Читать книгу How to Analyze People on Sight - Elsie Lincoln Benedict - Страница 2
ОглавлениеModern science has proved that the fundamental traits of every
individual are indelibly stamped in the shape of his body, head, face
and hands--an X-ray by which you can read the characteristics of any
person on sight.
The most essential thing in the world to any individual is to understand
_himself_. The next is to understand the other fellow. For life is
largely a problem of running your own car as it was built to be run,
plus getting along with the other drivers on the highway.
From this book you are going to learn which type of car you are and the
main reasons why you have not been getting the maximum of service out of
yourself.
Also you are going to learn the makes of other human cars, and how to
get the maximum of co-operation out of them. This co-operation is vital
to happiness and success. We come in contact with our fellowman in all
the activities of our lives and what we get out of life depends, to an
astounding degree, on our relations with him.
Reaction to Environment
The greatest problem facing any organism is successful reaction to its
environment. Environment, speaking scientifically, is the sum total of
your experiences. In plain United States, this means fitting
vocationally, socially and maritally into the place where you are.
If you don't fit you must move or change your environment to fit _you_.
If you can't change the environment and you won't move you will become a
failure, just as tropical plants fail when transplanted to the Nevada
desert.
Learn From the Sagebrush
But there is something that grows and keeps on growing in the Nevada
desert--the sagebrush. It couldn't move away and it couldn't change its
waterless environment, so it did what you and I must do if we expect to
succeed. It adapted itself to its environment, and there it stands, each
little stalwart shrub a reminder of what even a plant can do when it
tries!
Moving Won't Help Much
Human life faces the same alternatives that confront all other forms
of life--of adapting itself to the conditions under which it must live
or becoming extinct. You have an advantage over the sagebrush in that
you can move from your city or state or country to another, but after
all that is not much of an advantage. For though you may improve your
situation slightly you will still find that in any civilized country the
main elements of your problem are the same.
Understand Yourself and Others
So long as you live in a civilized or thickly populated community you
will still need to understand your own nature and the natures of other
people. No matter what you desire of life, other people's aims,
ambitions and activities constitute vital obstructions along your
pathway. You will never get far without the co-operation, confidence and
comradeship of other men and women.
Primitive Problems
It was not always so. And its recentness in human history may account
for some of our blindness to this great fact.
In primitive times people saw each other rarely and had much less to do
with each other. The human element was then not the chief problem. Their
environmental problems had to do with such things as the elements,
violent storms, extremes of heat and cold, darkness, the ever-present
menace of wild beasts whose flesh was their food, yet who would eat them
first unless they were quick in brain and body.
Civilization's Changes
But all that is changed. Man has subjugated all other creatures and
now walks the earth its supreme sovereign. He has discovered and
invented and builded until now we live in skyscrapers, talk around the
world without wires and by pressing a button turn darkness into
daylight.
Causes of Failure
Yet with all our knowledge of the outside world ninety-nine lives out
of every hundred are comparative failures.
The reason is plain to every scientific investigator. We have failed
to study ourselves in relation to the great environmental problem of
today. The stage-setting has been changed but not the play. The game is
the same old game--you must adjust and adapt yourself to your
environment or it will destroy you.
Mastering His Own Environment
The cities of today _look_ different from the jungles of our ancestors
and we imagine that because the brain of man overcame the old menaces no
new ones have arisen to take their place. We no longer fear
extermination from cold. We turn on the heat. We are not afraid of the
vast oceans which held our primitive forebears in thrall, but pass
swiftly, safely and luxuriously over their surfaces. And soon we shall
be breakfasting in New York and dining the same evening in San
Francisco!
Facing New Enemies
But in building up this stupendous superstructure of modern
civilization man has brought into being a society so intricate and
complex that he now faces the new environmental problem of human
relationships.
The Modern Spider's Web
Today we depend for life's necessities almost wholly upon the
activities of others. The work of thousands of human hands and thousands
of human brains lies back of every meal you eat, every journey you take,
every book you read, every bed in which you sleep, every telephone
conversation, every telegram you receive, every garment you wear.
And this fellowman of ours has multiplied, since that dim distant dawn,
into almost two billion human beings, with at least one billion of them
after the very things you want, and not a tenth enough to go around!
