ABSTRACT
The chief disadvantage of knowing more and seeing farther than others, is not to be generally understood. Intellectual is not like bodily strength. People have no hold of the understanding of others but by their sympathy. Their knowing so much more about a subject does not give them a superiority, that is, a power over them, but only renders it the more impossible for them to make the least impression on them. One of the miseries of intellectual pretensions is, that nine-tenths of those people come in contact with do not know whether they are an impostor or not. The impertinence of admiration is scarcely more tolerable than the demonstrations of contempt. The first requires new objects of admiration to satisfy its uneasy cravings: the second makes them crouch to power wherever its shifting standard appears, and willing to curry favour with all parties, and ready to betray any out of sheer weakness and servility.
