How to be happy though human / by W. Béran Wolfe.
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of the side-show. If you are in one of life’s side-shows you
have evaded the main arena and its activities. Something
there is in every human being—call it conscience, super¬
ego, inborn social-feeling, race unconscious, or what you
will- that pricks him when he evades his responsibilities
as a human being. It is the sting of this unconscious
realization of the fitness of things that prods the side-show
artist to over-act. Look round you and you will find that
men and women in the side-shows of life work very much
harder than performers in the main arena. A man with a
broken leg needs no excuse for not walking, but a man
who insists on walking on stilts when the rest of the world
is on foot is compelled to spend much of his time
explaining and excusing himself. True, he can look down
on the rest of mankind, and gain a subjective sense of
superiority, but in the last analysis he has assumed a
greater responsibility than the ordinary responsibility of
walking on the level with his fellow-men, and taking his
chances of being noticed and approved because of his
smile or his helpfulness.
The side-shows do not pay. That is the chief reason
why you should get out of them if you spend your time
excusing yourself for not being in the main rings. This is
no moral or categorical imperative. We do not arrogate
to ourselves any moral superiority when we urge a neurotic
to change his ways, to assume his responsibilities, and to
take his chances with the rest of mankind. Our advice is
the advice of a physician who has just returned from a
malaria-infested country, counselling a traveller departing
for that swampy country to immunize himself with
quinine. It is the imperative of hygiene, not of ethics or
morals. Most normal, sane men and women would rather
not have malaria, and will take our advice. If they do not
do so, they must be ignorant of the discomfort of malarial
infection, or insanely confident that a divine providence
will toughen their skin against the bites of voracious
mosquitoes.
This hygienic imperative is the imperative of common
sense, yet it is extremely difficult for many individuals