[243] Continuing my chronological survey of previous contributions to this interesting problem of psychological types, I now come to a small and rather odd work, my acquaintance with which I owe to my esteemed colleague Dr. Constance Long, of London: Character as Seen in Body and Parentage, by Furneaux Jordan, F.R.C.S.
[244] In this little book of one hundred and twenty-six pages, Jordan describes in the main two characterological types, the definition of which is of interest to us in more than one respect. Although—to anticipate slightly—the author is really concerned with only one half of our types, thinking and feeling, he nevertheless introduces the standpoint of the other half, the intuitive and sensation types, and blends the two together. I will first let the author speak for himself in his introductory definition:
There are two generic fundamental biases in character … two conspicuous types of character (with a third, an intermediate one) … one in which the tendency to action is extreme and the tendency to reflection slight, and another in which the proneness to reflection greatly predominates and the impulse for action is feebler. Between the two extremes are innumerable gradations; it is sufficient to point only to a third type … in which the powers of reflection and action tend to meet in more or less equal degree. … In an intermediate class may also be placed the characters which tend to eccentricity, or in which other possibly abnormal tendencies predominate over the emotional and non-emotional.1
[245] It is clear from this definition that Jordan contrasts reflection, or thinking, with action. It is readily understandable that an observer of men, not probing too deeply, would first be struck by the contrast between reflective and active natures, and would therefore tend to define the observed antithesis in those terms. The simple reflection, however, that activity is not necessarily the product of mere impulse, but can also proceed from thinking, would make it seem necessary to carry the definition a stage further. Jordan himself reaches this conclusion, for on page 6 he introduces a further element which for us has a particular value, the element of feeling. He states here that the active type is less passionate, while the reflective temperament is distinguished by its passionate feelings. Hence he calls his types the “less impassioned” and the “more impassioned.” Thus the element he overlooked in his introductory definition subsequently acquires the status of a fixed term. But what mainly distinguishes his conception from ours is that he makes the “less impassioned” type active and the “more impassioned” inactive.
[247] This combination seems to me unfortunate, since highly passionate and profound natures exist which at the same time are very energetic and active, and conversely, there are less passionate and superficial natures which are in no way distinguished by activity, not even by the low form of activity that consists in being busy. In my view, his otherwise valuable conception would have gained much in clarity if he had left the factors of activity and inactivity altogether out of account, as belonging to a quite different point of view, although in themselves they are important characterological determinants.
[246] It will be seen from the arguments which follow that the “less impassioned and more active” type describes the extravert, and the “more impassioned and less active” type the introvert. Either can be active or inactive without changing his type, and for this reason the factor of activity should, in my opinion, be ruled out as a main characteristic. As a determinant of secondary importance, however, it still plays a role, since the whole nature of the extravert appears more mobile, more full of life and activity than that of the introvert. But this quality entirely depends on the phase in which the individual momentarily finds himself vis-à-vis the external world. An introvert in an extraverted phase appears active, while an extravert in an introverted phase appears passive. Activity itself, as a fundamental trait of character, can sometimes be introverted; it is then all directed inwards, developing a lively activity of thought or feeling behind an outward mask of profound repose. Or else it can be extraverted, showing itself a vigorous action while behind the scenes there stands a firm unmoved thought or untroubled feeling.
[248] Before we examine Jordan’s arguments more closely, I must, for greater clarity, stress yet another point which, if not borne in mind, may give rise to confusion. I remarked at the beginning of this book that in my earlier publications I identified the introvert with the thinking and the extravert with the feeling type. As I have said before, it became clear to me only later that introversion and extraversion are to be distinguished as general basic attitudes from the function-types. These two attitudes may be recognized with the greatest ease, while it requires considerable experience to distinguish the function-type. At times it is uncommonly difficult to find out which function holds prior place. The fact that the introvert, because of his abstracting attitude, naturally has a reflective and contemplative air is misleading. One is inclined to assume that in him the primacy falls to thinking. The extravert, on the contrary, naturally displays many immediate reactions, which easily lead one to conjecture a predominance of feeling. These suppositions are deceptive, since the extravert may well be a thinking, and the introvert a feeling type. Jordan describes in general merely the introvert and the extravert. But, when he goes into details, his description becomes misleading, because traits of different function-types are blended together which a more thorough examination of the material would have kept apart. In its general outline, however, the picture of the introverted and extraverted attitudes is unmistakable, so that the nature of the two basic attitudes can plainly be discerned.
