ORDINARY GENERAL MEETING.^ 

 Professor Edward Hull, LL.D., F.R.S., in the Chair. 



The Minutes of the last Meetino- were read and confirmed and the 

 following paper was read by the author : — 



ON THE SPRINGS OF CHARACTER. By Alfred T. 

 SCHOFIELD, Esq., M.D., M.R.C.S.E. 



IN offering a few remarks upon the springs of character, 

 it will be well to clear the ground Hrst by a brief 

 consideration of character itself. The first question is, 

 What is character? Character etymologically is the mark 

 of the brick-maker on the Bab}' Ionian brick, by which 

 it is recognised as liis oAvn. In the same way character 

 may be defined as the shape that the mind becomes by use, 

 just as a glove or shoe — perhaps at first exactly like 

 thousands of others — becomes individually specialized by 

 the shape of my hand or foot by wear. This gives a 

 fairly good idea of character in one of its aspects. It 

 may be defined as the eiKoiv of the e<yw, or likeness of 

 the self — the psychic likeness, exactly as the body is the 

 physical likeness. The physical impress of my being is in 

 what meets the eye in the body generally — the psychical 

 impress of my being consisting of my mental attributes, and 

 the amount that is seen of the character I possess. 



Character has its home in the unconscious region of the 

 mind and it is only by an effort of introspection, more or 

 less difficidt, that we can even partially discern our own 

 characters. 



In saying this I must just make one observation on mind 

 in general. I regard mind as never being wholly in con- 

 sciousness, or within the range of what may be called our 



* March 19th, 1900. 



