American literature -- Periodicals; Literature -- Periodicals
These sentences are written merely as suggestions, and from the point
of view of morals; there is also the point of view of heredity, and
the curious resemblance between those who belong to certain
professions. Just what it is that makes us almost certain to recognize
a doctor or a priest at first glance is too subtle a question for
discussion here. Some one has said that we usually arrive, in time, at
the opposite extreme to those preferences and opinions which we hold
in early life. The man who breaks away from conventionalities, ends by
returning to them, or out of narrow prejudices and restrictions grows
towards a late and serene liberty. These changes show themselves in
the face with amazing clearness, and it would seem also, that even
individuality sways us only for a time; that if we live far into the
autumnal period of life we lose much of our individuality of looks,
and become more emphatically members of the family from which we
spring. A man like Charles the First was already less himself than he
was a Stuart; we should not fail in instances of this sort, nor seek
far afield. The return to the type compels us steadily; at last it has
its way. Very old persons, and those who are dangerously ill, are
often noticed to be curiously like their nearest of kin, and to have
almost visibly ceased to be themselves.
All time has been getting our lives ready to be lived, to be shaped
as far as may be by our own wills, and furthered by that conscious
freedom that gives us to be ourselves. You may read all these in any
Human Document--the look of race, the look of family, the look that
is set like a seal by a man's occupation, the look of the spirit's
free or hindered life, and success or failure in the pursuit of
goodness--they are all plain to see. If we could read one human face
aright, the history not only of the man, but of humanity itself, is
written there.
BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES TO ACCOMPANY THE "HUMAN DOCUMENTS" GIVEN IN THIS
NUMBER.
GENERAL LEW WALLACE was born in Brookville, Indiana, in 1827. After
receiving a common school education, he studied law. He distinguished
himself in the Civil War, and was made a brigadier-general. After the
war he practised law in Crawfordsville, Indiana. A few years later he
was for a time Governor of New Mexico. From 1878-81 he was Governor of
Utah, and from 1881-85 Minister to Turkey. His first book, "A Fair
God," appeared in 1877. "Ben Hur," published in 1880, has reached a
sale of several hundred thousand copies. General Wallace's home is in
Crawfordsville, Indiana.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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