Adapt or Die
Who will win? Nature answers for you. She has said with awful and
inexorable finality that, whether you are a blade of grass on the Nevada
desert or a man in the streets of London, you can win only as you adapt
yourself to your environment. Today our environmental problem consists
largely of the other fellow. Only those who learn to adapt themselves to
their fellows can win great or lasting rewards.
Externals Indicate Internal Nature
To do this it is necessary to better understand our neighbors--to
recognize that people differ from each other in their likes and
dislikes, traits, talents, tendencies and capabilities. The combination
of these makes each individual's nature. It is not difficult to
understand others for with each group of these traits there always goes
its corresponding physical makeup--the externals whereby the internal is
invariably indicated. This is true of every species on the globe and of
every subdivision within each species.
Significance of Size, Shape and Structure
All dogs belong to the same species but there is a great difference
between the "nature" of a St. Bernard and that of a terrier, just as
there is a decided difference between the natures of different human
beings. But in both instances the actions, reactions and habits of each
can be accurately anticipated on sight by the shape, size and structure
of the two creatures.
Differences in Breed
When a terrier comes into the room you instinctively draw away unless
you want to be jumped at and greeted effusively. But you make no such
movement to protect yourself from a St. Bernard because you read, on
sight, the different natures of these two from their external
appearance.
You know a rose, a violet, a sunflower and an orchid and what perfume
you are sure to find in each, by the same method. All are flowers and
all belong to the same species, just as all human beings belong to the
same species. But their respective size, shape and structure tell you in
advance and on sight what their respective characteristics are.
The same is true of all human beings. They differ in certain
fundamentals but always and invariably in accordance with their
differences in size, shape and structure.
The Instinct of Self-Preservation
The reason for this is plain. Goaded by the instinct of
self-preservation, man, like all other living things, has made heroic
efforts to meet the demands of his environment. He has been more
successful than any other creature and is, as a result, the most complex
organism on the earth. But his most baffling complexities resolve
themselves into comparatively simple terms once it is recognized that
each internal change brought about by his environment brought with it
the corresponding external mechanism without which he could not have
survived.
Interrelation of Body and Brain
So today we see man a highly evolved creature who not only acts but
thinks and feels. All these thoughts, feelings and emotions are
interrelated.
The body and the mind of man are so closely bound together that whatever
affects one affects the other. An instantaneous change of mind instantly
changes the muscles of the face. A violent thought instantly brings
violent bodily movements.
Movies and Face Muscles
The moving picture industry--said to be the third largest in the
world--is based largely on this interrelation. This industry would
become extinct if something were to happen to sever the connection
between external expressions and the internal nature of men and women.
Tells Fundamentals
How much do external characteristics tell about a man? They tell, with
amazing accuracy, all the basic, fundamental principal traits of his
nature. The size, shape and structure of a man's body tell more
important facts about his real self--what he thinks and what he
does--than the average mother ever knows about her own child.
Learning to Read
If this sounds impossible, if the seeming incongruity, multiplicity
and heterogeneity of human qualities have baffled you, remember that
this is exactly how the print in all books and newspapers baffled you
before you learned to read.
Not long ago I was reading stories aloud to a three-year old. She wanted
to "see the pictures," and when told there were none had to be shown the
book.
"What funny little marks!" she cried, pointing to the print. "How do you
get stories out of them?"
Printing looked to all of us at first just masses of meaningless little
marks.
But after a few days at school how things did begin to clear up! It
wasn't a jumble after all. There was something to it. It straightened
itself out until the funny little marks became significant. Each of them
had a meaning and the same meaning under all conditions. Through them
your whole outlook on life became deepened and broadened--all because
you learned the meaning of twenty-six little letters and their
combinations!
Reading People
Learning to read men and women is a more delightful process than
learning to read books, for every person you see is a true story, more
romantic and absorbing than any ever bound in covers.
Learning to read people is also a simpler process than learning to read
books because there are fewer letters in the human alphabet. Though man
seems to the untrained eye a mystifying mass of "funny little marks," he
is not now difficult to analyze.
Only a Few Feelings
This is because there are after all but a few kinds of human feelings.
Some form of hunger, love, hate, fear, hope or ambition gives rise to
every human emotion and every human thought.
Thoughts Bring Actions
Now our actions follow our thoughts. Every thought, however
transitory, causes muscular action, which leaves its trace in that part
of the physical organism which is most closely allied to it.
