it is fortunate for domesticity that mutual transformation is the rule, since otherwise it may be doubted if the divorce court would be the exception.
But such inter-affection is no monopoly of matrimony. Each one of us is continually impressing, or being impressed by, others in proportion to the strength of our respective selves. Originality marks the height of the one, imitation the depth of the other. The action is commonly unconscious at the time, and only recognized afterwards. The fact is that character is contagious. All men go through life more or less inoculated thus of others. Boswell's very acute case of Dr. Johnson, pathologic as it was, is but an aggravated instance of what is not without a parallel about us every day. Plenty of men contract effective admirations, which they carry with them more or less through life. And we none of us wholly escape contagion, both good and bad. Whence the importance of carefully choosing one's friends. For to have a sufficiently violent attack of one person insures, for the time being, practical immunity from another. To such an extent are we all chameleons in mind.
