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Show THE INCREASE OF FLATTERY. The Boomerui Element la Latter I? Personalities of Society. - Preoccupation with personality is certainly cer-tainly an American possibly more or less a generally modern tait; but cat present orgy of compliment is, I think, a new variant of it. And it cannot ba that we are becoming Frenchified to the point of social insincerity for the mere lake of moral perversity. The troth, probably is that as wo progress in social -ivilization or perhaps better, as social sivilization spreads increasingly and penetrates our bewildering and encouraging encour-aging succession of nonvelles conches tho donire to make one'a self agreeable, instead of merely important, is increaa-ing increaa-ing proportionately. ' 1 Now, amenity as an art ia a difficult one. To succeed in it demands either tho "certain felicity" which Bacon affirmed af-firmed to be necessary to the painter who would improve upon nature, or that long coarse of social cirilination whereby where-by tradition secures the sinking of effort ef-fort in unconsciousness, and the substitution substi-tution of inherited for acquired capacities. capaci-ties. In the absence of either of these advantages it is the shortest rather than t! wisest road to the end of being agree-auTe agree-auTe that is pretty sure to be taken, and tho grosso modo pursuit of, as I said, the line of least resistance results in an amount and degree of personal flattery it the present moment which axe altogether alto-gether notable. We have probably not yet wholly smancipated ourselves from the wish to be appreciated, as well as to bo agree-ible. agree-ible. On the contrary, when we praise our friends for their qnalities or their performances in the blank and stark way sanctioned no doubt by our unquestioned unques-tioned sincerity, but dictated perhaps by an imperfect taste, it is probable that with our motive f beiug agretbleia very subtly associated a desire to be deemed discerning. Wo act on the assumptionso as-sumptionso tacit, to bo sure, as to be unconscious that the fact of our appreciation appre-ciation of them attests to them acute ness in us. Our well known and universally uni-versally acknowledged genuineness, ... that heirloom inherited from thesavagJ of the Elbe and Wesor marshes prevents pre-vents our perspicacity in these circunv stances front being distrusted. Scrib-ner's. |