It affords you then an inordinate amount of self-esteem.
You have the self-satisfaction of courage without the
inconvenience of danger. But the desire for approbation is
perhaps the most deeply seated instinct of civilised man.
No one runs so hurriedly to the cover of respectability as the
unconventional woman who has exposed herself to the slings and
arrows of outraged propriety. I do not believe the people who
tell me they do not care a row of pins for the opinion of
their fellows. It is the bravado of ignorance. They mean
only that they do not fear reproaches for peccadillos which
they are convinced none will discover.
But here was a man who sincerely did not mind what people
thought of him, and so convention had no hold on him; he was
like a wrestler whose body is oiled; you could not get a grip
on him; it gave him a freedom which was an outrage.
I remember saying to him:
"Look here, if everyone acted like you, the world couldn't go on."
"That's a damned silly thing to say. Everyone doesn't want to
act like me. The great majority are perfectly content to do
the ordinary thing.
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