A Man Surprised at His Originality

Among the many acute sayings of La Rochefoucauld, there is hardly one
more acute than this: "La plus grande ambition n'en a pas la moindre
apparence lorsqu'elle se rencontre dans une impossibilité absolue
d'arriver où elle aspire." Some of us might do well to use this hint in
our treatment of acquaintances and friends from whom we are expecting
gratitude because we are so very kind in thinking of them, inviting
them, and even listening to what they say--considering how insignificant
they must feel themselves to be. We are often fallaciously confident in
supposing that our friend's state of mind is appropriate to our moderate
estimate of his importance: almost as if we imagined the humble mollusc
(so useful as an illustration) to have a sense of his own exceeding
softness and low place in the scale of being. Your mollusc, on the
contrary, is inwardly objecting to every other grade of solid rather
than to himself. Accustomed to observe what we think an unwarrantable
conceit exhibiting itself in ridiculous pretensions and forwardness to
play the lion's part, in obvious self-complacency and loud
peremptoriness, we are not on the alert to detect the egoistic claims of
a more exorbitant kind often hidden under an apparent neutrality or an
acquiescence in being put out of the question.

Thoughts of this kind occurred to me yesterday when I saw the name of
Lentulus in the obituary. The majority of his acquaintances, I imagine,
have always thought of him as a man justly unpretending and as nobody's
rival; but some of them have perhaps been struck with surprise at his
reserve in praising the works of his contemporaries, and have now and
then felt themselves in need of a key to his remarks on men of celebrity
in various departments. He was a man of fair position, deriving his
income from a business in which he did nothing, at leisure to frequent
clubs and at ease in giving dinners; well-looking, polite, and generally
acceptable in society as a part of what we may call its bread-crumb--the
neutral basis needful for the plums and spice. Why, then, did he speak
of the modern Maro or the modern Flaccus with a peculiarity in his tone
of assent to other people's praise which might almost have led you to
suppose that the eminent poet had borrowed money of him and showed an
indisposition to repay? He had no criticism to offer, no sign of
objection more specific than a slight cough, a scarcely perceptible
pause before assenting, and an air of self-control in his utterance--as
if certain considerations had determined him not to inform against the
so-called poet, who to his knowledge was a mere versifier. If you had
questioned him closely, he would perhaps have confessed that he did
think something