[249] The characterization of types in terms of affectivity seems to me the really important aspect of Jordan’s work. We have already seen that the reflective, contemplative nature of the introvert is compensated by a condition in which instinct and sensation are unconscious and archaic. We might even say this is just why he is introverted: he has to rise above his archaic, impulsive nature to the safe heights of abstraction in order to dominate from there his unruly and turbulent affects. This point of view is not at all wide of the mark in many cases. We might also say, conversely, that the affective life of the extravert, being less deeply rooted, lends itself more readily to differentiation and domestication than his unconscious, archaic thinking and feeling, and that this fantasy life of his can have a dangerous influence on his personality. Hence he is always the one who seeks life and experience as busily and abundantly as possible in order not to have to come to himself and face his evil thoughts and feelings. These observations, which can easily be verified, help to explain an otherwise paradoxical passage in Jordan, where he says (p. 6) that in the “less impassioned” (= extraverted) temperament the intellect predominates and has an unusually large share in the regulation of life, whereas in the “reflective” (= introverted) temperament it is affects that claim the greater importance.
[250] At first glance, this view would seem to fly in the face of my assertion that the “less impassioned” type corresponds to the extravert. But closer scrutiny proves that this is not so, since the reflective character, the introvert, though certainly trying to deal with his unruly affects, is in reality more influenced by his passions than the man whose life is consciously guided by desires oriented to objects. The latter, the extravert, tries to get away with this all the time, but is forced to experience how his subjective thoughts and feelings constantly stand in his way. He is far more influenced by his psychic inner world than he suspects. He cannot see it himself, but the people around him, if observant, will always detect the personal purpose in his striving. Hence his golden rule should always be to ask himself: “What am I really after? What is my secret intention?” The other, the introvert, with his conscious thought-out intentions, always overlooks what the people around him see only too clearly, that his intentions are really subservient to powerful impulses, lacking both aim and object, and are in a high degree influenced by them. The observer and critic of the extravert is liable to take the parade of thinking and feeling as a thin covering that only imperfectly conceals a cold and calculated personal aim. Whereas the man who tries to understand the introvert will readily conclude that vehement passions are only with difficulty held in check by apparent sophistries.
[251] Either judgment is both true and false. It is false when the conscious standpoint, or consciousness itself, is strong enough to offer resistance to the unconscious; but it is true when a weaker conscious standpoint encounters a strong unconscious and eventually has to give way to it. Then the motive that was kept in the background breaks through: in one case the egoistic aim, in the other the unsubdued passion, the elemental affect, that throws every consideration to the winds.
[252] These reflections enable us to discern Jordan’s mode of observation: he is evidently preoccupied with the affectivity of the observed type, hence his nomenclature: “less impassioned,” “more impassioned.” When, therefore, from the standpoint of affect, he conceives the introvert as the more impassioned, and the extravert as the less impassioned and even as the intellectual type, he displays a peculiar kind of discernment which one must describe as intuitive. I have already pointed out that Jordan blends the standpoint of the rational types with that of the “aesthetic” types.2 So when he characterizes the introvert as passionate and the extravert as intellectual he is obviously seeing the two types from the unconscious side, that is, he perceives them through the medium of his own unconscious. He observes and cognizes intuitively, and this must always be the case, more or less, with a practical observer of men.
[253] But however true and profound such an apprehension may sometimes be, it suffers from one very important limitation: it overlooks the living reality of the person observed, since it always judges him by his unconscious mirror-image instead of by his actual appearance. This error is inseparable from all intuition, and reason has always been at loggerheads with it on that account, only grudgingly admitting its right to exist despite the fact that in many cases the objective rightness of the intuition cannot be denied. Thus Jordan’s formulations accord on the whole with reality, though not with reality as it is understood by the rational types, but with the reality which for them is unconscious. Naturally these conditions are calculated to confuse all judgment of the observed and to make agreement about it all the more difficult. One should therefore not quarrel over the nomenclature but should stick exclusively to the observable differences. Although I, in accordance with my nature, express myself quite differently from Jordan, we are—allowing for certain divergences—nevertheless at one in our classification of the observed material.
