HOW THE SCIENCE IS VERIFIED
We have presented to you, in a brief way, the fundamental principles of the science of character analysis and the nine fundamental variables in man to which those principles apply. Are we not justified in saying that a body of knowledge which has been so classified and organized that the main fundamental facts of it can be presented in a few pages, is, indeed, a science? Add to this the fact that every conclusion is not only based upon these fundamental scientific principles, but has been carefully verified by investigation and observation in not only hundreds but thousands of cases, and has been used daily for years under the trying conditions of actual commercial practice, and this science has passed out of the merely experimental stage.
There are two ways to learn any science.
The first is to begin by collecting all possible facts, recording them and verifying them under all possible conditions, until they are as thoroughly established as any facts can be in our imperfect human understanding. The collection of facts in this way requires the most painstaking research, oftentimes including many thousands of observations. When all the facts have been thus collected and verified, they are classified. Then they are carefully analyzed and an effort is made to find some of the laws which underlie them. Perhaps, instead of a definite law, all that can be at first advanced is a hypothesis or theory. This hypothesis or theory having been formulated, many thousands of observations are taken in an effort to establish it as a definite law or a principle. Oftentimes whole new realms have to be explored before this can be determined. Sometimes, after a theory is advanced, perhaps seems to be approaching complete establishment, some fact or set of facts is discovered which compels the setting aside of all old theories and the formulation of a new one. When a theory has been definitely established as a law, other laws are sought in the same way until, finally, there are enough laws established to form the basis of a general principle. Then more laws and more principles are added in the same way until, finally, the body of knowledge has become sufficiently accurate, sufficiently definite and sufficiently organized and classified to be called a science.
HOW SCIENCE SLOWLY EVOLVES
This is the way in which all of the sciences known to man were first learned; that is to say, they were learned by their formulators coincident with the process of their formulation.This is a slow and laborious process of learning. Few, if any, sciences have ever been thus mastered by any one individual. Indeed, the certain establishment of a very few facts, or, perhaps, only one important fact, the formulation of a theory, or the final statement of a law is usually the limit of the contribution of any one person to any science.
No science is independent. The science of physics, for example, could never have reached its present-day state of development if it had not laid heavy tribute upon the sciences of mathematics, astronomy, chemistry, geography, mechanics, optics, and others. In a similar way, the science of character analysis has derived many of its facts, laws, and even principles, from the sciences of physics, chemistry, biology, anthropology, ethnology, geography, geology, anatomy, physiology, histology, embryology, psychology, and others. Since this is true, it is obvious that the work of collecting, verifying, classifying, analyzing, and organizing the facts upon which the science of character analysis is based has been going on from the very dawn of civilization. Many investigators, students and scholars, in many branches of knowledge, have labored, added their little mite to the sum total, and passed on. The net result of all their work, all their thousands of years of research, investigation, study and thought, can now be gathered together and presented in so simple a form that it can be learned by anyone of intelligence in a few months. It took humanity untold thousands of years to learn the scientific truth that the earth is an oblate spheroid. Many men gave their lives to establish the truth. As a result, to-day every schoolboy learns and understands the fact within a very few days after his first opening of a text book on geography. Thousands of scholars have been working on the science of physics from the dawn of human intelligence down to the present date. Now a high school student learns all of its essentials and fundamentals in a short term of fourteen weeks.
A SHORT CUT TO KNOWLEDGE
The second method of learning a science, therefore, is totake advantage of all that has been done and, instead of beginning with facts and working up to principles, begin with principles and work down to a practical application amongst facts.
There are many ways of learning principles. One may memorize them from books, or have them set forth and explained by an instructor or lecturer, or stumble upon them in general reading, or work out a series of carefully prescribed experiments in a laboratory, leading up to an enunciation of the principles or, through its intelligent application in the world of work, establish it in one's consciousness.
