In this matter of discounting, as in connection with most other stock market phenomena, the most useful hint that can be given is to avoid all efforts to reduce the movement of prices to rules, measures, or similarities and to analyze each case by itself. Historical parallels are likely to be misleading. Every situation is new, though usually composed of familiar elements. Each element must be weighed by itself and the probable result of the combination estimated. In most cases the problem is by no means impossible, but the student must learn to look into the future and to consider the present only as a guide to the future. Extreme prices will come at the time when the news is most emphatic and most widely disseminated. When that point is passed the question must always be, “What next?” V—Confusing the Personal with the General In a previous chapter the fact has been mentioned that one of the greatest difficulties encountered by the active trader is that of keeping his mind in a balanced and unprejudiced condition when he is heavily committed to either the long or short side of the market. Unconsciously to himself, he permits his judgment to be swayed by his hopes. A former large speculator on the Chicago Board of Trade, after being short of the market and very bearish on wheat for a long time, one day surprised all his friends by covering everything, going long a moderate amount, and arguing violently on the bull side. For two days he maintained this position, but the market failed to go up. He then turned back to the short side, and had even more bear arguments at his tongue’s end than before. To a certain extent he did this to test the market, but still more to test himself—to see whether, by changing front and taking the other side, he could persuade himself out of his bearish opinions. When even this failed to make any real change in his views, he was reassured and was ready for a new and more aggressive campaign on the short side. There is nothing peculiar about this condition. While it is especially difficult to maintain a balanced mind in regard to commitments in the markets, it is not easy to do so about anything that closely touches our personal interests. As a rule we can find plenty of reasons for doing what we very much want to do, and we are still more prolific with excuses for not doing what we don’t want to do. Most of us change the old sophism “Whatever is, is right” to the more directly useful form “Whatever I want is right.” To many readers will occur at once the name of a man prominent in public life who seems very frequently to act on this motto.