pessimism a proof of culture. Your youthful agnostic, fresh from school, feels his mind to be of such a superior order, that he considers quite beneath his notice arguments which were powerful enough to convince the mind of Hegel. Similarly there are pessimists who feel themselves possessed of an organism so highly strung, that they are compelled to regard as coarse and commonplace pleasures which were pure enough and keen enough to fill with ecstasy the heart of Wordsworth. They assiduously cultivate their melancholy. They revel in the poetry of despair. They are positively glad to find the universe out of joint. All this puts them, they fancy, on a higher platform than that occupied by the vulgar herd. They glory in their pessimism as a proof of their superior refinement ! They might as well glory in their toothache as a proof of the superior delicacy of their nerves. There is no delicacy about it. There is nothing but disease. The most delicate nerves in their normal state will never give pain. And so with the pessimistic mood. It is abnormal. It is not the sign of a cultivated ear to hear nothing in the world but discords; it is not the sign of a cultivated eye to see nothing in the world but ugliness; nor is it the sign of a cultivated heart to discover nothing in life but its worthlessness. The pessimistic mood is an

unhealthy mood. It is a sign that something is wrong with him who feels it. Cultivate it! Foster it! As well might you cultivate delirium or fever. I tell you it is a disease, and it must be cured. And if you ask me how I reply, by forcing yourself to dwell on the bright, rather than on the dark, side of things. Instead of brooding over waste and pain and disease and disappointment and death, think of pleasure, happiness, beauty, love, life-life with its infinite power and promise. Cultivate cheerfulness!

"O wonder of Cosmical Order! O Maker and Ruler of all, Before whose infinite greatness in silence we worship and fall!

Could I doubt that the will which keeps this great universe steadfast and sure,

Can be less than His creatures thought, full of goodness, pitiful, pure?

Could I dream that the Power which keeps those great suns circling around,

Takes no thought for the humblest life which flutters and falls to the ground?

O Faith! thou art higher than all. Then I turned from the glories above,

And from every casement new-lit there shone a soft radiance of love :

Young mothers were teaching their children to fold little hands

in prayer;

Strong fathers were resting from toil, 'mid the hush of the Sabbath air;

Peasant lovers strolled through the lanes, shy and diffident each

with each,

Yet knit by some subtle union too fine for their halting speech :

Humble lives, to low thought, and low; but linked, to the thinker's eye,

By a bond that is stronger than death, with the lights of the farthest sky:

Here as there, the great drama of life rolled on, and a jubilant voice

Thrilled through me ineffable, vast, and bade me exult and

rejoice."

183

True and False Discontent.

IX.

TRUE DISCONTENT WITH THE WORLD.

WE have been engaged for about two months in

the consideration of true and false discontent. We first of all noticed discontent in relation to personal conditions and environment. Those who are falsely—i.e., unwisely-discontented, grumble at all their circumstances, even at those which cannot possibly be altered; while the truly-i.e., the wisely -discontented, are just so far dissatisfied that they feel stimulated to improve such of their circumstances as are capable of being changed. Similarly in regard to knowledge, some people are always repining that they cannot know everything all at once while others spend their time in patiently learning to know more and more. And the same difference may be noticed in the mental attitude,

which people assume towards the world as a whole. Some grumble at its being so wretched; others make it happier. With the former class we have been engaged for several Sundays. We have seen that the world after all is not nearly so miserable as they would have us believe. Even judged by the criterion of pleasure, life for most men is decidedly worth living. But this, as I pointed out, is a low criterion. The real purpose of life is progress and development. And looked at from this point of view, we saw that pain itself, about which the pessimists make such a fuss, was often useful and indeed inevitable.

But just because the purpose of life is progress, just because the environment of human beings and the human beings themselves are capable of improvement, it follows that we should not be satisfied with the world as it is. In other words, there is a true, a wise, an honourable discontent, quite different from pessimism, giving us inspiration instead of despair. A certain sense of unsatisfaction, as we have seen, is the key-note of every noble life. We ought to feel discontented with the present condition of this world, for it is in our power to make it better; and if we were not discontented with it we should never try.

But this feeling of discontent is often conspicu