Physiology and Psychology Interwoven
Look into the mirror the next time you are angry, happy, surprised,
tired or sorrowful and note the changes wrought by your emotions in your
facial muscles.
Constant repetition of the same kinds of thoughts or emotions finally
makes permanent changes in that part of the body which is
physiologically related to these mental processes.
The Evolution of the Jaw
The jaw is a good illustration of this alliance between the mind and
the body. Its muscles and bones are so closely allied to the pugnacity
instinct center in the brain that the slightest thought of combat causes
the jaw muscles to stiffen. Let the thought of any actual physical
encounter go through your mind and your jaw bone will automatically move
upward and outward.
After a lifetime of combat, whether by fists or words, the jaw sets
permanently a little more upward and outward--a little more like that of
the bulldog. It keeps to this combative mold, "because," says Mother
Nature, the great efficiency expert, "if you are going to call on me
constantly to stiffen that jaw I'll fix it so it will stay that way and
save myself the trouble."
Inheritance of Acquired Traits
Thus the more combative jaw, having become permanent in the man's
organism, can be passed on to his children.
Right here comes a most interesting law and one that has made possible
the science of Human Analysis:
Law of Size
_The larger any part or organ the better its equipment for carrying
out the work of that organ and the more does it tend to express itself._
Nature IS an efficiency expert and doesn't give you an oversupply of
anything without demanding that you use it.
Jaws Becoming Smaller
Our ancestors developed massive jaws as a result of constant combat.
As fast as civilization decreased the necessity for combat Nature
decreased the size of the average human jaw.
Meaning of the Big Jaw
But wherever you see a large protruding jaw you see an individual
"armed and engined," as Kipling says, for some kind of fighting. The
large jaw always goes with a combative nature, whether it is found on a
man or a woman, a child, a pugilist or a minister.
Exhibit A--The Irishman
The large jaw, therefore, is seen to be both a result and a cause of
certain things. As the inheritance of a fighting ancestor it is the
result of millions of years of fighting in prehistoric times, and, like
any other over-developed part or organ, it has an intense urge to
express itself. This inherent urge is what makes the owner of that jaw
"fight at the drop of the hat," and often have "a chip on his shoulder."
Natural Selection
Thus, because every external characteristic is the result of natural
laws, and chiefly of natural selection, the vital traits of any creature
can be read from his externals. Every student of biology, anatomy,
anthropology, ethnology or psychology is familiar with these facts.
Built to Fit
Man's organism has developed, altered, improved and evolved "down
through the slow revolving years" with one instinctive aim--successful
reaction to its environment. Every part has been laboriously constructed
to that sole end. Because of this its functions are marked as clearly
upon it as those of a grain elevator, a steamship or a piano.
Survival of the Fittest
Nature has no accidents, she wastes no material and everything has a
purpose. If you put up a good fight to live she will usually come to
your rescue and give you enough of whatever is needed to tide you over.
If you don't, she says you are not fit to people the earth and lets you
go without a pang. Thus she weeds out all but the strong--and evolution
marches on.
Causes of Racial Characteristics
This inherent potentiality for altering the organism to meet the
demands of the environment is especially noticeable in races and is the
reason for most racial differences.
Differences in environment--climate, altitude and topography
necessitated most of these physical differentiations which today enable
us to know at a glance whether a man belongs to the white race, the
yellow race, or the black race. The results of these differentiations
and modifications will be told in the various chapters of this book.
Types Earlier than Races
The student of Human Analysis reads the disposition and nature of
every individual with ease regardless of whether that individual be an
American, a Frenchman, a Kaffir or a Chinaman, because Human Analysis
explains those fundamental traits which run through every race, color
and nationality, according to the externals which always go with those
traits.
Five Biological Types
_Human Analysis differs from every other system of character analysis
in that it classifies man, for the first time, into five types according
to his biological evolution._
It deals with man in the light of the most recent scientific
discoveries. It estimates each individual according to his "human"
qualities rather than his "character" or so-called "moral" qualities. In
other words, it takes his measure as a human being and determines from
his externals his chances for success in the world of today.
These Rules Work
Every rule in this book is based on scientific data, has been proved
to be accurate by investigations and surveys of all kinds of people in
all parts of the world.
