background are created solely by the interested
attention of the looker-on; and if the small difference between the
genius and his tribe interests me most, while the large one between
that tribe and another tribe interests Mr. Allen, our controversy
cannot be ended until a complete philosophy, accounting for all
differences impartially, shall justify us both.

An unlearned carpenter of my acquaintance once said in my hearing:
"There is very little difference between one man and another; but what
little there {257} is, _is very important_." This distinction seems to
me to go to the root of the matter. It is not only the size of the
difference which concerns the philosopher, but also its place and its
kind. An inch is a small thing, but we know the proverb about an inch
on a man's nose. Messrs. Allen and Spencer, in inveighing against
hero-worship, are thinking exclusively of the size of the inch; I, as a
hero-worshipper, attend to its seat and function.

Now, there is a striking law over which few people seem to have
pondered. It is this: That among all the differences which exist, the
only ones that interest us strongly are those _we do not take for
granted_. We are not a bit elated that our friend should have two
hands and the power of speech, and should practise the matter-of-course
human virtues; and quite as little are we vexed that our dog goes on
all fours and fails to understand our conversation. Expecting no more
from the latter companion, and no less from the former, we get what we
expect and are satisfied. We never think of communing with the dog by
discourse of philosophy, or with the friend by head-scratching or the
throwing of crusts to be snapped at. But if either dog or friend fall
above or below the expected standard, they arouse the most lively
emotion. On our brother's vices or genius we never weary of
descanting; to his bipedism or his hairless skin we do not consecrate a
thought. _What_ he says may transport us; that he is able to speak at
all leaves us stone cold. The reason of all this is that his virtues
and vices and utterances might, compatibly with the current range of
variation in our tribe, be just the opposites of what they are, while
his zoologically human attributes cannot possibly go astray. There
{258} is thus a zone of insecurity in human affairs in which all the
dramatic interest lies; the rest belongs to the dead machinery of the
stage. This is the formative zone, the