The student who learns his laws and principles out of books may have a very clear and definite understanding of them. He may be able to add to them or to teach them. But he has little skill in their practical application as compared with the student who learns them in a laboratory. Furthermore, the laboratory student is at a disadvantage, probably, as compared with the man who makes intelligent application of the laws and principles to his daily work. So well recognized by educators is this truth that no attempt is made in our colleges and universities and, for the most part, even in our high schools, to teach sciences involving observation, logical reasoning and sound judgment purely out of books. Medicine, surgery, agriculture, horticulture, mechanics and other such sciences are now taught almost entirely by a combination of text books and actual practice. This rule also applies to the science of character analysis.
LEARN THE PRINCIPLES
The first step in the mastery and practical use of the science of character analysis is to learn the principles and the laws which underlie them. These principles and laws are comparatively few in number and comparatively simple. They are all classified under and grouped around the nine fundamental variables, a list of which was given in the preceding chapter.
The best way to learn a principle is not to memorize it, butto understand it. Learn, if possible, the reason for its existence, at least in a general way; the laws which underlie it, and the facts upon which it is based. The student who memorizes the words, "all bodies attract one another directly in proportion to their mass and inversely in proportion to the square of the distance between them," knows little or nothing about the law of gravitation, while the student who understands just what those words mean, whether he is able to repeat them correctly or not, does know the law of gravitation, and, if necessary, can probably apply it. The boy who learns that any object weighs less on a mountain-top than at the sea level learns an interesting and perhaps valuable fact. The man who learns that the law involved in this fact is the law of gravitation has learned something which he may be able to apply in a thousand ways. The man who, in the future, may learnwhythe law of gravitation operates as it does, may open untapped reservoirs of power for himself, for all humanity, and for all future generations. Therefore, in learning a principle, learn not only to understand it, but, if possible,why.
DEMONSTRATE AND VERIFY
Having gained as complete as possible an understanding of the laws and principles of the science of character analysis, the next step is to demonstrate to your own satisfaction that they are sound. This process will also enable you to understand them even more definitely and specifically than before.
When you learn, for example, that a blonde is more volatile, more fond of change and variety, more inclined to pioneering and government, than the brunette, you have learned an important law. When you study carefully the history of the evolution of the blonde and brunette races, you know why the law is as it is. But when you have gone out and observed several hundred blondes and several hundred brunettes and have seen them manifest dispositions, aptitudes and characteristics in accordance with the law, you have not only demonstrated the law to your own satisfaction, but you understandit even better than before. Furthermore, you are far better able than ever to determine the characteristics of the people you meet, as indicated by their color.
ANALYZE YOURSELF
There are many good reasons why the very first application of the knowledge of the principles and laws of character analysis should be to yourself. While, in one sense, you know your own thoughts and feelings and innermost desires and ambitions better than anyone else does, in another and very important sense, your friends and relatives probably understand you far better than you understand yourself. If you need any demonstration of this truth, look for it amongst your relatives and friends. You may have a relative, for example, who is very modest, retiring and diffident, who lacks self-confidence, who imagines that he is unattractive, unintelligent, and below the average in ability. You and all the rest of his friends, on the other hand, know that he has genuine talent, that he has an unusually attractive personality once his self-consciousness has been laid aside, that he is intelligent and far above the average in ability. Contrariwise, you may know someone who vastly over-estimates himself, whose own opinion of himself is at least fifty per cent higher than that of his relatives and immediate acquaintances. If other people, therefore, do not understand themselves, is it not at least probable that you do not understand yourself? So universal is this lack of self-under standing that the poet expressed a real human longing when he said:
"Oh, wad some power the giftie gie us To see oursels as others see us! It wad frae mony a blunder free usAnd foolish notion:What airs in dress and gait wad lea'e usAnd even devotion!"
Careful analysis of yourself, however, with your own intimate knowledge of the depths of your being will do more thangive you an understanding of your own character. It will give you a better understanding of some, at least, of the laws and principles of character analysis. For this reason, it will also give you a far more intimate understanding of others.
