Don't laugh at a youth for his affectations; he is only trying on one face after another to find a face of his own.

Logan Pearsall Smith (1865–1946), an American-born essayist and aphorist who spent much of his life in England, became known for polished, epigrammatic observations on manners, selfhood, and social performance. This remark belongs to the tradition of his aphorisms about character and conduct, written in the early 20th century when “personality,” self-fashioning, and social roles were frequent subjects of literary reflection. Smith’s work often treats identity as something cultivated through experiment and imitation rather than discovered fully formed. The line addresses the common adult tendency to mock youthful posing, reframing it as a necessary stage in the formation of an authentic self.

The aphorism argues for patience with adolescent “affectations”—exaggerated styles, borrowed opinions, or theatrical manners—by treating them as experiments in identity. The metaphor of “trying on” faces suggests that the self is not a fixed essence but something assembled through rehearsal, imitation, and revision. What looks like insincerity may be a sincere search for a stable way of being. Smith also implies a moral lesson for observers: ridicule misunderstands development and can harden a young person into defensiveness or conformity. The quote’s enduring appeal lies in its compassionate psychology and its modern view of identity as performative and provisional before it becomes integrated.