Individual difference

“ Now, by taking note in thought of this supposed uniqueness, you can, of course, in general, define, as a sort of problem to be solved by real Beings, the ideal and abstract nature of individuality itself. But then, you do not, in that case, tell what constitutes any one individual such as he is. ”

“ Facts should explain facts; and the view called ‘individualism’ (because the one reality that it believes in is the ‘individual,’ in the sense of this, that, and the other particular) should hence be the right explanation. What are the facts here to be explained? They are human communities, the family, society, and the state. Individualism has explained them long ago. ”

“ But we also find it socially convenient to view the common objects of our human and social knowledge as independent both of my fellow and myself, even while we still view these objects as the same for both of us, and for all other actual and possible human observers. ”

“ And so my present remark hereupon is that, in following our enterprise of defining Being, we shall not be looking for mere abstract principles, but we shall be seeking for the most concrete objects in the world, namely for Individual Beings, and for the system that links them in one Individual Whole, — for Individuals viewed as the limits towards which all ideas of universal meanings tend, and for the Absolute as himself simply the highest fulfilment of the very category of Individuality, the Individual of Individuals. ”

“ This world would appear to such an insight as a Social Order. For the categories of the World of Appreciation, as we shall later more fully see, when we come to the study of our human Social consciousness, are the categories of the Self in Social form and expression. But as I discriminate the world, taking account now of ɑ and now of b, my discrimination, determined as it is by the interest of ray individual development, does not seize upon the facts in the order in which they are actually determined by the Will whose expression is the world. ”

“ If, then, we fix our thought upon this unique Personality as the embodiment of universal principles, it follows that those principles must exist in ourselves also, and that His actual specialization of them is the earnest of our potential specialization of them. ”

“ Without Knowledge of the Human Nature. “Varied, according to character, are the demands made by heart and mind,” assures us a representative of modern philosophy, “corresponding to them is the image of the world to which the individual turns by inner necessity. ”

“ The degree to which this mastery over our own nature is attained is the truest standard of individual or social progress, since it has the closest relation to the existence of the Great Being, and to the happiness of the elements that compose it. ”

“ So complex is our modern civilization that it is not possible to separate the individual in our estimation of his standards and character from the conditions by which he is surrounded, and in which he lives. For they vitally influence his point of view, his ideals, his efforts to attain them. ”

“ Control by the subjective mind nearly always produces in the subject either a feeling of dual personality, in which two egos are realized, each distinct from the other—the old me and the new me—or else the subjective mind is identified with a totally distinct, extrinsic and usually superior individual ”

“ Now if, with this fact in mind, I look back on the world which I attempted thus to describe, I find that the limitation which experience often seems to set to my postulates about the discrimination of facts, may well be founded in the deepest nature of things. The true world, the World of Values or of Appreciation, as rightly viewed by an absolute insight, would be a world of Selves, forming in the unity of their systems One Self. ”

“ The answer to the first is the need of the One to differentiate itself into the Many, proving its universality and its power to integrate and raise up the good. But, he shows, the answer to the second question is in the conduct of the individual. ”

“ The deeply rooted conception which every individual even now has of himself as a social being, tends to make him feel it one of his natural wants that there should be harmony between his feelings and aims and those of his fellow creatures. ”

“ The whole individual life that expresses and presents the meaning of any single idea. But you will still properly be dissatisfied. You will say: “Are not the individuals as various as are all our various ideas? And how are these individuals of which you have so far spoken to be related to what we mean when we talk of individual men, of souls, of moral personalities, or of one man as different from any other man?” ”

“ I now feel certain that before we can reach the individualism which we crave—and have tried to claim too soon—we must first know such participation as hers in all conscious life—in all life, conscious or unconscious. ”

“ In order to reach still more definite results, let us consider what their psychology, that is to say, what their doctrine, was in regard to the nature of man, considered as an isolated individual, or viewed in his unsocial capacity. You will observe that man presents himself to our notice under two points of view; as a member of society, and as a man simply, and irrespective of all social relations; in other and shorter words, as a citizen and as an individual. Now, the question is, What are the attributes and constituents of man considered as an individual? ”

“ So soon as one passes from general terms to the question of individual good, one encounters individuality; for everyone in the differing quality and measure of their personality and powers and possibilities, good and right must be different. ”

“ If, however, the standard of living which one has inherited from his class is adopted as an individual standard, and is made the object of effort and self-denial, the individual and social results are of high value. ”

“ So much then for Exclusion and Selection as aspects of will both in God and in man. We next pass on toward more special comparisons between Absolute and Finite Individuality. For Individuality, as we now begin to see, is, in one aspect, the expression of Selective Interest. Yet for a moment we must still treat of Individuality in general. ”

“ Many differences in degree or detail there have been, of course, in the various historic embodiments of these ideals; but for the sake of making clear the fundamental contrast we may neglect these individual divergences and group together those on the one hand who have called men to a fuller, completer life and those who have summoned them to an austerer and purer life, free from taint of sin and regret. ”

“ Now it is this selective character of every rational conscious process, a character as manifest to consciousness as it is ultimately significant for the constitution of all Being, — it is this character, I say, which to my mind is responsible above all for the Individuality which we have already characterized as belonging to the whole of Being, and which we shall now find as equally characistic of every region of finite Being. ”

