the kind is given by Dr. D. Macdonald, who, in a study of scarlet fever, diphtheria, measles and whooping-cough among Glasgow children, on whom 3535 observations were made, concludes as follows: "The dark-haired and jet black-haired child has higher recuperative power than the red-haired and, much more so, than the fair-haired child. The medium-haired child occupies an intermediate position . . it and the dark-eyed child has higher recuperative power than the light-eyed and blue-eyed child. . . . In the various gradations between extreme dark and extreme fair types, the closer the type approximates to fair, the less recuperative power it has, and the less resistance it oilers to the disease." See BIOMETRIKA (Cambridge, 1911), VIII, p. 38. There are grounds for supposing that dark women marry more easily than fair, but has it ever been proved? Dr. Beddoe, who made an examination of 600 working women of Bristol, found that "fewer of the red-haired and of the black-haired entered matrimony than of the fair, or dark-brown". 6 An old Italian proverb says: Tol la mora per morosa e la blonda per to sposa!" (Take the black one for a lover and the fair one for a wife!), and such a proverb, voicing the experience and instincts of a people, would hardly have been possible if the fair female had, as a rule, been sexually below parity. According to Percival Symonds, an investigation was carried out by Drs. Paterson and Ludgate to determine the alleged differences between blondes and brunettes, and they were found to be "remarkably small". 7 Summing up, we must assume that, owing (a) to their later maturation; (b) to their usually smaller interest in domestic life; (c) to the consensus of expert opinion against them; and (d) to their ethnic association with peoples who have recently been very Puritanical, but who, according to ancient historians, were always inclined to be so, Teutonic or Nordic women (blondes) are inferior to brunettes in sexual ardour. But I think there are notable exceptions and that the charge has been exaggerated. In any case, what is true of their womenfolk is also probably true of the men in this respect. There may be greater validity in the claim that blondness in 1 M.R., p. 61. 2 R.E., p. 407. A.H.E., p. 177. 3 A.H.E., p. 177. 4 T.J.C., pp. 9 and 12. 5 R.E., pp. 386 and 394. 6 A.H.E., p. 28. 7 D.P.C., p. 522. See also Karl Pearson, pp. 329–330 supra. Havelock Ellis points out that "created peers are fairer than either hereditary peers or even most groups of intellectual persons," and he adds, "they have possessed in higher measure the qualities that insure success." 1 It has also been shown that "all American Presidents have been blue-eyed, and Scotland has furnished as many as 13 of them," 2 while Dr. Beddoe speaks of "the prevalence of tall fair types among the colonial born", nicknamed "cornstalks". 3 He also says: "An unusual proportion of men with dark straight hair enter the ministry . . . red-whiskered are apt to be given to sporting and horseflesh . . . and tall, vigorous, blond, long-headed-men . . . still furnish a large contingent to our travellers and emigrants . . . lineal descendants of the Vikings or of the Athelings." 4 When we remember that the fair Anglo-Saxons, with their Teutonic and Scandinavian cousins, have given the world its greatest adventurers, pioneers and colonizers, and that the Mediterranean race, with its various cultures — in Egypt, Greece, Italy, etc. — has been chiefly distinguished by its hardiness and high artistic tastes and achievements, we cannot wonder that these different qualities should have descended to their respective modern representatives, and if the women of each race tend to share their men's gifts and tastes, it should not astonish us that the darker and more æsthetic are reputed to have more ardent sensibilities than the fair and venturesome, who again and again must have sacrificed love, hearth and home, and family ties, in order to strike out new paths and explore and conquer the world. 12. The approach from Phrenology. Beyond certain elementary generalizations, correlating size of head and breadth and length of head (all of which come under 11) with certain types of mind, this approach is not very helpful. There is undoubtedly much evidence in favour of the view that brain functions are to some extent localized. There is also some parallelism between the inner 1 S.P.S., IV, p. 203, also pp. 117–182. 2 MED. PRESS, 31.8.32. 3 A.H.E., p. 34. 4 Ibid., p. 33. 13. The approach from scientific Cheiromancy and popular Palmistry — the former undoubtedly a guide, the latter no guide at all. That it should be possible to correlate certain features of the hand, the ringers and the thumb, with mental qualities, gifts, propensities and temperament, nobody in his senses can doubt for one moment. To suppose that, in a psycho-physical whole like the human organism, a member as important as the hand can be of any shape imaginable without involving specific invisible tendencies in their owner, would be the acme of Socratic stupidity. All experience argues against such a supposition. All modern discoveries concerning the correlation in children between manual dexterity and intelligence, show that there is a profound relation between the kind of hands and the kind of brain. The fact, moreover, that the most casual observer can see differences between the hands of artists and inartistic people, 1 between the hands of stupid and bright people, and between those of brutes and refined people; the fact that simian and other traits can be seen in the hands of the low-bred, and peculiarly human traits in the hands of highly-bred people, all point to the conclusion that, if only a scientific investigation of hand morphology were made on an extensive material, certain general laws might be established. 