Adventures And Enthusiasms — E.V. Lucas

There are certain qualities that we all claim. We are probably wrong, of course, but we deceive ourselves into believing that, short as we may fall in other ways, we really can do this or that superlatively well. I'll say this for myself, we remark, with an approving glance in the mirror, at any rate I'm a good listener; or, Whatever I may not be, I'm a good host. These are things that may be asserted of oneself, by oneself, without undue conceit. I pride myself on being a wit, a man may not say; or I am not ashamed of being the handsomest man in London; but no one resents the tone of those other arrogations, even if their truth is denied.