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The fallibility of introspection as regards what we desire is made evident by psycho-analysis; its fallibility as to what we know is easily demonstrated. An autobiography, when confronted by a careful editor with documentary evidence, is usually found to be full of obviously inadvertent errors.
I have often said this to students: if all our thoughts and conscious desires could be exposed, the most of us would almost die of shame. True, we do not clearly understand ourselves and our conflicts and explanation is often necessary, but that is not equivalent to the subconsciousness; it merely means that introspection is not sagacious.
In Julie we have Jean Jacques' ideal woman, a being of a noble nature, tinged and defiled with something low and morbid; but Claire and Sophie seem taken only from observation, not introspection, and although far from faultless are often charming. "La Nouvelle Heloise" is a novel written in letters, a form of writing more tedious than any other.
There was a petty town near them, which he had never visited alone, although he had made more than one attempt with that view; and it was only on the terrace in the early morn, a spot whence he could be observed from the villa, and which did not easily communicate with the precipitous and surrounding scenery, that Lothair would indulge that habit of introspection which he had pursued through many a long ride, and which to him was a never-failing source of interest and even excitement.
In our first View we saw the necessity of clearing away the weeds, the moss, and the lichen from the stem of our Real Personality before that Transcendental Self could send forth fresh buds for the advancement of conscious thought to higher levels; we found that the first step towards this clearing the approach to our window, was to recognise that a knowledge of the Truth was to be gained by the use of "Introspection" rather than by Intellectualism to realise, in fact, that it is not we, with our intellects, who are looking out upon Nature, but that it is the Absolute looking into us and ever trying to teach us divine truths concerning the "Reality of Being."
"The most careful introspection possible under the circumstances seems to show that these sensations arise almost wholly from the urethra and in a far less degree from the corona.
Yet many a mother of to-day torments her child into a bad introspection and self-consciousness, herself into neurasthenia, and her husband into seething rebellion, because of her desire for perfection, because of her fear that a "bad act" may form into a habit and thence into a vicious character.
"I think it very likely, ma'am," said Fritzing with conviction. A startled expression crept into her eyes. "So much morbid introspection," he went on, "followed by hours of weeping and fasting, if indulged in long enough will certainly have that result. A person who fasts a sufficient length of time invariably parts piecemeal with valuable portions of his wits." She stretched out her hand.
He stood outside now, able to review and form a judgment. His mind loved order. Undue introspection he disliked, as a form of undesirable familiarity; a balanced man must not be too familiar with himself; it endangered self-respect. He had been floundering rather. After years of methodical labour the freedom of too long a holiday was disorganising. He tried to steady himself.
Every man's opinion of himself, as a whole, is a very complex mental product, in which facts known by introspection no doubt play a part, but probably only a very subordinate part.
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