1 Darwin, for instance, found hands larger at birth in the children of labourers. (D.O.M., p. 33.) 14. The approach from a persons clothes, personal surroundings and general habits. This approach is important because all these features are self-revelatory. More will be said about the philosophy of clothes in the next chapter. The features to be observed are:— (a) Cleanliness, (b) tidiness, (c) smartness, (d) taste. (a) Clothes may be scrupulously clean though old, shabby and faded. The cleaner they are in these circumstances, the more may cleanliness, care, thrift, and self-respect be inferred in the wearer. There is clearly no merit in clean new clothes. But dirty new clothes argue extremely unclean habits. To-day dirty clothes are more to be reprehended in a woman than a man; because, particularly in summer, most women's clothes are easily washed. In both sexes, any tendency, as familiarity increases, to relax habits of cleanliness in appearance, and for a man to appear, for instance, unshaven on occasion, is a disquieting sign, and points to indolence and lack of self-discipline. Mud or dust of a previous day's wet or dry weather, still to be seen on lower garments, argues a slovenly, indolent, careless nature. Clothes indicate the measure of their wearer's self-respect, and as self-respecting persons are less inclined to depart from the ruling morality than non-self-respecting persons, clothes may tell a useful tale. Where lady's maids or valets are kept, cleanliness of clothing has no characterological value. (b) Tidiness in clothes depends not only on a good fit, but also on the wearer's attention. Buttons, patent fasteners, buckles, hooks or laces which have been overlooked or badly fastened, or are missing, or fastened in the wrong place, or badly matched, General untidiness in appearance may, however, be due to traits which, unfortunately, are exceedingly lovable; for instance, to a complete lack of self-consciousness, a tendency to dreaminess, meditativeness or philosophic preoccupation. It may be due to absentmindedness or an absorbing concern about other people's welfare, to an eagerness and impatience to be at hand, or to an inability to regard oneself as important. Thus it is often seen in devoted mothers of large families. On the other hand it may be due to vicious habits, and is proverbial in drunkards, drug-addicts, gluttons, etc. Untidiness of appearance in a prospective mate is more ominous in a female than in a male, because although it may be allied with lovable qualities not necessarily excluding worldly success in a man, in a mistress of a home it can hardly be anything but a bane, no matter how many lovable traits are associated with it. There is an untidiness of footwear, apart from fastenings, which consists in ungainly appearance through clumsy and unbalanced walking. In these cases wrong poise or undue weight (adiposity) may be the cause, each of which is ominous in youth. There is a myth about artistic people and their specific untidiness. I have known scores of artists in my time, and the best of them have been scrupulously tidy. (c) Smartness, when extreme, is more tolerable in the young than the old; because youth may have many vital reasons, apart from mere vanity, for wishing to attract attention. A conspicuously smart man of middle age, unless he happens to be the Governor of a Dominion, may often be suspected of being a roué, as he always is in France, and a woman of the same age, similarly smart (which in both sexes generally includes an effort to be belatedly youthful), is usually childless, or lacking loving children, particularly sons. Conspicuous smartness in a young married woman may be disquieting as being a sign of an unconscious desire to attract other men because the spouse is disappointing. Smartness cultivated beyond the limits of income is disquieting Nevertheless, moderate smartness, like tidiness, is a sign of self-respect and is a good omen in the young. When inconsistent, as, for instance, when one dowdy garment mars the effect, it reveals a lack of judgment, or merely naïveté, or stupidity, unless the subject is dressed wholly by a strict parent. (d) Taste in clothing indicates general tastefulness. Only when a young person can control his or her wardrobe, is it, however, significant. The test then is, to what extent has a young person rightly understood his or her character and morphology, and dressed accordingly. Clothes that clash with personality, colours that clash, over-dressing, clothes that increase volume in the obese, of that decrease volume in the asthenic, unsuitable materials or styles (corded velvets or tweeds in the obese, plus-fours or morning-coat in the undersized) and clothes that are too fussy or busy, all reveal bad taste. Simplicity, particularly in the young, is the keynote of taste, because beauty