Notes On Publication
From the author's Foreword: It is obvious that an essay of this kind must be based on first-hand knowledge and on intuition. This is no 'scientific' work, based on statistics, comparative study of sources and 'facts'. It is, on the contrary, an attempt at utilizing the method of the living witness for purposes of knowledge. Strictly speaking, this method is not without scientific interest. We may consider the living witness as a re-agent plunged successively in various national environments in order that he may report his re-actions. A strong personal factor, a possible source of error, is to be expected, but the estimate of this error can always be made by the reader --of course with his own personal and inevitable source of error as well.
For these reasons, the choice of characters to be studied has been limited to three: England, France, Spain, the three peoples of which the author can claim to possess some intuitional knowledge. For the same reasons, these peoples are considered mainly as they are to-day. Some illustrations and arguments are drawn from history, but only from relatively recent times. All allowances are made for possibilities of change and evolution. No causes of national character have been investigated.1
The starting-point is the observation of the three peoples in order to note their instinctive attitudes towards everyday life; hence, a law or hypothesis has been drawn, the development of which occupies the first half of the book; the second half is devoted to a series of parallel studies in which the three peoples are watched in the several aspects of life, in order to justify by experience the conclusions arrived at in the first part.