These rules do not work merely _part_ of the time. They work _all_ the
time, under all conditions and apply to every individual of every race,
every color, every country, every community and every family.
Through this latest human science you can learn to read people as easily
as you read books--if you will take the little time and pains to learn
the rules which compose your working alphabet.
Do What We Want to Do
It is easy to know what an individual will do under most circumstances
because every human being does what he _wants_ to do in the _way_ he
prefers to do it _most_ of the time. If you doubt it try this test:
bring to mind any intimate friends, or even that husband or wife, and
note how few changes they have made in their way of doing things in
twenty years!
Preferences Inborn
Every human being is born with preferences and predilections which
manifest themselves from earliest childhood to death. These inborn
tendencies are never obliterated and seldom controlled to any great
extent, and then only by individuals who have learned the power of the
mind over the body. Inasmuch as this knowledge is possessed by only a
few, most of the people of the earth are blindly following the dictates
of their inborn leanings.
Follow Our Bents
In other words, more than ninety-nine per cent of all the people you
know are following their natural bents in reacting to all their
experiences--from the most trivial incidents to the most far-reaching
emergencies.
"Took It" From Grandmother
The individual is seldom conscious of these habitual acts of his, much
less of where he got them. The nearest he comes is to say he "got it
from his father" or "she takes it from grandmother." But where did
grandmother get it?
Man No Mystery
Science has taken the trouble to investigate and today we know not only
where grandmother got it but what she did with it. She got it along with
her size, shape and structure--in other words, from her type--and she did
just what you and everybody else does with his type-characteristics. She
acted in accordance with her type just as a canary sings like a canary
instead of talking like a parrot, and just as a rose gives off rose
perfume instead of violet.
This law holds throughout every species and explains man--who likes to
think himself a deep mystery--as it explains every other creature.
The Hold of Habit
Look around you in shop, office, field or home and you will find that
the quick, alert, impulsive man is acting quickly, alertly and
impulsively most of the time. Nothing less than a calamity slows him
down and then only temporarily; while the slow, patient, mild and
passive individual is acting slowly, patiently, mildly and passively in
spite of all goads. Some overwhelming passion or crisis may speed him up
momentarily but as soon as it fades he reverts to his old slow habits.
Significance of Fat, Bone and Muscle
Human Analysis is the new science which shows you how to recognize the
slow man, the quick man, the stubborn man, the yielding man, the leader,
the learner, and all other basic kinds of men on sight from the shape,
size and structure of their bodies.
Certain bodily shapes indicate predispositions to fatness, leanness,
boniness, muscularity and nervousness, and this predisposition is so
much a part of the warp and woof of the individual that he can not
disguise it. The urge given him by this inborn mechanism is so strong as
to be practically irresistible. Every experience of his life calls
forth some kind of reaction and invariably the reaction will be
similar, in every vital respect, to the reactions of other people who
have bodies of the same general size, shape and structure as his own.
Succeed at What We Like
No person achieves success or happiness when compelled to do what he
naturally dislikes to do. Since these likes and dislikes stay with him
to the grave, one of the biggest modern problems is that of helping men
and women to discover and to capitalize their inborn traits.
Enthusiasm and Self-Expression
Every individual does best those things which permit him to act in
accordance with his natural bents. This explains why we like best those
things we do best. It takes real enthusiasm to make a success of any
undertaking for nothing less than enthusiasm can turn on a full current.
We struggle from the cradle to the grave for self-expression and
everything that pushes us in a direction opposed to our natural
tendencies is done half-heartedly, inefficiently and disgruntledly.
These are the steps that lead straight to failure. Yet failure can be
avoided and success approximated by every normal person if he will take
the same precaution with his own machinery that he takes with his
automobile.
Learn to Drive Your Car
If you were presented with a car by your ancestors--which is
precisely what happened to you at birth--you would not let an hour go by
without finding out what make or type of car it was. Before a week
elapsed you would have taken the time, labor and interest to learn how
to run it,--not merely any old way, but the _best_ way for that
particular make of car.
Five Makes of Human Cars
There are five makes or types of human cars, differing as definitely
in size, shape and structure as Fords differ from Pierce-Arrows. Each
human type differs as widely in its capacities, possibilities and
aptitudes as a Ford differs from a Pierce-Arrow. Like the Ford or Pierce
the externals indicate these functional differences with unfailing
accuracy. Furthermore just as a Ford never changes into a Pierce nor a
Pierce into a Ford, a human being never changes his type. He may modify
it, train it, polish it or control it somewhat, but he will never change
it.