[254] Before going on to discuss Jordan’s typology, I should like to return for a moment to the third or “intermediate” type which he postulates. Under this heading he includes on the one hand characters that are entirely balanced, and on the other those that are unbalanced or “eccentric.” It will not be superfluous to recall at this point the classification of the Valentinian school, according to which the hylic man is inferior to the psychic and the pneumatic man. The hylic man corresponds by definition to the sensation type, whose ruling determinants are supplied by the senses. The sensation type possesses neither differentiated thinking nor differentiated feeling, but his sensuousness is well developed. This, as we know, is also the case with the primitive. The instinctive sensuousness of the primitive has its counterpart in the spontaneity of his psychic processes: his mental products, his thoughts, just appear to him, as it were. It is not he who makes them or thinks them—he is not capable of that—they make themselves, they happen to him, they even confront him as hallucinations. Such a mentality must be termed intuitive, for intuition is the instinctive perception of an emergent psychic content. Although the principal psychological function of the primitive is as a rule sensation, the less conspicuous compensatory function is intuition. On the higher levels of civilization, where one man has thinking more more or less differentiated and another feeling, there are also quite a number who have developed intuition to a high degree and can employ it as the essentially determining function. From these we get the intuitive type. It is my belief, therefore, that Jordan’s intermediate group can be resolved into the sensation and intuitive types.
[255] As regards the general characterization of the two types, Jordan emphasizes (p. 17) that the more impassioned type includes far fewer prominent and striking personalities than the less impassioned. This assertion derives from the fact that Jordan identifies the active type with the less impassioned, which in my opinion is inadmissible. But if we discount this error, it is certainly true that the behaviour of the less impassioned or extraverted type makes him more conspicuous than the more impassioned or introverted type.
[256] We will first summarize the chief points in Jordan’s discussion of the introverted woman:
She has quiet manners, and a character not easy to read: she is occasionally critical, even sarcastic, but though bad temper is sometimes noticeable, she is not habitually fitful, or restless, or captious, or censorious, nor is she a “nagging” woman. She diffuses an atmosphere of repose, and unconsciously she consoles and heals, but under the surface emotions and passions lie dormant. Her emotional nature matures slowly. As she grows older the charm of her character increases. She is “sympathetic,” i.e., she brings insight and experience to bear on the problems of others. Yet the very worst characters are found among the more impassioned women. They are the cruellest stepmothers. They make most affectionate wives and mothers, but their passions and emotions are so strong that these frequently hold reason in subjection or carry it away with them. They love too much, but they also hate too much. Jealousy can make wild beasts of them. Stepchildren, if hated by them, may even be done to death. If evil is not in the ascendant, morality itself is associated with deep feeling, and may take a profoundly reasoned and independent course which will not always fit itself to conventional standards. It will not be an imitation or a submission; not a bid for a reward here or hereafter. It is only in intimate relations that the excellences and drawbacks of the impassioned woman are seen. Here she unfolds herself; here are her joys and sorrows, here her faults and weaknesses are seen, perhaps slowness to forgive, implacability, sullenness, anger, jealousy, or degraded uncontrolled passions. She is charmed with the moment, and less apt to think of the comfort and welfare of the absent. She is disposed to forget others and forget time. If she is affected, her affectation is less an imitation than a pronounced change of manners and speech with changing shades of thought and especially of feeling. In social life she tends to be the same in all circles. In both domestic and social life she is as a rule not difficult to please, she spontaneously appreciates, congratulates, and praises. She can soothe the mentally bruised and encourage the unsuccessful. She rises to the high and stoops to the low, she is the sister and playmate of all nature. Her judgment is mild and lenient. When she reads she tries to grasp the inmost thought and deepest feeling of the book; she reads and rereads the book, marks it freely, and turns down its corners.3
[257] From this description it is not difficult to recognize the introverted character. But it is, in a certain sense, one-sided, because the chief stress is laid on feeling, without considering the one characteristic to which I attach special value—the conscious inner life. Jordan mentions in passing that the introverted woman is “contemplative” (p. 18), but he does not pursue the matter further. His description, however, seems to me a confirmation of my comments on his mode of observation. It is chiefly the outward behaviour constellated by feeling, and the expressions of passion that strike him; he does not probe into the conscious life of this type. He never mentions that the inner life plays an altogether decisive role in the introvert’s conscious psychology. Why, for example, does the introverted woman read so attentively? Because above everything else she loves to understand and grasp ideas. Why is she restful and soothing? Because she usually keeps her feelings to herself, expressing them in her thoughts instead of unloading them on others. Her unconventional morality is backed by deep reflection and convincing inner feelings. The charm of her quiet and intelligent character depends not merely on a peaceful attitude, but on the fact that one can talk with her reasonably and coherently, and that she is able to appreciate the value of her partner’s argument. She does not interrupt him with impulsive exclamations, but accompanies his meaning with her thoughts and feelings, which none the less remain steadfast, never yielding to the opposing argument.
