“The peoples inhabiting it [the northern hemisphere] grow steadily more personal as we go West.  So unmistakable is this gradation that we are almost tempted to ascribe it to cosmical rather than to human causes....  The sense of self grows more intense as we follow the wake of the setting sun, and fades steadily as we advance into the dawn.  America, Europe, the Levant, India, Japan, each is less personal than the one before.  We stand at the nearer end of the scale, the Far Orientals at the other.  If with us the ‘I’ seems to be the very essence of the soul, then the soul of the Far East may be said to be ‘Impersonality.’"[CH]

Following the argument through the volume we see that individual physical force and aggressiveness, deficiency of politeness, and selfishness are, according to this line of thought, essential elements of personality.  The opposite set of qualities constitutes the essence of impersonality.  “The average Far Oriental, indeed, talks as much to no purpose as his Western cousin, only in his chit-chat politeness takes the place of personalities.  With him, self is suppressed, and an ever-present regard for others is substituted in its stead.  A lack of personality is, as we have seen, the occasion of this courtesy; it is also its cause....  Considered a priori, the connection between the two is not far to seek.  Impersonality, by lessening the interest in one’s self, induces one to take an interest in others.  Introspection tends to make a man a solitary animal, the absence of it a social one.  The more impersonal the people, the more will the community supplant the individual in the popular estimation....  Then, as the social desires develop, politeness, being the means of their enjoyment, develops also."[CI]

Let us take a look at some definitions: 

“Individuality, personality, and the sense of self, are only three aspects of the same thing.  They are so many various views of the soul, according as we regard it from an intrinsic, an altruistic, or an egoistic standpoint....  By individuality we mean that bundle of ideas, thoughts, and day-dreams which constitute our separate identity, and by virtue of which we feel each one of us at home within himself....  Consciousness is the necessary attribute of mental action.  Not only is it the sole way we have of knowing mind; without it there would be no mind to know.  Not to be conscious of one’s self is, mentally speaking, not to be.  This complex entity, this little cosmos of a world, the ‘I,’ has for its very law of existence, self-consciousness, while personality is the effect it produces upon the consciousness of others."[CJ]