There is something very naïve in those who speak of humility as a certain good and of pride as a proven evil. In the first place these are not opposites at all; there are a hundred kinds of both, and humility is sometimes simply a refined form of pride. Humility may be prudence, or good taste, or timidity, or a concealment, or a sermon, or a snub. How much of it, for instance, is simple prudence? Is not this, indeed, its chief _utility,_ that it saves men from the dangers which accompany pride? On the day on which some one discovered that "Pride goeth before a fall," humility became no mean virtue. For if one become the servant and proclaim himself the least of all, how can he still fall? Yet if he does it is a fall into greater humility, and his virtue only shows the brighter. This is the sagacity of the humble, that they turn even ignominy to their glorification. Humility is most commonly used with a different meaning, however. There are people who wish to be anonymous and uniform, and people who desire to be personal and distinct. Or, more exactly, it is their instincts that seek these ends. The first are humble in the fundamental sense that they are instinctively so; the latter are proud in the same sense. Humility, then, is the desire to be as others are and to escape notice; and this desire can only be realized in conformity. It is true, people become conceited after a while about their very conformity, and would be wounded in their vanity if they failed to comply with fashion; but vanity and humility are not incompatible.