THE SPRINGS OP CHARACTER. 33 



enlarge on or labour this subject further, but it is suflScient 

 for us to see how, in varying degrees, professional influences 

 alter the man himself. 



Let me say a word about the surroundings of character. 

 One character acts upon another to an immense extent. 

 A remarkable sentence, that 1 have never since forgotten, 

 dropped on my ears on attending a little village church 

 some years ago. Just as I was falling asleep in an old 

 worm-eaten pew, and the clergyman was reading an old 

 sermon, by the light of a tallow candle, he said, " Never 

 forget, that the mind casts a shadow just Hke the body." 



It is thus we influence others unconsciously for good 

 or for evil. In fact, character is just like that mysterious 

 substance in the body known as a ferment. We have, all 

 our lives (after six months old), a ferment in the mouth 

 which has the power of changing the starch in our food, 

 which is indigestible, into sugar, which is chgestible. This 

 ferment clianges, by virtue of its presence simply, the 

 one into the other. In the same way our characters are 

 potent as ferments, and it is well when they can change 

 the starch in others into sugar. There are characters that 

 are health- giving ; there are characters that are nothing less 

 than moral ozone, who do good to everyone who breathes 

 their influence ; and there are characters that are not less 

 poisonous and infectious than sewer gas. With regard to 

 unconscious influence IMaeterlinck says, " In silent company 

 Avith another, the character is often deeply formed ; and a 

 truth, which cannot be even taught in words, may be learned 

 in silence." 



Secondly, with regard to ideals, or what is before the 

 mind as forming fresh sj^rings of character. Introspection, 

 as a former of character, is no good. We never benefit any 

 characters by taking a piece off here and putting a piece 

 on there. To continually explore the character by forced 

 introspection is as injurious as having an arc light burning 

 all night in one's bed room. It is intended that we should 

 have darkness at night, in order that the brain should rest, 

 and if we turn night into day literally, or figuratively by 

 prying into the unconscious recesses of the mind, we produce 

 troubles. Close introspection, therefore, will not benefit our 

 characters. The pursuit of a noble ideal turns the eye 

 outward, and not inward. 



These ideals vary from the highest to the lowest. 1 

 believe there exist some who absolutely say, " Evil, be thou 



D 