COMPARE INDICATIONS AND CHARACTERISTICS
When you have learned what certain physical characteristics indicate, practise observing these indications amongst the people whom you know well. Try your skill at making the connection between the indication and the characteristics which, according to the science, it indicates. For example, go over in your mind all of the blondes you know and trace in their dispositions and characters, as you know them, the evidences of volatility, love of variety, eagerness, exuberance, positiveness, and other such characteristics. Take careful note as to how these qualities manifest themselves; observe differences in degrees of blondness, and corresponding differences in the degrees in which the characteristics indicated show themselves. Observe, also, how the various characteristics manifest themselves in combination. For example, note the difference between a blonde with a big nose and a blonde with a small nose.
ANALYZE, CHECK UP AND VERIFY
When you have analyzed yourself and your relatives, friends and acquaintances, you will be ready to begin on the analysis of people previously unknown to you. You will find them everywhere—in street-cars, in stores, on the streets, in churches and theaters, on athletic fields, in offices, in factories, in schools and in colleges. When you have analyzed them as carefully as you can and, if possible, have written down a brief outline of your analysis of them, check up and verify; find out how far you have been right. If, in any case, you find that you have been mistaken, find out why—study the case further. You have already demonstrated and verified your principles; therefore, either you have made an error in your observation or you have reasoned illogically in drawing yourconclusions. Find out which it is and correct your analyses—then verify them.
This is a practice which, if you are at all interested in human nature, you will find intensely fascinating. It is one which you can pursue for years and not find it monotonous. Not a day will pass, if you are diligent in this practice, in which you will not learn something new, something interesting, something valuable. Those who have studied and practised this science for many years are, almost without exception, the ones who are most eager and enthusiastic about making these observations, analyses and verifications.
STUDY TYPES
Perhaps one of the most interesting and valuable forms of exercise in the practical application of this science is the study of types and their variations. Anyone who has observed humanity knows that, while no two persons are exactly alike, practically all human beings can be classified satisfactorily into comparatively a few general types. We have considered some of these types at length in earlier chapters of this book. It is by a study and comparison of people belonging to these general types, the careful noting of resemblances and differences, that the science of character analysis becomes almost as easy as the reading of a book. If you see a man for the first time who resembles in many important particulars of appearance some man you know well, study him to see whether he will not manifest in much the same way the same characteristics as your friend. This kind of observation, intelligently made, is the basis of accuracy and swiftness in making analyses.
KEEP ACCURATE AND ADEQUATE RECORDS
The human mind is an excellent storehouse of knowledge, but it should not be over-burdened. One of the first principles of efficiency as enunciated by Mr. Harrington Emerson is: "If you would find the best, easiest and quickest ways to the desirable things of life, keep and use immediate, reliable, adequate, and permanent records."
The complete record of an analysis should show the name, address, sex, exact age, height, weight, and all other essential physical characteristics of the person analyzed, classified under the head of the nine fundamental variables. It should show your conclusions as to his ability, disposition, aptitudes and character in general. It should also show the result of any further observations for the purpose of verifying your conclusions, and should be so kept that, if, at any time in the future, the individual should speak or act in any way which is either a striking verification of the analysis or in striking disparity with it, these incidents may be recorded and their relationship to what has gone before on the record studied.
Such records as these are valuable in many ways. When you have collected a large number of them, they become the basis of statistics, averages, and other interesting and important collections of facts.
STICK TO THE PRINCIPLES
It has been our universal experience amongst practitioners of this science that those who adhere most closely and most faithfully to its principles are most successful. There is always a strong inclination, especially on the part of those who are just beginning and those who are unusually emotional and sympathetic, to make exceptions. It is very difficult for some people of exceedingly sympathetic and responsive natures to analyze correctly. The personality of the individual being analyzed appeals to them either favorably or unfavorably. Perhaps his words make a strong impression upon them. All these things cloud the analyst's judgment and, instead of applying the principles rigidly, he falls back upon the old, unreliable method of analyzing by means of his "intuitions."
