own respectability, and prompts him, on comparing himself with others, to depreciate them, in order to raise himself in the scale of comparative excellence. It is a chief element in the disposition to censoriousness and envy. Persons who are fond of discussing the characters of others, and feel the tendency to vituperate rather than to praise them, will be found to have this organ large. It is the comparison with self, and a secret satisfaction at fancied superiority, that gives pleasure in this practice. Envy is the result of Self-Esteem and Love of Approbation, offended by the excellencies of others, and calling up Destructiveness to hate them. To make way for this effect, however, Benevolence and Conscientiousness must be deficient.

When Self-Esteem predominates, it gives an intense feeling of egotism; and the individual in his discourse, is then prone to use the emphatic I: "I did this, I said the other thing." The faculty then gives a solemn gravity to the manners, an authoritative commanding tone to the voice, and a kind of oracular turn to the mind, which frequently shews itself in the most ludicrous manner. COBBETT's whole life and writings indicate an excessively active Self-Esteem, aided by Combativeness; and he has maintained, at different times, every variety of opinion that could enter the human imagination, and upon every point of his changeful creed he has dogmatized with more than oracular infallibility. Madame de STAEL describes most graphically another illustrious example of the effects of an inordinate Self-Esteem, even on a powerful mind. Speaking of one of the heroes of the Revolution, she says that he possessed considerable talents, "mais au lieu de travailler il s'etonnoit de lui même." Some individuals manifest a solemn good-natured patronizing tendency towards others, indicated in discourse by epithets such as "my good sir," "my good fellow," and the like. This arises from Self-Esteem and Benevolence both large.

Another effect of a predominating Self-Esteem, is to render the individual extremely well satisfied with whatever be

longs to himself. An eminent phrenologist sailed as a passenger from the Clyde to a foreign port, in a vessel commanded by a person in whose head this organ was very largely developed, and saw many striking manifestations of it on the voyage. The captain said, that he thought nothing of the vessel when he first saw her, but after commanding her for a while, he thought her the first ship belonging to the Clyde. This was evidently because she had become his vessel. On his voyage, he assumed the most dictatorial airs; told the passengers he would send them before the mast, that he was sole commander here, and that all must obey; spoke habitually of himself, and seemed to have an insatiable appetite for power. He possessed little reflection, and was deficient in Conscientious

ness.

Under the influence of this faculty, some authors appear, in their compositions, to fall instinctively and unconsciously into excessive use of pronouns of the first person. The following example is taken from the works of an esteemed philosopher: "When I first ventured to appear before the public as an author, I resolved that nothing should ever induce me to enter into any controversy in defence of my conclusions, but to leave them to stand or to fall by their own evidence. From the plan of inductive investigation which I was conscious of having steadily followed, as far as I was able, I knew that whatever mistakes might be detected in the execution of my design, no such fatal consequences were to be dreaded to my general undertaking, as might have been justly apprehended, had I presented to the world a connected system, founded on gratuitous hypothesis, or on arbitrary definitions. The detections, on the contrary, of my occasional errors, would, I flattered myself, from the invariable consistency and harmony of truth, throw new lights on those inquiries which I had conducted with greater success; as the correction of a trifling mistatement in an authentic history is often found, by completing an imperfect link, or reconciling a seeming contradiction, to dispel

the doubts which hung over the more faithful and accurate details of the narrative.

"In this hope I was fortified by the following sentence of Lord BACON, which I thought I might apply to myself, without incurring the charge of presumption: 'Nos autem, si qua in re vel male credidimus, vel obdormivimus et minus attendimus vel defecimus in via et inquisitionem abru, pimus, nihilo minus IIS MODIS RES NUDAS ET Apertas exHIBEMUS, ut errores nostri notari et separari possint; atque etiam, ut facilis et expedita sit laborum nostrorum continuatio.'

"As this indifference, however, about the fate of my particular doctrines, arose from a deep rooted conviction, both of the importance of my subject, and of the soundness of my plan, it was impossible for me to be insensible to such criticisms as were directed against either of these two fundamental assumptions. Some criticisms of this description I had, from the first, anticipated; and I would not have failed to obviate them in the introduction to my former work, if I had not been afraid to expose myself to the imputation of prolixity, by conjuring up objections for the purpose of refuting them," &c.