Can Not be Deceived
The student of Human Analysis cannot be deceived as to the type of any
individual any more than you can be deceived about the make of a car.
One may "doll up" a Ford to his heart's content--remove the hood and top
and put on custom-made substitutes--it is still a Ford, always will be a
Ford and you can always detect that it is a Ford. It will do valuable,
necessary things but only those things it was designed to do and in its
own particular manner; nor could a Pierce act like a Ford.
Are You a Ford or a Pierce?
So it is with human cars. Maybe you have been awed by the jewels and
clothes with which many human Fords disguise themselves. The chances are
that you have overlooked a dozen Pierces this week because their paint
was rusty. Perchance you are a Pierce yourself, drawing a Ford salary
because you don't know you are a high-powered machine capable of making
ten times the speed you have been making on your highway of life.
Superficialities Sway Us
If so your mistake is only natural. The world classifies human beings
according to their superficialities. To the world a human motorcycle can
pass for a Rolls-Royce any day if sufficiently camouflaged with
diamonds, curls, French heels and plucked eyebrows.
Bicycles in Congress
In the same manner many a bicycle in human form gets elected to
Congress because he plays his machinery for all it is worth and gets a
hundred per cent service out of it. Every such person learned early in
life what kind of car he was and capitalized its natural tendencies.
Don't Judge by Veneer
Nothing is more unsafe than to attempt to judge the actual natures of
people by their clothes, houses, religious faith, political
affiliations, prejudices, dialect, etiquette or customs. These are only
the veneer laid on by upbringing, teachers, preachers, traditions and
other forces of suggestion, and it is a veneer so thin that trifles
scratch it off.
The Real Always There
But the real individual is always there, filled with the tendencies of
his type, bending always toward them, constantly seeking opportunities
to run as he was built to run, forever striving toward self-expression.
It is this ever-active urge which causes him to revert, in the manifold
activities of everyday life, to the methods, manners and peculiarities
common to his type.
This means that unless he gets into an environment, a vocation and a
marriage which permits of his doing what he _wants_ to do he will be
miserable, inefficient, unsuccessful and sometimes criminal.
Causes of Crime
That this is the true explanation of crime has been recognized for
many years by leading thinkers. Two prison wardens--Thomas Tynan of
Colorado and Thomas Mott Osborne of Sing Sing--effectively initiated
penal reforms based upon it.
Every crime, like every personal problem, arises from some kind of
situation wherein instinct is thwarted by outside influence.
Human Analysis teaches you to recognize, on sight, the predominant
instincts of any individual--in brief, what that individual is inclined
to do under all the general situations of his life. You know what the
world tries to compel him to do. If the discrepancy between these two is
beyond the reach of his type he refuses to do what society demands.
This and this only is back of every human digression from indiscretion
to murder.
It is as vain to expect to eradicate these inborn trends and put others
in their places as to make a sewing machine out of an airplane or an oak
out of a pine. The most man can do for his neighbor is to understand and
inspire him. The most he can do for himself is to understand and
organize his inborn capacities.
Find Your Own Type
The first problem of your happiness is to find out what type you are
yourself--which you will know after reading this book--and to build your
future accordingly.
Knowing and Helping Others
The second is to learn how to analyze others to the end that your
relationships with them may be harmonious and mutually advantageous.
Take every individual according to the way he was born, accept him as
that kind of mechanism and deal with him in the manner befitting that
mechanism. In this way and this only will you be able to impress or to
help others.
In this way only will you be able to achieve real success. In this way
only will you be able to help your fellowman find the work, the
environment and the marriage wherein he can be happy and successful.
The Four C's
To get the maximum of pleasure and knowledge out of this interesting
course there are four things to remember as _your_ part of the contract.
Read CONCENTRATEDLY
Think of _what_ you are reading _while_ you are reading it.
Concentration is a very simple thing. The next C is
Observe CAREFULLY
Look at people carefully (but not starefully) when analyzing them.