The laws and principles of the science of character analysis are based upon scientific truths regarding the development, evolution, history, anatomy and psychology of the human race. They have been verified by hundreds of thousands of careful observations. They have stood the test of years of practicaluse in the business world. They are now being successfully applied in commerce, in industry, in education, and in the professions, by thousands of people. They can be relied upon, therefore, to give you an intimate knowledge of the ability, disposition, aptitudes, and character in general of every human being who comes under your careful observation.
The old-time farmer planted his potatoes "in the dark of the moon." He probably took good care not to plant them on Friday, never planted a field of thirteen rows, and would have been horrified at putting them into the ground on the same day when he has spilled salt or broken a mirror. By taking all of this superstitious care to insure a good crop, he probably counted himself lucky if he got 100 bushels to the acre. Eugene Grubb, out in Wyoming, by throwing superstition to the four winds and depending, instead, upon exact scientific knowledge, leaves luck out of the question and knows that he will net 1,000 bushels to the acre.
One thousand years ago or more, our educational methods stiffened and set in the rigid moulds of tradition. For nine hundred years civilization and progress stood still. Then here and there men began to break the moulds with hammers of scientific knowledge. Education, instead of blindly following traditional forms, began to shape itself more and more to exact knowledge of the child nature and its needs—very slowly, cautiously and tentatively at first, but, as knowledge grew, with more and more boldness and freedom. This is one of the reasons why the last one hundred years has seen greater progress toward our dominion over the earth than all of the thousand years before it.
For more than four thousand years—perhaps more than five thousand—men have been constructing buildings with bricks. Brick-laying was a trade, a skilled occupation, almost a profession, but its methods were based upon traditions handed down from father to son, from journeyman to apprentice, unbroken throughout that entire four-thousand-year period.
Then a bricklayer and his wife defied the heavens to fall, threw aside traditions and began to apply exact knowledgeto brick-laying. As a result, they learned how to lay bricks three times as rapidly as the best workman had ever been able to before—and with less fatigue.
SCIENCE TAKES THE PLACE OF GUESSWORK
Fifty years ago, the merchant and the manufacturer guessed at their costs and fixed their prices with shrewd estimates as to their probable profits. They also guessed as to which departments of their business paid the most profit, how much and what kind of material they should buy, where the best markets were to be found, what would be the best location for their stores and factories, and many other important factors of profitable enterprise. Some of these old worthies were good guessers. They built up fairly large business institutions and made some very comfortable fortunes.
The business men of to-day—who are, indeed, of to-day and not a relic of yesterday and the day before yesterday—have an exact and detailed knowledge of their costs, determine prices scientifically, know definitely where are the best markets and what are the best locations for their factories, forecast with a reasonable degree of accuracy their need for materials, determine in a laboratory just which materials will best supply their needs, and in many other ways walk upon solid highways of exact information rather than upon the quaking bog of guesswork. Partly because of this, they have built up a multitude of institutions, each of them far larger than the largest of the olden days and have made fortunes which make the big accumulations of other days seem like mere pocket money. In making these fortunes for themselves, they have enabled millions not only to enjoy far larger incomes than people of their class and situation ever received before, but to enjoy conveniences and luxuries beyond even the dreams of the rich men and kings of olden days.
RANDOM METHODS YIELD TO SCIENTIFIC
In the old-time factories the various departments of work, machinery and equipment in each of the departments werearranged almost at random. Even a few years ago we sometimes saw factories in which the materials worked upon were moved upstairs, then downstairs, then back upstairs, hither and yon, until a diagram of their wanderings looked like a tangle of yarn. Even in offices, desks were placed at random and letters, orders, memoranda, and other documents and papers were moved about with all of the orderliness and method of a school-girl playing "pussy wants a corner." Modern scientific management, horrified at the waste of time and energy, makes accurate knowledge take the place of this random, helter-skelter, hit-or-miss basis of action and multiplies profits.
