In the Capitoline Museum at Rome is a famous statue of Venus, which, like many works of this kind, is ingeniously mounted upon a pivot, so that one who wishes to study it can place it at any angle with reference to the light that he may prefer. Thus he may get an indefinite number of views, but in every view what he really observes, so far as he observes intelligently, is the whole statue in a particular aspect. Even if he fixes his attention upon the foot, or the great toe, he sees this part, if he sees it rightly, in relation to the work as a whole. And it seems to me that the study of human life is analogous in character. It is expedient to divide it into manageable parts in some way; but this division can only be a matter of aspects, not of elements. The various chapters of this book, for instance, do not deal with separable subjects, but merely with phases of a common subject, and the same is true of any work in psychology, history or biology. CHAPTER V THE SOCIAL SELF—1. THE MEANING OF “I” THE “EMPIRICAL SELF”—“I” AS A STATE OF FEELING—ITS RELATION TO THE BODY—AS A SENSE OF POWER OR CAUSATION—AS A SENSE OF SPECIALITY OR DIFFERENTIATION IN A SOCIAL LIFE—THE REFLECTED OR LOOKING-GLASS “I”—“I” IS ROOTED IN THE PAST AND VARIES WITH SOCIAL CONDITIONS—ITS RELATION TO HABIT—TO DISINTERESTED LOVE—HOW CHILDREN LEARN THE MEANING OF “I”—THE SPECULATIVE OR METAPHYSICAL “I” IN CHILDREN—THE LOOKING-GLASS “I” IN CHILDREN—THE SAME IN ADOLESCENCE—“I” IN RELATION TO SEX—SIMPLICITY AND AFFECTATION—SOCIAL SELF-FEELING IS UNIVERSAL. It is well to say at the outset that by the word “self” in this discussion is meant simply that which is designated in common speech by the pronouns of the first person singular, “I,” “me,” “my,” “mine,” and “myself.” “Self” and “ego” are used by metaphysicians and moralists in many other senses, more or less remote from the “I” of daily speech and thought, and with these I wish to have as little to do as possible. What is here discussed is what psychologists call the empirical self, the self that can be apprehended or verified by ordinary observation. I qualify it by the word social not as implying the existence of a self that is not social—for I think that the “I” of common language always has more or less distinct reference to other people as well as the speaker—but because I wish to emphasize and dwell upon the social aspect of it.