Deseret evening news. [volume] (Great Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1867-1920, 1909-05-22
Nervous Children Of
This / wentieth Century

n - 4 4
to speak it out, and he is domlneered
over. at least in appearance, by peo-
pie who below loudly enough, unless,
as sometimes happens, he thinks best
to run away from them. And he shuts
UP only tighter when there are capt.
tai reasons for his being gay or sad.
Great joys, like great woes. leave him
silent: he is merry or woebegone a.
week after. Don't try to force his
door; he defends it, becoming aggres-
sfve. His windows close automatically,
and he is angered If you try to peep
through.
And he has a heart for intimacies,
for he is emotional and easily fatigued.
Being emotional he is in terror of peo-
pie he doesn't know What Philistines
mistake for haughtiness and GOODNESS
Is only the reserve of a timid spirit. If
he seems cold. 1t is because he represses
every outburst Of feeling out of fear lest
people rnisconceive him. If he has an
air of severity, 1t is only because that
is the attitude of a pent-up sensibiity.
{, soul that is "elsewhere' To be some
where else--is not this the dream OF
every sensitive nature prisoned among
the ugllnesses of the world And be-
cause easily fatigued, he is 'serious;"
he lacks the strength to be merry. He
must rest before he can be in high
spirits: for are not high spirits tax
upon vitality? He Is not rich enough
in Individual energy to let loose his
joy. Sometimes he has fits of volun-
tary jolity that amaze and alarm his
elders, for they seem forced; these arc
the jollities Of grimace. child too
serious is weary child. To cheap
and wholesale COMPREHENSIVE, he in
5stinctlYely prefers the company of sym
pathetic frlends--those who feel and
suffer as he himself does.
gCONTRARITIEs, OF THE SENSITIVE.
He is timid-sometimes more so,
sometimes less, Occasionally his timid-
ity amounts to q savage misanthropy.
He is timid with his parents, his
friends, his comrades, and yet. under
a strong impulse or with strangers, as
dauntless as messenger boy; timid
with two or three companions, he loses
all fear when confronting five hundred
people.
And this sensitive child has passions.
though neither very strong nor very
lasting. He has emotions at once sud-
den and violent, but the passion that is
like torrent that constantly digs its
bed deeper and deeper is not for him
such, for instance, as the passion for
gaming, or for the chase. or for war
or for religion. or for politics. He may
show signs of such, but the passion
changes. HODDy succeeds. hObDV. he
is by instinct dilettante. Yet he is
always tremendously in earnest. a
paradox, likewise a fact. But who will
believe 1t? The world understands and
loves only those who seem self-consist-
entail of a piece.
He loves religion-to begin with-and
readily becomes mystic. Later he
will love poetry. II he has gift for
expression. he will discharge in verse
or prose the subtleness of his active
and melancholy spirit He worships all
that Is vague and without precise form.
That is why he takes to philosophy, to
distractions rather than to the con-
crete: he likes to generalze. and his
knowledge Is always broader than 1t Is
deep One day he will learn his les
sons magnihcently the next day eS-
,ecrnbly This denotes an inequality of
nervous tension, which parents and
teachers will not pass over lightly-if
over pedagogy becomes scientific. And
it is for the same reason that he rarely
finishes what he has begun. He is in
complete and always falls short of do
ing himself Justice. He spends his
youth and perhaps his life in not doing
what he wants to do-in not doing it
because he lacked the courage. So he
has stronger regrets than desires. And
yet he has tirmness. tenacity. and con-
Hnuity in his ideas for the future. It
is to the present thft he fails to adapt
himself; II is the present that he fails
to make Immediate use or
+ 1t cannot be said that he has no Will