[258] This compact and well-developed ordering of the conscious psychic contents is a stout defence against a chaotic and passionate emotional life of which the introvert is very often aware, at least in its personal aspect: she fears it because she knows it too well. She meditates about herself, and is therefore outwardly calm and can acknowledge and accept others without overwhelming them with praise or blame. But because her emotional life would devastate these good qualities, she rejects as far as possible her instincts and affects, though without mastering them. In contrast, therefore, to her logical and well-knit consciousness, her affective life is elemental, confused, and ungovernable. It lacks the true human note, it is out of proportion, irrational, a phenomenon of nature that breaks through the human order. It lacks any kind of palpable afterthought or purpose, so at times it is purely destructive, a raging torrent that neither intends destruction nor avoids it, ruthless and necessary, obedient only to its own laws, a process that is its own fulfillment. Her good qualities depend on her thinking, which by its tolerant or benevolent outlook has succeeded in influencing or restraining one part of her instinctive life, though without being able to embrace and transform the whole. The introverted woman is far less conscious of the full range of her affectivity than she is of her rational thoughts and feelings. Her affectivity is much less mobile than her intellectual content; it is, as it were, viscous and curiously inert, therefore hard to change; it is persevering, hence her unconscious steadiness and equability, but also her self-will and her occasional unreasonable inflexibility in things that touch her emotions.
[259] These reflections may explain why any judgment on the introverted woman in terms of affectivity alone is incomplete and unfair in good and bad alike. If Jordan finds the vilest characters among introverted women, this, in my opinion, is due to the fact that he lays too great a stress on affectivity, as if passion alone were the mother of all evil. We can torture children to death in other ways than the merely physical. And, conversely, that wondrous wealth of love in the introverted woman is not by any means always her own possession; she is more often possessed by it and cannot choose but love, until one day a favourable opportunity occurs, when suddenly, to the amazement of her partner, she displays an inexplicable coldness. The emotional life of the introverted woman is generally her weak side, it is not absolutely trustworthy. She deceives herself about it; others also are deceived and disappointed in her if they rely too much on her emotionality. Her mind is more to be relied on, because more adapted. Her affect is too close to sheer untamed nature.
[260] Let us now turn to Jordan’s description of the “less impassioned” woman. Here too I must reject everything the author has confused by the introduction of activity, since this admixture is only calculated to make the typical character less recognizable. Thus when he speaks of a certain “quickness” of the extravert, this does not mean vivacity or activity, but merely the mobility of active psychological processes.
[261] Of the extraverted woman Jordan says:
She is marked by activity, vivacity, quickness, and opportuneness rather than by persistence or consistency. Her life is almost wholly occupied with little things. She goes even further than Lord Beaconsfield in the belief that unimportant things are not very unimportant, and important things not very important. She likes to dwell on the way her grandmother did things, and how her grandchildren will do them, and on the universal degeneracy of human beings and affairs. Her daily wonder is how things would go on if she were not there to look after them. She is frequently invaluable in social movements. She expends her energies in household cleanliness, which is the end and aim of existence to not a few women. Frequently she is “idea-less, emotionless, restless and spotless.” Her emotional development is usually precocious, and at eighteen she is little less wise than at twenty-eight or forty-eight. Her mental outlook usually lacks range and depth, but it is clear from the first. When intelligent, she is capable of taking a leading position. In society she is kindly, generous and hospitable. She judges her neighbours and friends, forgetful that she is herself being judged, but she is active in helping them in misfortune. Deep passion is absent in her, love is simply preference, hatred merely dislike, and jealousy only injured pride. Her enthusiasm is not sustained, and she is more alive to the beauty of poetry than she is to its passion and pathos. Her beliefs and disbeliefs are complete rather than strong. She has no convictions, but she has no misgivings. She does not believe, she adopts, she does not disbelieve, she ignores. She never enquires and she never doubts. In large affairs she defers to authority; in small affairs she jumps to conclusions. In the detail of her own little world, whatever is, is wrong: in the larger world outside, whatever is, is right. She instinctively rebels against carrying the conclusions of reason into practice.