If the old-time farmer rotated his crops at all, he did it at random. He was, therefore, a little more likely than not, perhaps, to put a crop into a field which had been exhausted of the very elements that crop most needed. By this method and by other superstitious, guesswork, traditional, random, and neglectful methods, he struggled along on an average of about twenty bushels of corn to the acre, proudly defying anybody to teach him anything about farming out of books, or any white-collared dude from an agricultural college to show him anything about raising corn. Hadn't he been raising corn for nigh on forty years? How could there, then, be anything more for him to learn about its production?
But a little twelve-year-old boy down in what had always been supposed to be the poor corn lands of Alabama, by the painstaking application of a little simple knowledge, produced 232 and a fraction bushels of corn on one acre of land. Other boys in all parts of the South and of the corn belt began producing from 100 to 200 bushels of corn to the acre in the same way.
SCIENCE TAKES THE PLACE OF SUPERSTITION
Because man has lacked accurate knowledge about the world around him, he has been the credulous victim of countless generations of swindlers, fakers, fortune-tellers, mountebanks, and others experienced in chicanery. Speculators used toconsult clairvoyants, crystal gazers, astrologists and card-readers for a forecast of business conditions. To-day, through accurate knowledge based upon statistics relative to fundamental factors in the business situation, they forecast the future with remarkable accuracy.
The practice of medicine was once a combination of superstition, incantation, ignorance and chicanery. In those days people were swept into eternity by the millions on account of plague, cholera, and other pestilences. To-day medical practice is based upon knowledge, and people who are willing to order their lives in accordance with that knowledge not only recover from their illnesses, but are scarcely ever ill. The ignorant man pays $1.00 for a small bottle of colored alcohol and water which some mountebank has convinced him is a panacea for all ills. In his blindness he hopes to drink health out of that bottle. The man who knows eats moderately, drinks moderately—if at all—smokes moderately—if at all—does work for which he is fitted and in which he can be happy, secures recreation and exercise according to his own particular needs, and almost never thinks of medicine. Should he need treatment, however, he goes to a man who has scientific knowledge of diagnosis and materia medica. The first man, in all likelihood, goes to an early grave, "stricken down by the hand of a mysterious Providence." The second man lives to a ripe old age and enjoys life more at eighty than he did at eight or eighteen.
Fifty years ago, mothers relied upon tradition and maternal instinct in the care of their babies. More than one-half of all the babies born died before they were five years old. The wise mother of to-day knows what she is doing, and, as a result, infant mortality amongst the babies in her hands becomes an almost negligible quantity.
NEGLECT YIELDS TO SCIENCE
Because we did not know how to take care of them, we neglected our forests until they became well nigh extinct. To-day, by means of the science of forestry, we are slowlywinning back the priceless heritage we almost threw away. Because of our ignorance, we neglected the by-products of our fields, our mines, and our industries, and no one can compute the fortunes we lost. Through scientific knowledge, we have begun to utilize these by-products. Some of the greatest of modern industries, and the fortunes which have grown out of them, are the result.
Selling and advertising used to be done partly by tradition and partly by instinct, so called. To-day, while they have, perhaps, not been reduced to exact sciences, they are based more and more upon exact knowledge, so that merchandizing has become less and less a gamble and more and more a satisfaction.
Since, through scientific knowledge, man has wrought such miracles in agriculture, construction, education, commerce, industry, finance, medicine, war, mining, and practically all of his other activities, it is time he applied the same scientific methods to that without which all these wonderful things would never have been executed, namely, his mind and soul.
SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE OF SELF
In Part One of this book we have attempted to show the benefits which follow upon self-knowledge as to vocation. But this is only one phase, after all, of your life and activity. Obedience to the injunction, "know thyself," will help, also, to solve many of the hard problems you meet in education, social life, religion, morality, and family relations. The man who, through character analysis, has a scientific knowledge of himself, has therein a valuable guide to self-development and self-improvement. He knows which qualities to cultivate and which to restrain. He knows what situations and associations to avoid so that his frailties and weaknesses will handicap him as little as possible.
SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE IN EMPLOYMENT
In Part Two we have shown briefly the application of knowledge of human nature to the selection, assignment andmanagement of employees. In common with so many other important matters, this has been left in the past very largely to superstitious traditions, guesswork, random, hit-or-miss methods, chicanery, and so-called intuition. Now, for the sake of his profits, and also for the sake of the fellow human beings with whom he deals, the wise employer is seeking for and, in many cases, using exact knowledge.
SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE IN PERSUASION
In Part Three we have referred to the use of character analysis in persuasion. Without this knowledge, it is the most natural thing in the world for the man who seeks to persuade others to present to them the arguments and suggestions which would appeal to him. Long ago some wise man said: "If you would persuade another, put yourself in his place; look at the matter through his eyes." 'Twas easier said than done. You cannot put yourself in another's place or see things from his point of view unless you know him accurately, which is possible only through the science of character analysis. We have often found people who have lived together for a lifetime who neither knew nor understood each other.
SCIENTIFIC KNOWLEDGE IN SOCIAL RELATIONS
Man's fundamental needs are food, drink, clothing, shelter, work, companionship, and rest. If one of man's fundamental needs is companionship, then he needs to know how to be successful socially. Most people deeply feel this need. One of the most frequent questions we are called upon to answer is: "How can I be a greater social success?" Social success depends upon personal attractiveness in the broadest sense of that term and upon a desire to make the most of that attractiveness. Many people have great social ambitions but, for some reason or other, are so unattractive that they are social failures. There are others who have pleasant personalities but who, because of other interests, neglect their social opportunities.
Personal attractiveness depends, first, upon the development of those elements which are pleasing to others, such as intelligence, judgment, reason, memory, sympathy, kindliness, courtesy, tactfulness, refinement, a sense of humor, decision, adaptability, self-confidence, proper personal pride, dignity, and perhaps others; second, upon a knowledge of each individual with whom one comes in contact, so that one knows best how to gain that person's favorable attention, to arouse his interest, and to give him pleasure.
Many people are shy, diffident, self-conscious, and painfully embarassed in the presence of strangers. They feel these deficiencies keenly. They long, perhaps with an intensity which the naturally self-possessed person will never know, for that social ease which they so greatly admire. Their self-consciousness, diffidence and timidity in the presence of others is very largely the result, first, of a lack of knowledge of themselves and how to make the most of their own good qualities socially; second, of a lack of knowledge of other people. It is a human trait deeply ingrained and going back to the very beginning of life to be afraid of that which we do not understand. Courage, self-confidence, and self-possession always come with complete understanding. Therefore, these timid, bashful ones may find, and many of them have found, greater social ease through a knowledge of themselves and of others, gained through a study of character analysis.
LOVE AND MARRIAGE
We shall probably not be disputed when we state that, aside from religion, at least, the most momentous problem in the life of every man and woman is that of love and marriage.
