day by day, and mood by mood, we build up our disposition until finally it
comes to characterize us.
Temperament.—Some are, however, more predisposed to certain types of
mood than are others. The organization of our nervous system which we get
through heredity undoubtedly has much to do with the feeling tone into which
we most easily fall. We call this predisposition temperament. On the effects of
temperament, our ancestors must divide the responsibility with us. I say divide
the responsibility, for even if we find ourselves predisposed toward a certain
undesirable type of moods, there is no reason why we should give up to them.
Even in spite of hereditary predispositions, we can still largely determine for
ourselves what our moods are to be.
If we have a tendency toward cheerful, quiet, and optimistic moods, the
psychologist names our temperament the sanguine; if we are tense, easily
excited and irritable, with a tendency toward sullen or angry moods, the
choleric; if we are given to frequent fits of the "blues," if we usually look on the
dark side of things and have a tendency toward moods of discouragement and
the "dumps," the melancholic; if hard to rouse, and given to indolent and
indifferent moods, the phlegmatic. Whatever be our temperament, it is one of the
most important factors in our character.
3. PERMANENT FEELING ATTITUDES, OR SENTIMENTS
Besides the more or less transitory feeling states which we have called moods,
there exists also a class of feeling attitudes, which contain more of the complex
intellectual element, are withal of rather a higher nature, and much more
permanent than our moods. We may call these our sentiments, or attitudes. Our
sentiments comprise the somewhat constant level of feeling combined with
cognition, which we name sympathy, friendship, love, patriotism, religious faith,
selfishness, pride, vanity, etc. Like our dispositions, our sentiments are a growth
of months and years. Unlike our dispositions, however, our sentiments are
relatively independent of the physiological undertone, and depend more largely
upon long-continued experience and intellectual elements as a basis. A sluggish
liver might throw us into an irritable mood and, if the condition were long
continued, might result in a surly disposition; but it would hardly permanently
destroy one's patriotism and make him turn traitor to his country. One's feeling
attitude on such matters is too deep seated to be modified by changing whims.