Personality Types and Holiness by Alexander Roldan, S. J (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 439 In the third and final part of his book, " The Difference It Makes," Adler seeks to convey something of the import of the outcome (whether directly or indirectly achieved) to what was portrayed at the conclusion to Part II as " the one remaining issue " in the question as to how man differs. Whether man's difference is superficial or radical-what difference does it make? As Adler has little trouble making clear, it makes a great deal of ethical, scientific, philosophical, religious, and theological difference. Suffice it to remark here simply that at the heart of the difference it makes as to how man differs is the issue on which the moral fabric and quality of human life depends, the issue of human responsibility ; since only if man differs according to the mode called radical is there a dimension in human being which provides a ground for praise and blame, a ground for principled as well as expedient conduct in our treatment of other men. Thus this reviewer would like to suggest that the " new twist " Adler gives to the subject of his book does not so much concern (as suggested by Time's reviewer (January 12, 1968]) any 'asserting that man's nature is defined not only by his difference from the beasts but by his difference from machines,' as it " concerns the somewhat paradoxical character of introducing an argument drawn from Aristotle and Aquinas into the dispute of the mind-body problem as that has developed in modern thought since the time of Descartes " (p. 217) ; for herewith the suggestion is made that the deepest and truest insights into the nature of man lie in a tradition of thought that is almost entirely neglected in the universities of our era. University of Ottawa Ottawa, Canada JoHN N. DEELY Personality Types and Holiness. By Alexander Roldan, S. J. Trans. by Gregory McCaskey. Staten Island, N.Y.: Alba House, 1967. Pp. 884. $6.50. The study of the psychology of constitutional or temperamental differences seems to be perennially fascinating, for there is no doubt that there are different basic " types " of people and that an understanding of the varieties, aside from the intellectual satisfaction it would provide, is important and even essential in practical dealings with people. One man's meat is another man's poison, and educators, counsellors, salesmen and administrators, to mention a few, have to take this into account. So do spiritual directors, and to serve their need Fr. Alexander Roldan has written his book on personality types and holiness. 440 BOOK REVIEWS However, the psychology of temperamental differences is also one of the most controversial parts of a generally controversial science, and it is safe to say that there is presently no generally acceptable system of classification of basic human types. As a matter of fact, there seems to be no substantial hope that a generally acceptable system can be produced at the present stage of development of psychological sciences, as a result of which, as the author notes, constitutional psychology is largely discounted, especially in the United States. It seems evident, for instance, that early infantile experiences can produce deep attitudes and tendencies which will persist virtually unchanged throughout life, and that these acquired modes of response cannot presently be distinguished from genuine temperamental factors. The author accepts the three component typology of W. H. Sheldon as the best theory yet proposed, defending it with a number of arguments of convenience, e. g., that it accords with tri-dimensional psychologies of basic human capacities. He seems to give much more weight to the relationships of somatotypes to blastodermic layers than Sheldon himself was willing to do. He sees many congruencies between Sheldon's theory and the theories of other constitutional psychologists, which he accepts as further confirmation of Sheldon. When, however, he applies Sheldon's methods to the problem of determining hagiotypes (basic personality components in relation to Christian spirituality), he reports negative results and falls back on intuitive descriptions which merely parallel Sheldon's types. Thus agapetonia is for viscerotonia, prasotonia for somatotonia, and deontotonia for cerebrotonia (constitutional psychologists are prone to jaw-breaking neologisms-saints typifying one or another spiritual...