Buchanan's Journal of Man, August 1887: Volume 1, Number 7
Religion
Buchanan's Journal of Man, August 1887: Volume 1, Number 7
Medicine -- Periodicals; Phrenology -- Periodicals; Science -- Periodicals
The psychic department of Anthropology in which we are now entering
the study of the faculties of the soul, the organs of the brain, and
the effects of their varying development upon the characters of men
and animals, is rich in very practical instruction for the guidance of
life, and the attainment not only of spiritual and physical health and
success in this life, but of that nobler and greater success, which is
chiefly realized in the coming centuries, in which a grander realm is
opened for our expanded powers in the higher life.
One of the most essential things for success in life is a correct
self-knowledge. A strong, well-balanced organization with a clear
intuitive intellect, generally gives this knowledge, and leads to a
correct course in life. But how few are really well developed and well
balanced, with intuitive clearness of perception, and again how many
are there who, in the unrestrained indulgence of all their passions
and propensities, care not whether their lives are right or wrong,
according to a correct standard. This class desire no admonition, no
explanation of their peculiarities, and the causes of their failures
or misfortunes.
Selfish and narrow-minded men charge all their failures and
misfortunes either to inevitable destiny, or to the faults and
misconduct of others. But the truth which science enforces is that we
should charge all our failures to ourselves. Other men have succeeded
splendidly in life, winning wealth, power, renown and friendship. If
we have not, it must be because we have not exercised the same
faculties which made them successful, and we should study most
diligently to learn wherein, or how, we have failed.
Nearly all are disqualified for this task of self-inspection either by
a selfish bias which is unwilling to recognize a fault, or by the
fault itself which biases the judgment. The faculty, or passion, which
misleads one becomes a part of his judging faculty, and cannot condemn
itself. The miser cannot realize the baseness of his avarice, nor the
mercenary soldier the enormity of war. Nor can a defective faculty
assist in realizing the defect. The color-blind cannot appreciate
painting, the thief cannot appreciate integrity, the brutal
wife-beater cannot appreciate love, and a Napoleon cannot appreciate
disinterested friendship.
Nor do they who fail to comprehend their own faults learn much from
the admonition of friends, for _they_ are too desirous of maintaining
a friendly relation to give entirely candid advice, and the criticisms
of those who are not friends excite suspicion and anger. Fortunate is
the man who can profit by the criticisms of his enemies.
How many are there who go through life with glaring defects of
character, injurious to their welfare, who are never warned, either by
kind friends or by conscience, and never realize the necessity of any
higher wisdom than their own, or the necessity of self-culture.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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