Scarcely anyone ever wants to be anybody else. However handicapped or unhappy he feels himself, he would not change places with other more fortunate mortals.

Each person is an idiom unto himself, an apparent violation of the syntax of the species.

A prejudice, unlike a simple misconception, is actively resistant to all evidence that would unseat it.

We cannot know the young child's personality by studying his systems of interest, for his attention is as yet too labile, his reactions impulsive, and interests unformed. From adolescence onward, however, the surest clue to personality is the hierarchy of interests, including the loves and loyalties of adult life.

Personality is less a finished product than a transitive process. While it has some stable features, it is at the same time continually undergoing change.

Open-mindedness is considered to be a virtue. But, strictly speaking, it cannot occur. A new experience must be redacted into old categories. We cannot handle each event freshly in its own right. If we did so, of what use would past experience be?