At home she shows quite a different character from the one seen in society. With her, marriage is much influenced by ambition, or a love of change, or obedience to well-recognized custom and a desire to be “settled in life,” or from a sincere wish to enter a greater sphere of usefulness. If her husband belongs to the impassioned type, he will love children more than she does.
In the domestic circle, her least pleasing characteristics are evident. Here she indulges in disconnected, disapproving comment, and none can foresee when there will be a gleam of sunshine through the cloud. The unemotional woman has little or no self-analysis. If she is plainly accused of habitual disapproval she is surprised and offended, and intimates that she only desires the general good, “but some people do not know what is good for them.” She has one way of doing good to her family, and quite another way where society is concerned. The household must always be ready for social inspection. Society must be encouraged and propitiated. Its upper section must be impressed and its lower section kept in order. Home is her winter, society her summer. If the door but opens and a visitor is announced, the transformation is instant.
The less emotional woman is by no means given to asceticism; respectability and orthodoxy do not demand it of her. She is fond of movement, recreation, change. Her busy day may open with a religious service, and close with a comic opera. She delights, above all, to entertain her friends and to be entertained by them. In society she finds not only her work and her happiness, but her rewards and her consolations. She believes in society, and society believes in her. Her feelings are little influenced by prejudice, and as a rule she is “reasonable.” She is very imitative and usually selects good models, but is only dimly conscious of her imitations. The books she reads must deal with life and action.4
[262] This familiar type of woman is extraverted beyond a doubt. Her whole demeanour indicates a character that by its very nature must be called extraverted. The continual criticizing, which is never based on real reflection, is an extraversion of a fleeting impression that has nothing to do with real thinking. I remember a witty aphorism I once read somewhere: “Thinking is difficult, therefore let the herd pass judgment!” Reflection demands time above everything: hence the man who reflects has no opportunity for continual criticism. Incoherent and inconsequential criticism, dependent on tradition and authority, reveals the absence of any independent reflection; similarly the lack of self-criticism and the dearth of independent ideas betray a defect in the function of judgment. The absence of inner mental life in this type comes out much more clearly than its presence in the introverted type described earlier. From this sketch one might easily conclude that there is just as great or even greater a lack of affectivity, for it is obviously superficial, shallow, almost spurious, because the ulterior motive always bound up with it or discernible behind it makes the affective output practically worthless. I am, however, inclined to assume that our author is undervaluing here, just as much as he overvalued in the former case. In spite of an occasional admission of good qualities, the type on the whole comes out of it very badly. I believe this is due to a bias on the part of the author. It is usually enough to have had bitter experiences with one or more representatives of the same type for one’s taste to be spoiled for all of them. One must not forget that, just as the good sense of the introverted woman depends on a careful accommodation of her mental contents to the general thinking, the affectivity of the extraverted woman possesses a certain lability and shallowness because it is adapted to the ordinary life of human society. It is thus a socially differentiated affectivity with an incontestable general value, which compares very favourably with the heavy, sultry, passionate affect of the introvert. This differentiated affectivity has sloughed off everything chaotic and pathetic and become a disposable function of adaptation, even though it be at the expense of the inner mental life, which is conspicuous by its absence. It none the less exists in the unconscious, and moreover in a form corresponding to the passion of the introvert, i.e., it is in an undeveloped, archaic, infantile state. Working from the unconscious, the undeveloped mentality supplies the affective output with contents and hidden motives that cannot fail to make a bad impression on the critical observer, although they may be unperceived by the uncritical eye. The disagreeable impression that the constant perception of thinly veiled egoistic motives has on the observer makes him only too prone to forget the actual reality and adapted usefulness of the affective output displayed. All that is easy-going, unforced, temperate, harmless, and superficial in life would disappear if there were no differentiated affects. One would either be stifled in perpetual pathos or engulfed in the yawning abyss of repressed passion. If the social function of the introvert concentrates mainly on individuals, it is usually true that the extravert promotes the life of the community, which also has a right to exist. For this extraversion is needed, because it is first and foremost the bridge to one’s neighbour.