“ And, now, just this difficulty gives one further reason why our Third Conception of Being, in conflict with common sense, does, indeed, abandon the concept that Being is individual, and confines itself to forming internal meanings, and to confirming them by external experience. It tries to rest content with abstract universals, more or less determined by particular observations. ”

“ And my ego is often too ready to treat as important all the differences that my mind notices: lifestyle, skin color, social status, educational background, our differing ideas and opinions and on and on. ”

“ But each of the maxims can be taken to the heart and conscience of the individual, to become a principle of each man’s own character and conduct, and then to reappear, retranslated into social action, according to the wisdom of the time or the wisdom of the man or the wisdom of the Church. ”

“ Of all these wider, more potential selves, the potential social self is the most interesting, by reason of certain apparent paradoxes to which it leads in conduct, and by reason of its connection with our moral and religious life. ”

“ The values of most objects are at first fixed for us by instinct or they are suggested by the ethos and mores of our groups—family, society, national religions, and "reign under the appearance of habitual self-suggested tendencies." The self is constituted accordingly. Collisions with other selves, conflicts between group valuations and standards and individual impulses or desires, failure of old standards as applied to new situations, bring about a more conscious definition of purposes. The agent identifies himself with these purposes, and values objects with reference to them. ”

“ The rational attitude of the individual toward the question of conformity or non-conformity in his own life, would seem to be: assert your individuality in matters which you deem important; conform in those you deem unimportant. ”

“ In the realized idea which, superior to me, and yet here and now in and by me, affirms itself in a continuous process, we have found the end, we have found self-realization, duty, and happiness in one;—yes, we have found ourselves, when we have found our station and its duties, our function as an organ in the social organism. ”

“ Such are the differences among human beings in their sources of pleasure, their susceptibilities of pain, and the operation on them of different physical and moral agencies, that unless there is a corresponding diversity in their modes of life, they neither obtain their fair share of happiness, nor grow up to the mental, moral, and æsthetic stature of which their nature is capable. ”

“ Our notion, therefore, of the claim we have on our fellow-creatures to join in making safe for us the very groundwork of our existence, gathers feelings around it so much more intense than those concerned in any of the more common cases of utility, that the difference in degree (as is often the case in psychology) becomes a real difference in kind. ”

“ We shall see that, in the light of the specific and natural tendencies toward social behavior which are part of man's original equipment, this sharp psychological isolation between the individual and the group is an altogether unwarranted assumption. ”

“ That is, we mean that acts so characterized correspond exactly to a self in a peculiar attitude, viz., one of adequate standardizing and adjustment, of equilibrium, in383 view of all relations. The concept signifies that in finding our way into a moral world into which we are born in the process of valuing and judging, we take along the imagery of social judgment in which through language and behavior the individual is constantly adjusting himself, not only to the social institutions, and group organization but far more subtly and unconsciously to the social consciousness and attitudes. ”

“ It might be truer to say that I, the real, the deeper, the relatively impersonal, or, rather, if you like, the genuinely and essentially personal self, need, and so express myself in, the world of social business. All we human selves are thus one true organic self, in so far as we work together. And this organic self we all of us experience just in so far as we do toil together. But not even this larger self of society can fully express the vocation which constitutes me in my true, in my deeper personality. ”

“ In Fact, we may easily perceive that among the Differences, which distinguish Men, several pass for natural, which are merely the Work of Habit and the different Kinds of Life adopted by Men living in a social Way. ”

“ Perhaps it would be nearer the mark to say that every civilised or semi-civilised human being may be divided into two persons, the one an individual who chooses, walks, eats, feels, and imagines in a private and personal way ”

“ Such is human nature—not, to be sure, at its best, but common human nature; and even when we escape the foregoing personally invidious distinctions, we still—and this is the main point—treat self and environment as two naturally conflicting, altogether independent sources of conduct. ”

“ Behold then all human faculties developed, memory and imagination in full play, egoism interested, reason active, and the mind almost at the highest point of its perfection. Behold all the natural qualities in action, the rank and condition of every man assigned him; not merely his share of property and his power to serve or injure others, but also his wit, beauty, strength or skill, merit or talents: and these being the only qualities capable of commanding respect, it soon became necessary to possess or to affect them. ”

“ Unequal Moral Development.—In character, no less than in body and mind, do we see vast differences among men. From the perfect activity of a well-balanced will to the uncertain energy of a vacillating character, there are innumerable variations. ”

“ To know how to deal with such men—to know how to use them—is the problem which ambitious force is called upon to solve. Personality, individuality, force of character, or by whatever name we choose to designate original and vigourous manhood, is the best thing which nature has in her gift. ”

“ To trace out the different natures of men, to account for the variation, either from innate difference, or the influence of dissimilar circumstances, is, perhaps, one of the most useful objects of a biographer. We all vary one from another, yet none of us tolerate the difference in others: the haughty and independent spirit disdains the pliant and tender, while this regards its opposite as unfeeling and lawless. ”

“ If they could place us under the influence of certain circumstances, we, in like manner, can place ourselves under the influence of other circumstances. We are exactly as capable of making our own character, if we will, as others are of making it for us. ”