Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 11.djvu/646

 630 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

which we understand each other, and interpret not merely words and other conventional symbols, and deeds that are intentionally overt, but also subtle revealers of emotions, moods, and traits which their owners never meant to reveal, but endeavored to con- ceal. At the same time, the too frequent success of lying and dis- simulation indicates that we have not direct access to the conscious states of our associates, and cannot rest back upon an assumption of the metaphysical identity of our natures, but depend for our knowledge of each other's conscious life upon our interpretations of sensible tokens.

A great portion of the world's literature exhibits the success with which the emotional phase of human experience can be " described." Conventionality is a vast monument to the fact of the communication of psychic meanings by physical signs. And many of the signals from the inner life which we learn so accurately to read are far too subtle to be conventionalized. Smiles, frowns, tones, and changes of the facial muscles, too minute to be described, are interpreted unerringly. One reads a passage full of subtile suggestion, and by his reading proves that he has felt the suggestion, and looking up he sees in the face of his listening friend that the friend has felt it too. This is communion of spirits author, reader, and friend. Expressions of voice, countenance, and bearing, numberless and fleeting, are included in the seemingly inexhaustible signal code that reveals the rich variety of human feeling. They are mediums for the admonish- ing or cheering influence of the parent, friend, and lover, and instruments of the power of the man of prestige, the orator, and the commander. Not tears and sighs alone, but the slight move- ment of the eyelid and the almost insensible tension of the person thrill the heart of the observer, and awaken trust or suspicion, love or hate, fascination or contempt, as they signal the presence of affective experiences which the observer is prompt to recognize and estimate in terms of his own subjectivity.

Signs which we have learned to recognize as tokens of admi- rable or despicable traits in an associate may arouse strong feelings before we have formed definite notions of the traits of the indi- vidual in question. We may suspect and dislike, or incline to