[263] As we all know, the expression of affect works by suggestion, whereas the mind can operate only indirectly, after arduous translation into another medium. The affects required by the social function need not be at all deep, otherwise they beget passion in others, and passion upsets the life and wellbeing of society. Similarly, the adapted, differentiated mentality of the introvert has extensity rather than intensity; hence it is not disturbing and provocative but reasonable and calming. But, just as the introvert causes trouble by the violence of his passions, the extravert irritates by his half-unconscious thoughts and feelings, incoherently and abruptly applied in the form of tactless and unsparing judgments on his fellow men. If we were to make a collection of such judgments and tried to construct a psychology out of them, they would build up into an utterly brutal outlook, which in chilling savagery, crudity, and stupidity rivals the murderous affectivity of the introvert. Hence I cannot subscribe to Jordan’s view that the very worst characters are to be found among passionate introverted natures. Among extraverts there is just as much inveterate wickedness. But whereas introverted passion expresses itself in brutal actions, the vulgarity of the extravert’s unconscious thoughts and feelings commits crimes against the soul of the victim. I do not know which is worse. The drawback in the former case is that the deed is visible, while the latter’s vulgarity of mind is concealed behind the veil of acceptable behaviour. I would like, however, to stress the social thoughtfulness of this type, his active concern for the general welfare, as well as a decided tendency to give pleasure to others. The introvert as a rule has these qualities only in his fantasies.
[264] Differentiated affects have the further advantage of charm and elegance. They spread about them an air that is aesthetic and beneficial. A surprising number of extraverts practise an art—chiefly music—not so much because they are specially qualified for it as from a desire to make their contribution to social life. Nor is their fault-finding always unpleasant or altogether worthless. Very often it is no more than a well-adapted educative tendency which does a great deal of good. Equally, their dependence on the judgment of others is not necessarily a bad thing, as it often conduces to the suppression of extravagances and pernicious excesses which in no way further the life and welfare of society. It would be altogether unjustifiable to maintain that one type is in any respect more valuable than the other. The types are mutually complementary, and their differences generate the tension that both the individual and society need for the maintenance of life.
[265] Of the extraverted man Jordan says:
He is fitful and uncertain in temper and behaviour, given to petulance, fuss, discontent and censoriousness. He makes depreciatory judgments on all and sundry, but is ever well satisfied with himself. His judgment is often at fault and his projects often fail, but he never ceases to place unbounded confidence in both. Sidney Smith, speaking of a conspicuous statesman of his time, said he was ready at any moment to command the Channel Fleet or amputate a limb. He has an incisive formula for everything that is put before him—either the thing is not true, or everybody knows it already. In his sky there is not room for two suns. If other suns insist on shining, he has a curious sense of martyrdom.
He matures early. He is fond of administration, and is often an admirable public servant. At the committee of his charity he is as much interested in the selection of its washer-woman as in the selection of its chairman. In company he is usually alert, to the point, witty, and apt at retort. He resolutely, confidently, and constantly shows himself. Experience helps him and he insists on getting experience. He would rather be the known chairman of a committee of three than the unknown benefactor of a nation. When he is less gifted he is probably not less self-important. Is he busy? He believes himself to be energetic. Is he loquacious? He believes himself to be eloquent.
He rarely puts forth new ideas, or opens new paths, but he is quick to follow, to seize, to apply, to carry out. His natural tendency is to ancient, or at least accepted, forms of belief and policy. Special circumstances may sometimes lead him to contemplate with admiration the audacity of his own heresy. Not rarely the less emotional intellect is so lofty and commanding that no disturbing influence can hinder the formation of broad and just views in all the provinces of life. His life is usually characterized by morality, truthfulness, and high principle; sometimes his desire to produce an immediate effect however leads to later trouble.
