"
Absurd as futile self-sacrifice seems, it is not less well balanced
than the selfish fortitude of a jealous woman or than the apparent
strength of a man who can only work forcibly for selfish ends. The
wisest use of the will can only grow with the decrease of
self-indulgence.
"Nervous" women are very effective examples of the perversion of a
strong will. There are women who will work themselves into an
illness and seem hopelessly weak when they are not having their own
way, who would feel quite able to give dinner parties at which they
could be prominent in whatever role they might prefer, and would
forget their supposed weakness with astonishing rapidity. When
things do not go to please such women, they are weak and ill; when
they stand out among their friends according to their own ideal of
themselves and are sufficiently flattered, they enter into work
which is far beyond their actual strength, and sooner or later break
down only to be built up on another false basis.
This strong will turned the wrong way is called "hysteria," or
"neurasthenia," or "degeneracy." It may be one of these or all
three, _in its effect,_ but the training of the will to overcome the
cause, which is always to be found in some kind of selfishness,
would cure the hysteric, give the neurasthenic more wholesome
nerves, and start the degenerate on a course of regeneration.
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