"
This splendid conviction I earnestly commend to all readers.
These are the ways, then, in which any occasion for fear may be
divided:
As a warning and as a maker of panic. But let us say that the
warning should be understood as given to reason, that fear need
not appear at all, and that the panic is perfectly useless pain.
With these discriminations in mind, we may now go on to a
PRELIMINARY STUDY OF FEAR.
Fear is (a) an impulse, (b) a habit, (c) a disease.
Fear, as it exists in man, is a make-believe of sanity, a creature
of the imagination, a state of insanity.
Furthermore, fear is, now of the nerves, now of the mind, now of
the moral consciousness.
The division depends upon the point of view. What is commonly
called normal fear should give place to REASON, using the word to
cover instinct as well as thought. From the correct point of view
all fear is an evil so long as entertained.
Whatever its manifestations, wherever its apparent location, fear
is a psychic state, of course, reacting upon the individual in
several ways: as, in the nerves, in mental moods, in a single
impulse, in a chronic habit, in a totally unbalanced condition.
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