acquaintances to wander after strange gods, in the shape of new
ideals, higher standards of culture, or a perfected refinement of
surroundings.

We are perhaps wrong to pity complacent people. It is for another
class our sympathy should be kept; for those who cannot refrain
from doubting of themselves and the value of their work - those
unfortunate gifted and artistic spirits who descend too often the
VIA DOLOROSA of discontent and despair, who have a higher ideal
than their neighbors, and, in struggling after an unattainable
perfection, fall by the wayside.




CHAPTER 7 - The Discontent of Talent


THE complacency that buoys up self-sufficient souls, soothing them
with the illusion that they themselves, their towns, country,
language, and habits are above improvement, causing them to
shudder, as at a sacrilege, if any changes are suggested, is
fortunately limited to a class of stay-at-home nonentities. In
proportion as it is common among them, is it rare or delightfully
absent in any society of gifted or imaginative people.

Among our globe-trotting compatriots this defect is much less
general than in the older nations of the world, for the excellent
reason, that the moment a man travels or takes the trouble to know
people of different nationalities, his armor of complacency