this tendency is to drive them into association
with mediocrity. In such a society alone will the vain find themselves
at their ease. But the very moment that they find themselves in the
presence of those who are their superiors, the fear of not being able to
occupy the front rank throws them into such a state of mental disarray
that they entirely lose their assurance and that appearance of poise by
whose aid they are often able to deceive others.

Finally, one of the most solid elements of poise is, without doubt, a
well-defined ambition, that is to say, one that is divested of the
drawbacks of frivolity and directly winged toward the goal of one's
hopes.

The man who possesses ambition of this kind is certainly destined to
acquire, if he has not already acquired it, that poise which is
absolutely necessary to him in order to make his way in the world.

He will neither be pretentious nor timorous, exaggerated nor fearful. He
will go forward without hesitation toward the goal which he knows to be
before him, and will make, without any apologies, those detours which
seem to him necessary to the success of his undertaking, without paying
any attention to the fruitless distractions that make victims of the
rash.

He will not have to put up with the affront of being refused, for he
will ask aid only of those persons who, for various reasons, he is
practically sure will be of assistance to him. The knowledge of his own
deserts, while keeping him in the position he has attained, will prevent
him from being satisfied in commonplace surroundings, and his will-power
will always maintain him at the level he has reached, permitting him no
latitude save that of exceeding it.

Such is true poise, not that whose spirit one violates by merely
associating it with the incapable, the pretentious, or the extravagant,
but that which is at once the motive power and the inspiration of all
the actions of those who, in their determination to force their way
through the great modern struggle for existence, perseveringly follow a
line of conduct that they have worked out for themselves in advance.

Ignoring such enterprises as they know to be unworthy of their powers,
those who are possest of real poise (and not of that foolish temerity
colloquially known as _bluff_) will devote themselves solely to such
tasks as a well-ordered judgment and an accurate knowledge of their own
potentialities indicate to them to be fitting.

Does this mean