unadorned, etc. Clothes suitable to the occasion and to the age of the wearer also reveal taste. A few last words great fussyness or busyness in the appearance of clothes may indicate a childlike, naïve mind. In a man it may denote feminity. The constant affectation of male styles in a woman, or of female styles in a man, may be morbid and indicate a tendency to transvestitism, an affliction which points to dominating, though frequently unconscious, sex-elements of the opposite sex in the sufferer. All such signs are ominous, particularly if they are confirmed by masculinity in a female's, and feminity in a male's general morphology. N.B. — Remember that clothes conceal as well as reveal. A future mate should, therefore, always be seen sea-bathing or sun-bathing if possible. The appointments and surroundings of the future mate are also self-revelatory. It he or she have any command of circumstances, we should ask, do the future mate's surroundings represent a hopeless jumble, or is there method, style, discrimination in their choice? Are they untidy, dirty, spoilt by neglect? If consisting partly of treasures, pictures, ornaments, are they harmonious, or just Are personal belongings used as a means of asserting self-importance? Is much made of family arms, crests, insignificant mementoes of ancestors who are slightly above the ordinary? If this is carried very far, so that attention is repeatedly being called to these things, inferiority feelings may be suspected, for which the future mate is trying to compensate. Does he or she treat animal pets with affection, and understanding, callousness or cruelty? Do cats readily respond to the touch of his or her hand? (This is a good test of sensitive sensuousness.) A future mate's treatment of a dog may reveal sadism, capricious hardness, lack of firmness or good understanding. If a girl's treatment of animals, children and inferiors betrays a constant concern about securing their attachment by indulging them and spoiling them, inferiority feelings may be suspected, accompanied by the compensatory endeavour to bolster up her self-esteem by buying love and attachment. If a man reveals the same capricious treatment of animals, children and inferiors, and cannot discipline them, he too may be suspected of inferiority feelings. In him, however, the defect is much more serious because its effect on social life is more serious. It means there will be no justice where he rules. Does the mate (male) unhesitatingly answer every question and profess to solve every problem, however abstruse, even at the risk of being subsequently discovered in error, or does he occasionally admit ignorance? In the former case he may be suspected of inferiority feelings, and his desire to appear omniscient is a compensatory effort. The corresponding vice in a girl, which consists in constantly asking her future mate questions, the answers to many of which she knows before asking them, is to be ascribed to part of her incessant desire to please, and is of no importance. How does the mate treat superiors? Can he or she retain dignity while showing respect, or is there a tendency to fawn? In the latter case inferiority feelings may be suspected. Is the future mate respectful to parents? Disrespect before strangers, unless bitterly provoked, is an ominous sign. It means insults and offensiveness in the future home. Is the mate changeable, flitting from hobby to hobby without doing anything perfectly? This, too, denotes a lack of discipline and constancy. A drunkard who at least sticks to his bottle, or cask, promises more constancy than a creature of sober habits who can stick to nothing. Is the mate an early or prompt riser? Is he or she sluggish? Constant drowsiness, when nothing is doing, may indicate bad digestion, lack of tone, endocrine imbalance, lack of discipline, or all four. Is the mate easily fatigued, lazy or sedentary? This may mean an asthenic constitution, or hypothyroidism, or anæmia, or chronic constipation, or if it is of psychogenic origin, it may indicate the disquieting fact that one is not a sufficiently stimulating partner. The same person may respond by a plea of fatigue to one's own invitation for a walk, and be eager to start at once on having an invitation from somebody else. Does the mate (female) constantly assert herself to the point of loudness in speech and laughter, when in company, or when other men are present? Does she ever sacrifice the feelings of a friend, even other future mate, to raise a laugh among strangers or friends? In that case, she may be suspected of the hysterical tendencies of the record-breaker type (the person who wishes above all to gesticulate and perform before an audience, so well described by Klages) 1 and she should be immediately dropped, because marriage does not cure this affliction. 2 In a man such behaviour is so monstrous that no girl, having once been victimized, should continue to know one who has been guilty of it. It may be taken as a general rule that constant self-assertion is an ominous sign, and means that for the gratification of vanity the self-assertor is prepared to stamp across God's face, not to mention the future mate's. More indications for drawing inferences from behaviour will 1 Op. cit., Chap. VIII. 2 W.S.H., p. 42; Dr. Fischer-Defoy denies that hysteria is overcome by marriage. Dr. Fritz Lenz agrees, and adds: "No persons with pronounced hysteria should ever marry" (M.A.R., p. 472). Dr. Lorenzen admits that the unhappiest marriages are those of hysterics, but has known cases in which a harmonious marriage has completely cured hysteria (W.S.H., p. 60). 