Another amusing instance of a similar style of writing will be found in an account of himself by "FLECHIER EVEQUE de NISMES," prefixed to an edition of his "Oraisons Funebres," printed at Paris in 1802. I infer this to arise from a great endowment of Self-Esteem. A plate of the author last named is prefixed to his work, in which a strong expression of Self-Esteem appears depicted on his countenance. The portraits of GIBBON also indicate this expression in a remarkable degree. By pointing out this tendency of the faculty, those in whom the organ is large will be put upon their guard to avoid this ludicrous form of its manifestation.

The feeling of individual personality has been supposed by some phrenologists to arise from this faculty; and they have been led to this conjecture, by the undoubted fact, that the prominence which the first person assumes in the

mind, bears a proportion to the size of the organ of SelfEsteem.

The

Self-Esteem is an ingredient in the love of uniques. high value attached by some persons to objects which no other person can possess, seems resolvable to a great extent into gratification of this feeling. In possessing the article they enjoy a superiority over the whole world, and the consciousness of this confers a high value on it in their estimation.

This faculty is one element in the love of dominion and power. It is large in the busts of AUGUSTUS CÆSAR and of BONAPARTE; and I have observed that those individuals who, in private life, aspire most eagerly to office, and who are most delighted with the possession of a little brief authority, generally have a large Self-Esteem. From the same cause, viz. that this faculty produces the love of power, it happens that those who are most violent in their opposition to persons in authority, generally possess the same organ also fully developed. In short, when two individuals equally thirst for dominion, and when the one can rule only by the other obeying, it is easy to perceive that the subject will, in such a case, manifest little satisfaction under the yoke, and that his very love of authority will make him the most determined opponent of it in others.

Nations differ with regard to the degree in which they possess this organ. It is large in the Hindoos, and the English have more of it than the French; hence the manner of a genuine Frenchman appears to an Englishman to be fawning and undignified; while the manner of an Englishman appears to the French cold, haughty, and supercilious. The great Self-Esteem of the English, and their consequent instinctive aversion to all stretches of power, are probably causes of their political liberty. Dr ADAM FERGUSON has recognised the operation of this sentiment in maintaining their freedom. Alluding to the habeas corpus act, he remarks, "that it requires a fabric no less than the whole political constitution of Great Britain,

a spirit no less than the refractory and turbulent zeal of this fortunate people, to secure its effects *."

Self-Esteem, when eminently powerful, and not combined with the higher sentiments equally strong, causes the individual to carry his head high and reclining backwards. It gives a cold and repulsive expression to the manners, and it is in an especial degree offensive to other individuals largely endowed with the same faculty.

Dr REID and Mr STEWART treat of this sentiment under the designation of the Desire of Power. Dr THOMAS BROWN calls it " pride," and defines it as "That feeling of vivid pleasure which attends the consciousness of our excellence +." Dr BROWN views the desire of power as a separate principle; but the sentiment is the same as the one which we name Self-Esteem; and the latter appears to me to be the primitive emotion, which is felt and manifested as the fundamental function of the organ; whereas, the desire of power is a direction of the faculty in a particular way, resulting from a combination with Love of Approbation, and depending on external situation. It is quite conceivable, that a private individual, removed from all means of acquiring authority in public, may be very proud, and manifest little of the appetite for dominion, except over those of his household; but I do not conceive, that any one could be found fired with an insatiable ambition for situations of command, in whom Self-Esteem is defective, or even moderate in size; so that there appears no adequate ground for assuming pride as one primitive sentiment, and the love of power as another and distinct original desire.

In treating of Acquisitiveness, I mentioned, that the practical effects of that faculty were much modified by the endowment of Self-Esteem, with which it happened to be combined, selfishness being greatly increased by the combination of both in a full degree of development. Mr STEWART approaches close to the same doctrine, when he observes, that" the idea of power is, partly at least, the • History of Civil Society, part iii. sect. 6. + Vol. iii. p. 300.