If, in public assembly, adverse fates have given him nothing to do,—nothing to propose, or second, or support, or amend, or oppose—he will rise and ask for some window to be closed to keep out a draught, or, which is more likely, that one be opened to let in more air; for, physiologically, he commonly needs much air as well as much notice. He is especially prone to do what he is not asked to do—what, perhaps, he is not best fitted to do; nevertheless he constantly believes that the public sees him as he wishes it to see him, as he sees himself—a sleepless seeker of the public good. He puts others in his debt, and he cannot go unrewarded. He may, by well-chosen language, move his audience although he is not moved himself. He is probably quick to understand his time or at least his party; he warns it of impending evil, organizes its forces, deals smartly with its opponents. He is full of projects and prophecies and bustle. Society must be pleased if possible; if it will not be pleased it must be astonished; if it will neither be pleased nor astonished it must be pestered and shocked. He is a saviour by profession and as an acknowledged saviour is not ill pleased with himself. We can of ourselves do nothing right—but we can believe in him, dream of him, thank God for him, and ask him to address us.
He is unhappy in repose, and rests nowhere long. After a busy day he must have a pungent evening. He is found in the theatre, or concert, or church, or the bazaar, at the dinner, or conversazione or club, or all these, turn and turn about. If he misses a meeting, a telegram announces a more ostentatious call.5
[266] From this description, too, the type can easily be recognized. But, perhaps even more than in the description of the extraverted woman, there emerges, in spite of occasional appreciative touches, an element of depreciation that amounts to caricature. It is due partly to the fact that this method of description cannot hope to be fair to the extraverted nature in general, because it is virtually impossible for the intellectual approach to put the specific value of the extravert in the right light. This is much more possible with the introvert, because his essential reasonableness and his conscious motivation can be expressed in intellectual terms as readily as his passions can and the actions resulting from them. With the extravert, on the other hand, the specific value lies in his relation to the object. It seems to me that only life itself can grant the extravert the just dues that intellectual criticism cannot give him. Life alone reveals his values and appreciates them. We can, of course, establish that the extravert is socially useful, that he has made great contributions to the progress of human society, and so on. But any analysis of his resources and motives will always yield a negative result, because his specific value lies in the reciprocal relation to the object and not in himself. The relation to the object is one of those imponderables that an intellectual formulation can never grasp.
[267] Intellectual criticism cannot help proceeding analytically and bringing the observed type to full clarity by pinning down its motives and aims. But this, as we have said, results in a picture that amounts to a caricature of the psychology of the extravert, and anyone who believes he has found the right attitude to an extravert on the basis of such a description would be astonished to see how the actual personality turns the description into a mockery. Such a one-sided view of things makes any adaptation to the extravert impossible. In order to do him justice, thinking about him must be altogether excluded, while for his part the extravert can properly adapt to the introvert only when he is prepared to accept his mental contents in themselves regardless of their practical utility. Intellectual analysis cannot help attributing to the extravert every conceivable design, stratagem, ulterior motive, and so forth, though they have no actual existence but at most are shadowy effects leaking in from the unconscious background.
[268] It is certainly true that the extravert, if he has nothing else to say, will at least demand that a window be open or shut. But who notices, who is struck by it? Only the man who is trying to account for all the possible reasons and intentions behind such an action, who reflects, dissects, puts constructions on it, while for everyone else this little stir vanishes in the general bustle of life without their seeing in it anything sinister or remarkable. But this is just the way the psychology of the extravert manifests itself: it is part and parcel of the happenings of daily human life, and it signifies nothing more than that, neither better nor worse. But the man who reflects sees further and—so far as actual life is concerned—sees crooked, though his vision is sound enough as regards the unconscious background of the extravert’s thought. He does not see the positive man, but only his shadow. And the shadow proves the judgment right at the expense of the conscious, positive man. For the sake of understanding, it is, I think, a good thing to detach the man from his shadow, the unconscious, otherwise the discussion is threatened with an unparalleled confusion of ideas. One sees much in another man that does not belong to his conscious psychology, but is a gleam from his unconscious, and one is deluded into attributing the observed quality to his conscious ego. Life and fate may do this, but the psychologist, to whom knowledge of the structure of the psyche and the possibility of a better understanding of man are of the deepest concern, must not. A clear differentiation of the conscious man from his unconscious is imperative, since only by the assimilation of conscious standpoints will clarity and understanding be gained, but never by a process of reduction to the unconscious backgrounds, sidelights, quarter-tones.
