noticing. Once locked up in this vicious circle, we seem destined to
be prisoners forever. That is what constitutes the anguish of the
situation. The most tyrannical of jailers--one's self--is over us, and
from his bondage we are powerless to escape. The trouble is by no
means peculiar to our time, though probably commoner forty years ago
than at any other period of the world's history. But it had already
attracted the attention of Shakespeare, who bases on it one of his
greatest plays. When Hamlet would act, self-consciousness stands in
his way. The hindering process is described in the famous soliloquy
with astonishing precision and vividness, if only we substitute our
modern term "self-consciousness" for that which was its ancient
equivalent:--

"Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought;
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action."

And such is our experience. We, too, have purposed all manner of
important and serviceable acts; but just as we were setting them in
execution, consideration fell upon us. We asked whether it was the
proper moment, whether he to whom it was to be done was really needy,
or were we the fit doer, or should it be done in this way or that. We
hesitated, and the moment was gone. Self-consciousness had again
demonstrated its incompetence for superintending a task. Many of us,
far from regarding self-consciousness as a ground of goodness, are
disposed to look upon it as a curse.