Some behavior that looks submissive is really self-assertion in disguise. There are two forms of self-assertion that are specially likely to be taken for submission. Wounded or thwarted self-assertion is one. Shame and envy are like submission in this respect, that they involve an absence of self-confidence or self-assurance, but they do not afford the satisfaction of willing submission, nor the relief of giving up the struggle against obstacles. So far from being genuinely submissive, they are states in which the self is making a violent and insistent demand for justification or social recognition. The other form of self-assertion which looks like submission occurs when a person identifies himself with a superior individual or with a social group. He will then boast of the prowess of his hero or of the prestige of his group, whether it be his family, his school, {169} his town or his country. Now, boasting cannot by any stretch of the imagination be regarded as a sign of submissiveness; it is a sign of assertiveness, and nothing else. What has happened here is that the individual, having identified himself with his hero or his group, finds in their greatness a means of asserting himself as against other individuals who have not the good fortune to be so identified. This transferred self-assertion is a strong element in loyalty and public spirit, and plays a large and useful part in public affairs. {170} EXERCISES 1. Make an outline of the chapter, in the form of a table, which shall show for each instinct: (a) the natural stimulus, (b) the native motor response, (c) the end-result that the instinct tends towards, in its adult as well as its native condition, and (d) the emotion, if any, that goes with the activity of the instinct. 2. An adult tendency or propensity may be simply an unmodified instinct, or it may be derived from instincts by combination, etc. Try to identify each of the following as an instinct, or to analyze it into two or more instincts: (a) Love for adventure. (b) Patriotism. (c) A father's pride in his children. (d) Love for travel. (e) Insubordination. (f) Love for dancing. 3. Which of the instincts are most concerned in making people work? 4. Show how self-assertion finds gratification in the life-work of an actor. a physician. a housekeeper. a teacher. a railroad engineer. 5. Arrange the following impulses and emotions in the order of the frequency of their occurrence in your ordinary day's work and play: (a) Fear. (b) Anger. (c) Disgust (d) Curiosity. (e) Self-assertion. (f) Submission. (g) The tendency to protect or "mother" another. 6. How do "practical jokes" lend support to the view that laughter is primarily aroused by a sense of one's own superiority? 7. Get together a dozen jokes or funny stories, and see how many of them can be placed with the practical jokes in this respect.