Analyzing Character, Arthur Newcomb [popular romance novels .txt] 📗

the same reasons he would not take pains to qualify himself for any occupation, although he might have made a fair success in retail salesmanship perhaps, notwithstanding his far greater fitness for educational, ministerial, or platform work. On the contrary, he roamed about the country occupying himself at odd times with such bits of light mental or physical work as came his way. Being without training and taking no real interest in his work, he never retained any job long. Sometimes, lured by the will-o'-the-wisp of some fancied opportunity to make a million, he gave up his work. Sometimes he merely got tired of working and quit. But most often he was discharged for his incompetence. It is difficult indeed for any man to attend properly to the cent-a-piece details of an ordinary job when he is dreaming of the easy thousands he is going to make next week.

This charming gentleman was always out of funds. Although he carefully tonsured the ends of his trouser legs, inked the cuffs of his coat, blackened and polished his hose and even his own, fine, fair skin where it showed through the holes of his shoes, and turned his collars and ties again and again, he was nearly always shabby. On rare and ever rarer occasions he would do some relative or friend the inestimable favor and honor of accepting a small loan, "to be repaid in a few days, as soon as a big deal I now have under way is consummated." These loans were his only successes in the realm of practical finance. Inasmuch as the repayment of them was contingent upon the closing of an ever-imminent, but never consummated, "big deal," they cost him nothing for either principal or interest. For a few weeks after the successful negotiation of one of these loans, he would be resplendent, opulent, fastidious, even generous. All too soon the last dollar would slip through his unheeding fingers. If during a period of affluence he had succeeded in establishing a little semblance of credit, he would maintain his regal style of living as long as it lasted. Then he would come down to the hall bedroom or even the ten-cent lodging house, the lunch wagon, and the pawn shop. But even at the lowest ebb of his fortunes, he never seemed to lose his cheerfulness, his good nature, his grand manners, and his easy, confident hope and conviction about the huge sums that were to come into his possession "within a few days."

A DILETTANTE IN REAL ESTATE

Do not imagine that this man's dreams of great and easy fortunes were mere idle fancies—far from it. He was nearly always engaged in negotiations for some big deal. One of his favorite pastimes was to hunt up large holdings of real estate offered for sale, go to the owners, represent himself as a real estate broker, and secure permission to put these properties on his "list." This permission obtained, he would go about trying to find buyers. But his ideas of real estate values, of the adaptation of properties to purchasers, of the details of a real estate transaction and of salesmanship were so vague and so impractical that if he ever succeeded in selling a piece of real estate, we have not yet heard of it. He lacked the practical sense necessary to inform himself upon such important matters as taxes, assessments, insurance rates, trend of population, direction and character of commercial expansion, bank clearings, freight shipments, volume of retail and wholesale business, projected municipal and public service improvements, crop reports, output of manufacturies, and many other items which form the basis for intelligent negotiation, in a real estate deal. He could talk only in glittering generalities, and his suggestions were usually so impracticable that he failed to secure the confidence of those who were in a position to purchase properties so valuable as those he invariably hit upon for his ambitious projects.

AN UNDESERVED BAD REPUTATION

Here, then, was a man of unusual intelligence and capacity along theoretical, abstract, philosophical, and spiritual lines. His intentions were good. He was kindly, sympathetic, generous to a fault, refined, ambitious, high principled at heart and a thorough gentleman by birth, training, and instinct. Yet, because of a lack of clear knowledge, his life has been one of hardship, privation, disappointment, disillusionment, galling poverty, and utter failure. He has been subjected to ridicule and the even more blighting cruelty of good-natured, patronizing, contemptuous tolerance. His reputation is that of a lazy, good-for-nothing, disreputable dead beat and loafer. And yet, in a sense, nothing is further from the truth. Notwithstanding his many disappointments, no one could have been more sincere than he in believing that just around the corner fortune awaited him.

DIAGNOSIS OF THE IMPRACTICAL MAN'S CASE

The fundamental difficulty with the impractical man is two fold. First, his powers of observation are so deficient that it is difficult for him to obtain facts. It is an axiom of conscious life that there is pleasure and satisfaction in the use of well-developed powers and a disinclination to use powers which are deficient in development. Because it is difficult for the impractical man to obtain facts, he has little desire to obtain them. He takes little interest in them, does not appreciate their value. He, therefore, assumes his facts, takes them for granted or proceeds almost wholly without them. Even when he does take the trouble to ascertain the facts, he is inclined to be hasty and slipshod in his methods. He, therefore does not obtain all of the necessary information bearing upon his problem. He does not painstakingly verify his knowledge through repeated observations, under all kinds of conditions. So he is frequently mistaken and reasons to his conclusions upon supposed facts which are not facts at all.

