Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1905 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER V Character of the Yezdi--Systematised inconsistency--Loyalty to causes and individuals--Unreliability of evidence--Shame--Humour--Disregard of time--Language--Lack of initiative--Courage--The Yezdi soldier--Etiquette aud manners--Triviality--Pride--Kindliness and cruelty--Dishonesty--Difficulty in obtaining anything--Tendency to fatalism--Latent strength of Persian character--Family ties--The Jus Paternum--Religious liberty--Open-handedness--Summary. If it were not absolutely essential to the purpose of a book like this that there should be a more or less detailed analysis of the character of the Yezdi, I should certainly shirk making such an analysis. The Yezdi's faults are numerous, glaring, and interesting. His virtues are not only fewer, but there is much less to be said about them. In the concrete man, these virtues show fairly prominently, the vices have their peculiar humour, and the whole is not unlovable. On paper, while discussing the different points of the Yezdi's Chap, v. SYSTEMATISED INCONSISTENCY 137 character one by one, it will be almost impossible to convey the general effect made by the entire human being. When one first becomes acquainted with the Yezdi, one is inclined to regard him as so inconsistent in matters of morals as to be utterly devoid of all principle, bad or good. There is the same uncertainty about his actions that there is about the fall of an unloaded die. But just as the fall of the die is regulated by the law of averages, so the actions of the Yezdi are more or less consciously decided by what can only be termed systematised inconsistency, a kind of law of balance which seems to him to possess the merit of a principle. When he has done a certain number of good actions, which it must be...