Says Edward Carpenter: "That there should exist one other person in the world toward whom all openness of interchange should establish itself, from whom there should be no concealment; whose body should be as dear to one, in every part, as one's own; with whom there should be no sense of Mine or Thine, in property or possession; into whose mind one'sthoughts should naturally flow, as it were, to know themselves and to receive a new illumination; and between whom and one's self there should be a spontaneous rebound of sympathy in all the joys and sorrows and experiences of life; such is, perhaps, one of the dearest wishes of the soul. For such a union Love must lay the foundation, but patience and gentle consideration and self-control must work unremittingly to perfect the structure. At length, each lover comes to know the complexion of the other's mind; the wants, bodily and mental; the needs; the regrets; the satisfactions of the other, almost as his or her own—and without prejudice in favor of self rather than in favor of the other; above all, both parties come to know, in course of time, and after, perhaps, some doubts and trials, that the great want, the great need, which holds them together is not going to fade away into thin air, but is going to become stronger and more indefeasible as the years go on. There falls a sweet, an irresistible trust over their relation to each other, which consecrates, as it were, the double life, making both feel that nothing can now divide; and robbing each of all desire to remain when death has, indeed (or at least in outer semblance) removed the other.
"So perfect and gracious a union—even if not always realized—is still, I say, the bona fide desire of most of those who have ever thought about such matters."
A HEAVEN ON EARTH
In such a union as the author quoted has here described men and women find life's deepest and truest joys and satisfactions. In it there is solace for every sorrow, balm for every wound, renewal of life for every weariness, comfort for every affliction, a multiplication of every joy, a doubling of every triumph, encouragement for every fond ambition, and an inspiration for every struggle. Those who are thus mated and married have found a true heaven on earth. But such a mating and such a marriage is not, as many fondly suppose, based solely upon the incident of "falling in love." If we have no other advice to give the young man or the young woman thanthat which has so often been given, "let your heart decide," we have, indeed, little to offer.
MARRIAGE A PRACTICAL PARTNERSHIP
The marriage relationship is not wholly, or even chiefly, a romantic and ethereal social union far above and unaffected by material and practical considerations. While this spiritual union is an essential part of every true marriage, it cannot exist unless there is also a true union upon intellectual and physical planes. Marriage is, in one sense, a business partnership. In another sense, it is an intellectual companionship, and in still another sense, it is a friendly, social relationship.
A man and a woman are, therefore, mated in the true sense of the word, not alone by a mysterious and intangible spiritual identity, but by mutual beliefs, mutual ideas and ideals, mutual or harmonious tastes, mutual physical attractiveness, and mutual respect and admiration each for the other's talents, disposition, aptitudes, and character in general. One of the reasons why there are so many unhappy marriages is because a blind instinct, which may be purely physical or purely intellectual or purely psychical, which may be a mere passing fancy, which oftentimes is based upon the flimsiest and shallowest possible knowledge of each other's characteristics, is mistaken for love. Many marriages, of course, are consummated without even the existence of an imagined love—marriages for convenience, marriages because of pique, marriages arranged by parents or others. When such a marriage is a happy one, it is, indeed, by virtue of great good fortune, a happy accident.
KNOWLEDGE THE BASIS OF CHOICE
Since a true marriage, therefore, must encircle with its golden band and harmonize all of the psychical, intellectual and physical qualities, activities and interests of two people, it follows that it must be based upon knowledge as well as intuition. He who would choose a mate must, first of all, understand himself, so that he may know what qualities will be most agreeable to him. This may seem unnecessary, but,unfortunately, it is not. Any man who will compare his youthful tastes and judgment in regard to women with his mature inclinations will see the truth.
Second, he ought to know before he reaches the point of falling in love, the disposition and character of those to whom his fancy turns. When propinquity and mere physical attraction have aroused the emotions of a young couple, the ardor of their excitement so obscures observation and judgment that any careful analysis of each other's characteristics is impossible. Even if such an analysis were possible, one could not be intelligently made by a mere observation of behavior and conversation, even under the most advantageous circumstances. As a general rule, young people associate together in their "company clothes and company manners." Every possible endeavor is made to show forth that which is considered to be most desirable and to conceal, so far as possible, that which may be undesirable. Even traits and tendencies which do manifest themselves do so under disguise, as it were, and their full seriousness is not recognized. In fact, many a young man and young woman have found the very characteristics which appeared most charming in a lover or sweetheart the ugly rock upon which marital happiness was wrecked.
