and her fears that she scarcely knows the meaning of her actions, she signs the deed that binds her to another. Thus, the ardent temper, which above all requires to be supplemented by a natural courage and firmness of will, is liable without their aid to be counteracted by the other tempers that may be combined with it.

We shall now attempt to formulate the law of the influence of an ardent temper on the stability of sentiments: (24) In proportion as our sensibility to joy in respect of any given class of objects is narrow, so that we feel joy in the presence of very few members of it, and indifference or repugnance to most, in that proportion does the love formed for any one member tend to be constant. Thus the strength of a sentiment, other things equal, varies inversely with the range of our sensibility to joy from the members of the class to which its object belongs.

There is a question which this law suggests, but to which it affords no answer. Why is it that a temper that renders us so insensible to joy in the presence of most of the members of a class, notwithstanding surprise at their novelty, should yet be sensible in a high degree to joy in the presence of some particular member of it: a joy not dependent on novelty, and to which it remains sensible when the freshness has worn off? In other words, what is the secret of the attraction which the favoured individual possesses over the rest of the class? Now in certain directions we can sometimes answer this question. Where there is an ardent love for some form of art or some branch of science, it often happens that there is an affinity between the talents of the man and the quality of work which the science or art requires for its successful cultivation. A man loves it because he enjoys it, and because it is adapted to his talents; he will love it the more steadfastly the less he is fitted to do other kinds of work. For-vanity apart-he will find no compensating enjoyment when he is forced to occupy his mind elsewhere. These other things, because he is unfitted to deal with them, or because they are beneath his abilities, will leave him indifferent; and if he is forced to attend to them will arouse repugnance. And this will prevent him forgetting

the delight which his favourite subject afforded him, will make him long to return to it, and render the dejection that he feels in working in uncongenial fields prolonged and unappeasable. All this we meet with frequently in the lives of men of genius. But what in sexual love is the explanation of the exclusive attraction which the favoured individual possesses for those of an ardent temper? There are those who could love almost any woman who had some degree of youthfulness and charm, as Hawthorne confesses of himself; there are others that remain insensible to the most beautiful. What is it that overcomes this insensibility? The favoured individual is raised above the members of the class to which he belongs; but what gives this pre-eminence to him? Is there here too some affinity, but a secret one, that we cannot penetrate, or is it due to accident or circumstances?

Scott, in the case we have been considering, traces the selection of the favoured individual to a variety of conditions, among which the timorous temper of the woman itself plays a part. Terrified by the near approach of a wild bull, a stranger killed the animal at the critical moment. In the sudden relief from such a painful emotion, surprise and joy were mingled with her feelings of gratitude toward her deliverer. Nor was this all: Lucy Ashton was of a romantic temper, inclined to wonder and admiration. "Her secret delight was in the old legendary tales of ardent devotion and unalterable affection, chequered as they so often are with strange adventures and supernatural horrors." In the noble appearance, in the career and misfortunes of the Master of Ravenswood there was an air of romance. Thus wonder and curiosity were connected with joy and gratitude; and as the scene of their meeting was recalled again and again in her solitary reflections, the same emotions were renewed and the connection between them and her thought of him established: he was "linked to her heart by the strong association of remembered danger and escape, of gratitude, wonder, and curiosity"; and in her admiration for him, “no cavalier appeared to rival, to obscure the ideal picture of

1 Op. cit. ch. iii.

chivalrous excellence"1 she had formed of him. All these emotions co-operated in her case, and perhaps others, before the general insensibility which guarded the approaches to sexual love could be overcome.

We may see in the preceding examples-in such tempers of narrow and obstructed sensibility to joy from the members of a given class of objects, how the one object that at length stirs them is taken out of the common things of the class to which it belongs, and raised into pre-eminence over them. The joy which it excites, containing or contained in admiration and wonder, becomes much more intense and lasting than those common joys of a broader sensibility that have scarcely anything to distinguish them, and are effaced by one another. We may then formulate this second law of the ardent tempers: (25) In proportion as our tempers have a narrow sensibility to joy, the joy to which they are sensible is the more intense and lasting, and establishes a more durable connection with their objects.

There are other laws which the study of the tempers will lead us to distinguish, such as the laws of their interaction, where several of them, as in the case of Lucy Ashton, combine together to form one complex temperament. Thus it seems to be clear that the compliant temper counteracts the ardent temper, and the ardent the compliant; and that the timorous temper also generally counteracts the ardent; for those who love greatly must greatly dare. Still there are many varieties of fear, and it often happens that the man who is peculiarly sensible to one is correspondingly insensible to another; as are those who have physical courage combined with moral cowardice, or those who can stake their happiness or glory on a chance, and work toward it through their lives undaunted, yet have some physical fear that might make cowards of them. The Apostle Peter had an ardent love of his Master, and the vehemence of this love made him protest that though all deserted him, he would remain faithful, yet when the hour came he disowned him through sudden fear.

The examples we have now adduced will be sufficient to

1 Ibid. ch. iv.

show how many observations require to be made, and how much material collected, before the laws of the influence of the tempers on one another and on the sentiments could be raised to the scientific standard. But at the same time these examples open before us a future of great promise; for once the problems are clearly understood, and we have formulated tentative laws for their solution, we know what are the facts that we have to observe in child-life, and to search for in the characters of individuals and of nations; and as these facts are gradually accumulated, so will the laws be gradually discovered and perfected, and the growth of the science be assured in respect to this fundamental side of it.

The conception of character that we have gradually unfolded in this first and introductory book, inadequate as it is, has suggested some of the initial problems of a science of character, has furnished us with some tentative laws for our guidance, and has indicated many lines along which further observation and research may be directed. The conclusion that we provisionally adopt is, that there are three principal stages in the development of character. Its foundations are those primary emotional systems, in which the instincts play at first a more important part than the emotions; in them, and as instrumental to their ends, are found the powers of intelligence and will to which the animal attains. But even in animals there is found some inter-organisation of these systems, or, at least, some balance of their instincts, by which these are fitted to work together as a system for the preservation of their offspring and of themselves. This inter-organisation is the basis of those higher and more complex systems which, if not peculiar to man, chiefly characterise him, and which we have called the sentiments; and this is the second stage. But character, if more or less rigid in the animals, is plastic in man: and thus the sentiments come to develop, for their own more perfect organisation, systems of self-control, in which the intellect and will rise to a higher level than is possible at the emotional stage, and give rise to those great qualities of character that we name 'fortitude,' 'patience' 'steadfastness,' 'loyalty,' and many others, and a relative ethics that is in constant interaction with the

ethics of the conscience, which is chiefly imposed upon us through social influences. And this is the third and highest stage in the development of character, and the most plastic, so that it is in constant flux in each of us; and the worth that we ascribe to men in a review of their lives, deeper than their outward success or failure, is determined by what they have here accomplished.