[269] Of the introverted man Jordan says:
He may spend his evenings in pleasure from a genuine love of it; but his pleasures do not change every hour, and he not driven to them from mere restlessness. If he takes part in public work he is probably invited to do so from some special fitness; or it may be that he has at heart some movement—beneficent or mischievous—which he wishes to promote. When his work is done he willingly retires. He is able to see what others can do better than he; and he would rather that his cause should prosper in other hands than fail in his own. He has a hearty word of praise for his fellow-workers. Probably he errs in estimating too generously the merits of those around him. He is never, and indeed cannot be, an habitual scold. … Men of profound feeling and illimitable pondering tend to suspense or even hesitation; they are never the founders of religions; never leaders of religious movements; they neither receive nor deliver divine messages. They are moreover never so supremely confident as to what is error that they burn their neighbours for it; never so confident that they possess infallible truth that, although not wanting in courage, they are prepared to be burnt in its behalf.6
[270] To me it seems significant that in his chapter on the introverted man Jordan says no more in effect than what is given in the above excerpts. What we miss most of all is a description of the passion on account of which the introvert is called “impassioned” in the first place. One must, of course, be cautious in making diagnostic conjectures, but this case seems to invite the supposition that the introverted man has received such niggardly treatment for subjective reasons. After the elaborately unfair description of the extraverted type, one might have expected an equal thoroughness in the description of the introvert. Why is it not forthcoming?
[271] Let us suppose that Jordan himself is on the side of the introverts. It would then be intelligible that a description like the one he gives of his opposite number with such pitiless severity would hardly have suited his book. I would not say from lack of objectivity, but rather from lack of knowledge of his own shadow. The introvert cannot possibly know or imagine how he appears to his opposite type unless he allows the extravert to tell him to his face, at the risk of having to challenge him to a duel. For as little as the extravert is disposed to accept Jordan’s description as an amiable and apposite picture of his character is the introvert inclined to let his picture be painted by an extraverted observer and critic. The one would be as depreciatory as the other. Just as the introvert who tries to get hold of the nature of the extravert invariably goes wide of the mark, so the extravert who tries to understand the other’s inner life from the standpoint of externality is equally at sea. The introvert makes the mistake of always wanting to derive the other’s actions from the subjective psychology of the extravert, while the extravert can conceive the other’s inner life only as a consequence of external circumstances. For the extravert an abstract train of thought must be a fantasy, a sort of cerebral mist, when no relation to an object is in evidence. And as a matter of fact the introvert’s brain-weavings are often nothing more. At all events a lot more could be said of the introverted man, and one could draw a shadow portrait of him no less complete and no less unfavourable than the one Jordan drew of the extravert.
[272] His observation that the introvert’s love of pleasure is “genuine” seems to me important. This appears to be a peculiarity of introverted feeling in general: it is genuine because it is there of itself, rooted in the man’s deeper nature; it wells up out of itself, having itself as its own aim; it will serve no other ends, lending itself to none, and is content to be an end in itself. This hangs together with the spontaneity of any archaic and natural phenomenon that has never yet bowed to the ends and aims of civilization. Rightly or wrongly, or at any rate without regard to right or wrong, suitability or unsuitability, the affective state bursts out, forcing itself on the subject even against his will and expectation. There is nothing about it that suggests a calculated motivation.
[273] I do not wish to discuss the remaining chapters of Jordan’s book. He cites historical personalities as examples, presenting numerous distorted points of view which all derive from the fallacy already referred to, of introducing the criterion of active and passive and mixing it up with the other criteria. This leads to the frequent conclusion that an active personality must be reckoned a passionless type and, conversely, that a passionate nature must be passive. I seek to avoid this error by excluding the factor of activity as a criterion altogether.
[274] To Jordan, however, belongs the credit for having been the first, so far as I know, to give a relatively appropriate character sketch of the emotional types.