15. The Approach from a Person's Repute. This is important, although, of course, it should be used with caution, as any number of subjective influences may play a part and have to be discounted. What do people say about him or her in whom we are interested? How is he or she treated by family, friends, acquaintances, employers, etc.? Both negative and positive statements should be weighed with care, particularly if they are conflicting. It should be borne in mind that, owing to the increasing subjectivity of the Age — and Goethe regarded subjectivity as one of the signs of modern decadence and disintegration over a century ago 1 — people are inclined to speak of a person not according to his or her merits, but according to how he or she has treated them. For instance, to have asked Madame de Staël, whom Napoleon had snubbed, for a fair estimate of his genius, would have been utterly futile. Nor should we have hoped to have a fair estimate of Charles I from Prynne. The lower a person is in character, the less will he be able to speak highly of one who has given him an affront, and disparagingly of a person who has flattered his self-esteem. This is what makes the approach from the standpoint of repute precarious, and it is of paramount importance to bear these considerations in mind in availing oneself of this approach as a check on one's own observation. 16. The Approach from Graphology. As regards this, the present state of scientific opinion seems to be divided, but that it can be used as a means of confirming or checking judgments, guesses or surmises already carefully made about a person, is, think, beyond question. The danger seems to lie in making it the only source, the first source, or the determining source of information, and there is the tendency to exercise inadequate vigilance in regard to compensatory features. The fact that it is now being used extensively in Germany, that a man of Goethe's genius and scientific erudition appears to have been not only a believer in graphology, but also to have made a collection of handwritings; 2 that a man of standing and authority in psychology such as Klages should be an advocate 1 E.G.G., 29.1.1826. Goethe said: "Alle im Rückschreiten und in der Auflösung begriffenen Epochen sind subjective, dagegen aber haben alle vorschreitenden Epochen eine objective Richtung. Unser ganze jetzige Zeit ist eine rückschreitende, denn sie ist eine subjective." 2 Ibid, 2.4.1829. Generally speaking, it seems just as likely that a person's handwriting should be an index to his character as that his voice, his speech, or his glance should be. Wherever there is differentiation, in tact, we may legitimately look for causes accounting for that differentiation and for qualities associated with it, whether it be found in various forms of handwriting, or in various shapes of body. On the other hand, authorities do not seem to be unanimous, and there are some who are against regarding graphology as a reliable first or only test of character. The fact that apparently it is impossible to determine so fundamental a character as sex from handwriting, 3 the fact that Galton, in his investigation of identical twins found "most singularly, the one point in which similarity is rare is in the handwriting", and that he found "only one case in which nobody, not even the twins themselves, could distinguish their own notes of lectures, etc."; 4 the fact that no less a scientist than Karl Pearson is opposed to the idea of character-reading from handwriting, although he admits, as we have seen, the effect on the latter of certain states of health and mind, and the association of good handwriting with athletic power, 5 should make us at least cautious about accepting everything that the graphologists claim. Dr. Arthur Kronfeld's considered opinion on the subject seems to be fair, and constitutes a good summing up of the whole question. He says: "Even graphology, which is so full of promise now that it has recently been elevated by Klages to a 1 W.S.H., pp. 35 and 68. 2 HANDSCHRIFT UND EHE (Munich, 1933). 3 J. Crépieux Jamin: THE PSYCHOLOGY OF THE MOVEMENTS OF HANDWRITING (Paris, 1926, pp. 161–162), and Robert Saudek, EXPERIMENTS WITH HANDWRITING (London, 1928, p. 258). The former of these goes so far as to add that "physical conditions have no effect on handwriting". If this is so, and physical and psychological conditions cannot be separated, graphology would be shown as useless as a guide to character. Strange to say Percival M. Symonds (D.P.C., pp. 525–526) declares that while graphology can and does reveal nothing reliable about character, the one thing it can reveal is sex! 4 I.H.F. HISTORY OF TWINS. 5 O.R.H.P., pp. 19 and 25. "But these strictures, passed on a mischievous fashion which is gaining ground, should not be taken as directed against the usefulness of a graphological inquiry as one among many other methods employed in a general characterological investigation." 2 1 K.U.C., p. 47. 2 Ibid, p. 45. |
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