"CHARMS" WHICH PROVE DEADLY
For example, many girls admire rather fast young men. But few wives find happiness with drunken, gambling, unfaithful husbands. Many young women experience a delightful thrill of interest in the young man who is inclined to be somewhat authoritative. But few wives submit with pleasure to the exactions of a domineering husband. Some young women find a gay, careless irresponsibility charming in a lover but bitterly resent having to shoulder all the burdens of financing and maintaining a home.
In a similar way, some men admire dimpled, pouting girls, but they cordially detest whimpering, whining wives. Most men are flattered by an air of helpless dependence in a sweetheart, but they soon grow tired of a wife who cannot thinkand act for herself and who is, perhaps, an imaginary or real invalid.
These characteristics in both men and women may be mere affectations and mannerisms, assumed for the purpose of imagined allurement and charm. Or they may be bedded deep in the character. Only a scientific knowledge of human nature will reveal the truth.
KNOWLEDGE IN MARITAL RELATIONS
No matter how truly mated a man and woman may be, life-long happiness in the marriage relation depends upon mutual understanding. Many a noble ship of matrimony has been wrecked hopelessly upon the jagged rocks of misunderstanding. Character analysis opens the eyes, reveals tendencies and motives and offers true knowledge as a guide to the making of one's self truly lovable, and the finding and bringing out in the other of lovable qualities.
An intelligent woman of thirty once said to us: "I could never get along with my father. As soon as I began to have a mind of my own, he and I clashed, notwithstanding the fact that I loved him and he idolized me. After I had married and left home, my love for him frequently drew me back under his roof for a visit. But before I had been there a week we had somehow managed to have a bitter quarrel and separated in anger. After I learned to apply the principles of character analysis, I returned home on a visit and the first thing I did was to analyze father. For the first time in my life I understood him. Since that time we have never clashed, and my visits with him are a great joy to me as well as to him."
We have in our files a sheaf of letters from both men and women telling of the regaining of a lost paradise through mutual knowledge and mutual understanding.
THE SCIENCE OF CHARACTER ANALYSIS NOT A CURE-ALL
We do not offer the science of character analysis as a panacea. We have already emphasized the fact that mere knowledge of one's true vocation is not enough for an unqualifiedsuccess in it. We do not believe that character analysis alone will solve the age-long problem of capital and labor, nor do we hold forth the promise that a scientific knowledge of human nature will enable every individual who obtains it to be uniformly successful in selling, advertising, public speaking legal practice, and other forms of persuasion. The serious and intricate puzzles of social life will find no golden key which unlocks them all in the science of character analysis. The supreme problems of love, marriage, marital relations, divorce, and family life are far beyond the limited scope of character analysis for their complete solution. Human life; human efficiency; human mental, moral, and physical development; human civilization in all of its aspects, are a matter of slow evolution, with many a slip backward. He is either self-deceived or a charlatan who claims to have found that which will enable the race to arrive at perfection in a single bound.
On the other hand, just so far as even one spark of true knowledge is a light on the way, to the degree in which one little adjustment helps men to harmonize with nature and her eternal forces, and in the measure in which one solid step adds to the causeway which man is building out of the mire of ignorance to the heights of wisdom—in so much is the science of character analysis an aid to man and his striving toward perfection and happiness.
THE END
REQUIREMENTS OF THE PRINCIPAL VOCATIONS
NOTE.—In the following lists the principal physical, intellectual, emotional and volitional qualifications needful for success in a number of representative vocations are given. The list of vocations is general, not detailed, and is by no means exhaustive. The qualifications suggested are also somewhat general in their nature. The list, therefore, is a valuable guide to the general vocation for which an individual may be fitted, but should be supplemented with much more detailed and specific analysis in order to determine his exact place in that vocation. We have used the words "Activity" and "Inactivity" in listing physical requirements. These refer to the man of bone and muscle, in the first case; to the physically frail or the fat man, in the second.