All character is personal, determined by some force that blends the
qualities into a special personality. The same apparent qualities
unite into the most various results. It is like the delicate
manufacture of mosaics. The skilful workers of Rome or Venice put in
the same ingredients in nature and amount, and the composition comes
out at one time dull and muddy and at another time perfectly clear and
lustrous. Some subtle difference in the mixture of the constituents
or in the condition of the atmosphere or in the heat of the furnace
alters the whole result. So out of life we may say in its various
minglings there come various products in character, either humility or
thankfulness or contentment or self-respect, from some failure of the
qualities to meet in perfect union, from some fault in the shape or
misregulation of the temperature of the human furnace in which they
are fused, this degenerate and confused result of pride which yet
is often so near to, that we can see how it was only some slightest
cause, some stray and unguarded draft across the surface that hindered
it from being, one of the clear and lustrous combinations of the same
material.
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