ho achieved distinction a hundred years ago, live in constant
thanksgiving that they "are not as other men." None of the great man's
descendants have done anything to be particularly proud of since their
remote progenitor signed the Declaration of Independence or governed a
colony. They have vegetated in small provincial cities and inter-married
into other equally fortunate families, but the sense of superiority is
ever present to sustain them, under straitened circumstances and
diminishing prestige. The world may move on around them, but they never
advance. Why should they? They have reached perfection. The brains and
enterprise that have revolutionized our age knock in vain at their doors.
They belong to that vast "majority that is always in the wrong," being so
pleased with themselves, their ways, and their feeble little lines of
thought, that any change or advancement gives their system a shock.

A painter I know was once importuned for a sketch by a lady of this
class. After many delays and renewed demands he presented her one day,
when she and some friends were visiting his studio, with a delightful
open-air study simply framed. She seemed confused at the offering, to
his astonishment, as she had not lacked _aplomb_ in asking for the
sketch. After much blushing and fumbling she succeeded in getting the
painting loose, and handing back the frame, remarked:

"I will take the painting, but you must keep the frame. My husband would
never allow me to accept anything of value from you!"--and smiled on the
speechless painter, doubtless charmed with her own tact.

Complacent people are the same drag on a society that a brake would be to
a coach going up hill. They are the "eternal negative" and would
extinguish, if they could, any light stronger than that to which their
weak eyes have been accustomed. They look with astonishment and distrust
at any one trying to break away from their tiresome old ways and habits,
and wonder why all the world is not as pleased with their personalities
as they are themselves, suggesting, if you are willing to waste your time
listening to their twaddle, that there is something radically wrong in
any innovation, that both "Church and State" will be imperilled if things
are altered. No blight, no mildew is more fatal to a plant than the
"complacent" are to the world. They resent any progress and are offended
if you mention before them any new standards or points of view. "What