Don't jump at conclusions. We humans have a great way of twisting facts
to fit our conclusion as soon as we have made one. But don't spend all
your time getting ready to decide and forget to decide at all, like the
man who was going to jump a ditch. He ran so far back to get a good
start each time that he never had the strength to jump when he got
there. Get a good start by observing carefully. Then
Decide CONFIDENTLY
Be sure you are right and then go ahead. Make a decision and make it
with the confidence that you are right. If you will determine now to
follow this rule it will compel you to follow the first two because, in
order to be sure you are right, to be certain you are not misjudging
anybody, you will read each rule concentratedly and observe each person
carefully beforehand.
Practise CONSTANTLY
"Practice makes perfect." Take this for your motto if you would become
expert in analyzing people. It is one easily followed for you come in
contact with people everywhere--at home, amongst your business
associates, with your friends and on the street. Remember you can only
benefit from a thing as you use it. A car that you never took out of the
garage would be of no value to you. So get full value out of this course
by using it at all times.
These Rules Your Tools
These rules are scientific. They are true and they are true always.
They are very valuable tools for the furtherance of your progress
through life.
An understanding of people is the greatest weapon you can possess.
Therefore these are the most precious tools you can own. But like every
tool in the world and all knowledge in the world, they must be used as
they were built to be used or you will get little service out of them.
You would not expect to run a car properly without paying the closest
attention to the rules for clutches, brakes, starters and gears.
Everything scientific is based not on guesses but laws. This course in
Analyzing People on Sight is as scientific as the automobile. It will
carry you far and do it easily if you will do your part. Your part
consists of learning the few simple rules laid down in this book and in
applying them in the everyday affairs of your life.
Fewer and Truer
Many things which have been found to be true in almost every instance
could have been included in this course. But we prefer to make fewer
statements and have those of bedrock certainty. Therefore this course,
like all our courses, consists exclusively of those facts which have
been found to be true in every particular of people in normal health.
IMPORTANT
The Five Extremes
This book deals with PURE or UNMIXED types only. When you understand
these, the significance of their several combinations as seen in
everyday life will be clear to you.
The Human Alphabet
Just as you can not understand the meaning of a word until you know
the letters that go into the makeup of that word, you cannot analyze
people accurately until you get these five extreme types firmly in your
mind, for they are your alphabet.
Founded in Five Biological Systems
Each PURE type is the result of the over-development of one of the
five biological systems possessed by all human beings--the nutritive,
circulatory, muscular, bony or nervous.
Therefore every individual exhibits to some degree the characteristics
of all the five types.
The Secret of Individuality
But his PREDOMINANT traits and INDIVIDUALITY--the things that make him
the KIND of man he is--agree infallibly with whichever one of the five
systems PREDOMINATES in him.
Combinations Common in America
The average American man or woman is a COMBINATION of some two of
these types with a third discernible in the background.
To Analyze People
To understand human beings familiarize yourself first with the PURE or
UNMIXED types and then it will be easy and fascinating to spell out
their combinations and what they mean in the people all about you.
Postpone Combinations
Until you have learned these pure types thoroughly it will be to your
advantage to forget that there is such a thing as combinations. After
you have these extreme types well in mind you will be ready to analyze
combinations.
The Five Types
Science has discovered that there are five types of human beings.
Discarding for a moment their technical names, they may be called the
fat people, the florid people, the muscular people, the bony people and
the mental people.
Each varies from the others in shape, size and structure and is
recognizable at a glance by his physique or build. This is because his
type is determined by the preponderance within his body of one of the
five great departments or biological systems--the nutritive, the
circulatory, the muscular, the bony or the nervous.
At Birth
Every child is born with one of these systems more highly developed,
larger and better equipped than the others.
Type Never Disappears
Throughout his life this system will express itself more, be more
intense and constant in its functioning than the others and no manner of
training, education, environment or experience, so long as he remains in
normal health, will alter the predominance of this system nor prevent
its dictating his likes, dislikes and most of his reactions.
Effect of Eating
If you do not understand why the overaction of one bodily system
should influence a man's nature see if you can't recall more than one
occasion when a square meal made a decided difference in your
disposition within the space of thirty minutes.
If one good meal has the power to alter so completely our personalities
temporarily, is it then any wonder that constant overfeeding causes
everybody to love a fat man? For the fat man is habitually and
chronically in that beatific state which comes from over-eating.