Second, the impractical man, as a general rule, has well-developed powers of reason, logic, and imagination. His mind easily and unerringly leaps from premises to conclusion and weaves long and beautiful chains of reasoning, each link perfectly formed. The only trouble is that none of the chains are attached to anything solid and substantial at either end. With highly developed powers of imagination, it follows that the impractical man loves to dream, to build castles in the air. When he attempts to form a judgment or reach a conclusion, he may possibly begin by attempting to ascertain the facts. But observation for him is a slow and painful process. He does not enjoy it. He has no patience with it. Mere facts restrict him. Practical reasoning is like walking painfully, step by step, along a narrow, steep pathway, leading to a fixed destination at which the traveler arrives whether he wills it or not. The impractical man's form of reasoning, starting at the same place, soars into the air, dips and sweeps in magnificent and inspiring curves and finally sets him down at whatever destination seems most desirable to him. His well-developed powers of imagination are usually more than willing to supply the deficiencies in his powers of observation. In his own realm he is a valuable member of society—often becomes rich and famous. But he is a misfit in any vocation which deals wholly with concrete things.

DESCRIPTION OF THE IMPRACTICAL MAN

The impractical man is easily recognized. He may be blonde or brunette, large or small, fine textured or coarse textured, energetic or lazy, aggressive or mild, friendly or unfriendly, ambitious or unambitious, honest or dishonest—but his mark is upon his forehead. If his brows are flat or if his forehead immediately above and at the sides of his eyes is undeveloped or only a little developed, his powers of observation are deficient. He is not interested in facts and his judgment is based upon hasty and mistaken premises. As a general rule, in such cases, the upper part of the forehead is well developed. This is always the case if the man is intelligent. If the forehead is both low and retreating and flat at the brows, then the individual lacks both power of observation and reasoning power, and is very deficient in intellect.

Figures 27 and 28 and 29 and 30 show some very common types of the impractical man. Note the flatness of the brows in every case. Figures 32, 50, and 54 show the foreheads of practical men.

CHAPTER IX HUNGRY FOR FAME

The born artist has a passion for creation. This is true whether his art expresses itself through paints and brushes, through chisel and stone, on the stage, through musical tones, through bricks and mortar, or through the printed page. The born artist may or may not have, as companion to his passion for creation, a hunger for fame, an ear which adores applause. Few artists, however, have ever become famous who were not spurred on by an eager desire for the plaudits of their fellows.

It is possible to have the passion for creation without the hunger for fame. It is also possible to have a hunger for fame without the passion for creation. In the "Light That Failed," Kipling tells of little Maisie, who toiled and struggled, not to create beauty, but for success. Yet, poor Dick, who loved her, was forced to admit that there was no special reason why her work should be done at all.

Horace Annesley Vachell, in "Brothers," tells the story of Mark Samphire's tragedy. "When, after three years of most gruelling, hard work as an art student, he turned to his great master and asked: 'When you were here last you said to a friend of mine that it was fortunate for me that I had independent means. You are my master; you have seen everything I have done. Pynsent knows my work, too, every line of it. I ask you both: Am I wasting my time?'

"Neither answered.

"'No mediocre success will content me,' continued Mark. 'I ask you again: Am I wasting my time?'

"'Yes,' said the master gruffly. He put on his hat and went out.

"'He's not infallible,' Pynsent muttered angrily.

"'Then you advise me to go on? No, you are too honest to do that. I shall not go on, Pynsent; but I do not regret the last three years. They would have been wasted, indeed, if they had blinded me to the truth concerning my powers.'"

WHEN THE DIVINE FIRE IS NOT AFLAME

The art schools of Paris! History, fiction, reminiscence, your own knowledge, perhaps your own experience, join in piling mountain-high the tale of wasted years, blasted ambitions, broken hopes and shattered ideals. Worse than this, perhaps, they tell of homes, galleries and shops disfigured with mediocre work and criminally hideous daubs.

The music studios of Paris, Berlin, New York, and other large cities, the schools of dramatic art, the theological seminaries, and the departments of literature in our universities could add their sad testimony. Theatrical managers, editors of magazines, publishers, art dealers, and lyceum bureaus are besieged by armies of aspiring misfits.

Probably there is no more difficult and hazardous undertaking in all the experience of the vocational counsellor than that presented by people of this type. The mere fact that a young man has painted scores of pictures which have been rejected has no bearing on the case. Artistic and literary history is studded with the glorious names of those who struggled through years of failure and rejection to final success. This is, in fact, true of nearly all of the great artists and writers. True, the mere dictum of any authority, however high, would have very little effect in turning the true creative artist from his life work, but what a pity it would have been if Richard Mansfield, Booth Tarkington, Mark Twain, and a host of others had paid any attention to the advice of those who told them they never could succeed! And yet, unless the vocational counsellor can encourage and urge on those who have the divine spark, and turn back from their quest those who have it not, he