710 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



national vanity. Along with too little, there goes an insufficient ten- 

 dency to maintain national claims leading to trespasses by other na- 

 tions ; and there goes an undervaluing of national capacity and insti- 

 tutions, which is discouraging to effort and progress. 



The effects of patriotic feeling which here concern us, are those it 

 works on belief rather than those it works on conduct. As dispropor- 

 tionate egoism, by distorting a man's conceptions of self and of others, 

 vitiates his conclusions respecting human nature and human actions ; 

 so disproportionate patriotism, by distorting his conceptions of his 

 own society and of other societies, vitiates the conclusions respecting 

 the natures and actions of societies. And from the opposite extremes 

 there result opposite distortions : which, however, are comparatively 

 infrequent and much less detrimental. 



Here we come upon one of the many ways in which the corporate 

 conscience proves itself less developed than the individual conscience. 

 For, while excess of egoism is everywhere regarded as a fault, excess 

 of patriotism is nowhere regarded as a fault. A man who recognizes 

 his own errors of conduct and his own deficiencies of faculty, shows a 

 trait of character considered praiseworthy ; but to admit that our 

 doings toward other nations have been wrong is reprobated as un- 

 patriotic. Defending the acts of another people with whom we have 

 a difference, seems to most citizens Something like treason ; and they 

 use offensive comparisons concerning birds and their nests, by way of 

 condemning those who ascribe misconduct to our own people rather 

 than to the people with whom we are at variance. Not only do they 

 exhibit the unchecked sway of this reflex egoism which constitutes 

 patriotism not only are they unconscious that there is any thing 

 blameworthy in giving the rein to this feeling; but they think the 

 blameworthiness is in those who restrain it, and try to see what may 

 be said on both sides. Judge, then, how seriously the patriotic bias, 

 thus perverting our judgments about international actions, necessarily 

 perverts our judgments about the characters of other societies, and so 

 vitiates sociological conclusions. 



We have to guard ourselves against this bias. To this end let us 

 take some examples of the errors attributable to it. 







What mistaken estimates of other races may result from over- 

 estimation of one's own race, will be most vividly shown by a case in 

 which we are ourselves valued at a very low rate by a race we hold 

 to be far inferior to us. Here is an instance supplied by a tribe of 

 negroes : 



"They amused themselves by remarking on the sly, 'The white man is an 

 old ape.' The African will say of the European, ' He looks like folks ' (men), 

 and the answer will often be, 'No, he don't.' .... While the Caucasian doubts 

 the humanity of the Hamite, the latter repays the compliment in kind." 1 



1 Burton's " Abeokuta," vol. ii., pp. 43, 44. 



