Does F. B. rejoice in inferiority, in the masochistic sense
spoken of before? Is his humility a sign of inversion, in the
Freudian sense, a sort of homosexuality? Possibly, and there are
very crude and coarse phrases of the common man indicating a
sexual feeling in all victory and defeat. But I am inclined to
call this a sort of monothymia, a mood of fear and negative self-
feeling coloring all the reactions.
I have previously cited the case of the man obsessed by fear in
all the relations of life,--shrinking, self-acknowledged
inferiority--who lost it with "a few drinks under my belt."
"Dutch courage" drove from many a man the inferiority and the
fear that plagued his soul. True, it drove him into a worse
situation, but for a few moments he tasted something of the life
that heroes and the great have. If we can ever find something
that will not degrade as it exalts, all the world will rush to
use it.
Of the monothymic types the choleric or angry are about as common
as those predisposed to fear. The anger emotion is aroused by a
thwarting of the instincts and purposes, and in the main the
strongly egoistic are those most given to explosive or chronic
anger. The angry feeling, however, must be controlled, else
failure or social dislike awaits the choleric. When a man wins
success he frequently allows himself the luxury of indulging his
anger because he feels his power cannot be challenged. The
Duchess in "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland," with her choleric
"off with his head" whenever any one contradicted her, is a
caricature, and a very apt one, of this type of person. We think
of the bull-necked Henry the Eighth--"bluff King Hal"--as the
choleric type, though here we also assume a certain cyclothymia,
great good nature alternating with fierce anger.
I have in mind G. as a type of the angry person. G. cannot bear
to have any one contradict him. Either he swallows his
resentment, if he is in the presence of one he cannot afford to
antagonize, or else he starts to abuse the victim verbally. He is
sarcastic or violent according to circumstances; rarely is he
pleasant in manner or speech. Though he is honest and said to be
well-meaning, his ego explodes in the presence of other
self-assertive egos. When a man truckles to him he is angry at
his insincerity; when the other disputes his statements, or even
offers other views, he finds himself confronted by one who has
taken deep offense. As a result G. has no real friends, and this
has added fuel to his anger. Often he has made up his mind to
"control" himself, to keep down his scorn and rage, but rarely
has he been able to maintain a proper attitude for any length of
time.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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