day facts. "Where is the want, the longing, the striving, the dissatisfaction, the pain, preceding the innumerable sensations of pleasure which are excited in us during a walk on a bright spring morning? Whether we should enjoy pleasure as much without some previous experience of pain is another question. But we can all probably recall some happy experience, consisting of a long chain of quiet gratifications, from which pain was wholly absent: days of pleasant sojourn among interesting scenes abroad, days of harmonious intercourse with friends in some lovely retreat, afford examples of such experiences."

Pessimists not unfrequently reject all testimony but their own. Hartmann says the opinion of the generality of men on this subject is untrustworthy, because they are inclined to magnify the value of life. But manifestly happiness is a personal matter; and the individual alone can tell whether he is happy or not. The vast majority of mankind, at any rate, find at least so much pleasure in existence that they are glad to be alive. Even those who believe in the superior enjoyments of the next world, seldom evince any eagerness to leave the inferior enjoyments of this-except perhaps when they are singing hymns in church. Now it is of no use for the philosopher to tell them that, according to his theory, they ought to be miserable. It is

his theory which is at fault, and not their feelings; about them there can be no mistake, for feelings are what they are felt to be.

Furthermore, many of the commonest and the most valuable pleasures of life are completely ignored by the pessimists. For example, Hartmann makes no mention of the pleasures of work or of laughter. Work he deals with in its painful aspect, where an excessive degree of it is necessary for the maintenance of life. But he does not speak of the agreeable kinds of muscular activity, such as walking or rowing or climbing; nor does he say anything of the keen enjoyment which the student finds in his intellectual labours. No; he quietly classifies work amongst the miseries of human existence. And of laughter he does not say a word. Yet "laughter serves to transform all the lighter evils of existence into sources of after gaiety; it may even throw a glamour of light over some of the gloomiest experiences." One need hardly wonder that a pessimist should be a little shy in talking about it.

'Life seems to include," says Mr Greg, "the amplest conceivable provision for a being of the most capacious and various desires. The surface of the earth is strewed with flowers, the path of years is paved and planted with enjoyments.

Every sort of beauty has been lavished on our allotted home; beauties to enrapture every sense; beauties to satisfy every taste; forms the noblest and the loveliest; colours the most gorgeous and the most delicate; odours the sweetest and the subtlest; harmonies the most soothing and the most stirring; the sunny glories of the day, the pale Elysian grace of moonlight; the lake, the mountain, the primeval forest, and the boundless ocean; the silent pinnacles of aged snow in one hemisphere, the marvels of tropical luxuriance in another; the serenity of sunsets; the sublimity of storms; everything is bestowed in boundless profusion on the scene of our existence; we can conceive or desire nothing more exquisite or perfect than what is around us every hour. And our faculties are so framed as to be consciously alive to it all. The provision made for our sensuous enjoyment is in overflowing abundance; and so is that for the other elements of our complex nature. Who that has revelled in the marvels of the world of thought, does not confess that the intelligence has been dowered with at least as profuse a beneficence as the senses? Who that has truly tasted and fathomed human love in its dawning and its crowning joys, has not thanked God for a felicity that passeth understanding? If we had set our fancy

to picture a Creator occupied solely in devising delight for the children whom He loved, we could not conceive one single element of bliss which is not here. We might retrench casualties; we might superadd duration and extension; we might wish that which is partial, occasional and transient to be universal and enduring; but we need not, and we could not, introduce one new ingredient of joy." Of all this pessimists say nothing.

"Why wilt thou make bright music

Give forth a sound of pain?

Why wilt thou weave fair flowers

Into a weary chain?

Why turn each cool grey shadow
Into a world of fears?

Why say the winds are wailing?
Why call the dewdrops tears?

The voices of happy nature,

And the heaven's sunny gleam,
Reprove thy sick heart's fancies,
Upbraid thy foolish dream.

Listen, and I will tell thee

The song creation sings,

From the humming of bees in the heather
To the flutter of angel's wings.

An echo rings for ever,

The sound can never cease;

It speaks to God of glory,

It speaks to earth of peace.