courtesy of Dave Thomson |
HERO WORSHIPWe are all alike on the inside. Also we are exteriorly all alike. Scoffing
democrats that we are, we do dearly love to be noticed by a duke, and
when we are noticed by a monarch we have softening of the brain for the
rest of our lives. We try our best to keep from referring to these precious
collisions, and in time some of us succeed in keeping our dukes and monarchs
to ourselves; it costs us something to do this but in time we accomplish
it. In my own case, I have so carefully and persistently trained myself
in this kind of self-denial that today I can look on calm and unmoved
when an American is casually and greatfully playing the earls he has met;
I can look on, silent and unexcited, and never offer to call his hand,
although I have three kings and a pair of emperors up my sleeve. |
Unconsciously we all have a standard by which we measure other men, and if
we examine closely we find that this standard is a very simple one and is this:
we admire them, we envy them, for great qualities which we ourselves lack. Hero
worship consists in just that. Our heroes are the men who do things which we
recognize with regret and sometimes with a secret shame that we cannot do. We
find not much in ourselves to admire, we are always privately wanting to be
like somebody else. If everybody was satisfied with himself there would be no
heroes.
- Mark Twain's Autobiography
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