I F a creed makes a man feel happy, he almost
invariably adopts it," says Professor James in his " Varieties of Religious Experience." We are perhaps too often inclined to be satisfied with this simple explanation of the beliefs of other the power over themselves after they had acknowledged Evidently, then, there are cases in which the art of cheer- this obligation of using this power to bring about the fulness must be reduced to a study, and we owe to the new desired condition of mind. At the same time it was dis- school many useful hints. But as the human will does not covered that not only practice and training, but advice appear to be an inexhaustible force, there is a danger that the and the benefit of other people's experience on the same carrying out of certain systems now proposed to us would road, are of use. Hence the popularity of a new kind absorb so much of it that there would be very little left for of literature dealing chiefly with the training of the will, other purposes. We shall be kept so busy acquiring and always with the same object of mental hygiene in view. We preserving the desired state of mind that there will be no time are grateful to any one who reminds us that there is nothing for anything else. And when we are all agreed that sadness especially meritorious in gloom. Virtue will not be its own is a crime, shall we not become hard upon ourselves and reward unless we have the honesty to admit that we have not harder upon others ? But the great objection to such given up anything much pleasanter for its sake. Un saint triste systems is that they tend to foster the belief that ease of est an triste saint. (The nearest thing in English may perhaps mind is the most important thing in life,—the good from be : "A sad saint is a sorry saint.") Apparently, too, people are which every other good will flow. For this reason one apt to forget that cheerfulness of mind is a habit which may, we think, call the members of the school followers of requires cultivation like any other, and that the means of Epicurus.
acquiring and preserving this habit are not so obvious as one might suppose. But. though we admit all this, it seems to us that the conception of life which underlies the movement not necessarily anything to do with the love of good dinners. is false. We do not think it a good sign that this point of It merely means the adoption of happiness, or, rather, of the avoidance of pain, as the chief aim of life. Epicurus was a view should appeal to many minds. Those who consider it necessary to expend so much ingenuity, so much will-force, materialist certainly, but not so consistent in his materialism upon the one object must, one thinks, either have found in themselves cause to dread the encroachment of a deadening despondency, or else have an exaggerated opinion of the value practice in an asceticism as thoroughgoing as that of any alue in Stoic. Entbehren sollst du, sollst entbehren, must be the of mental comfort. No doubt when our minds and our moods are against us we want all the help we can get; but have not maxim adopted by the Epicurean more consciously than by self-sufficiency and serenity sometimes proved themselves any other philosopher. And Epicurus recognised the force of the imagination and will as well as any "Christian Scientist." enemies too? What is the meaning of this fear of fear, this "If a wise man," he says, " were to be put to torture, he would dread of sympathy, all these elaborate precautions against the precautionary state ? Have we become more healthy-minded say how pleasant this is, how little do I care about it" ; and again, " how pleasant a meal bread and water make to the in that we make greater effort against morbidity, or are we hungry." The new Epicureans would require all the Christian more morbid since we are obliged to make an obligation of healthy-mindedness ? The remedy is usually discovered after the disease. A man must, one thinks, be feeble who repeats to himself while dressing in the morning, be " health, vigour objection, that any conscious search after happiness Youth, heth, vigour "; and any one who finds it necessary to join a "Don't Worry Club" proclaims a certain want of defeats its own object, is not irrefutable ; indeed, this very confidence in his own will school has done much by example to prove the contrary. .
These are American inventions, but, according to certain they aim at is of such supreme value as they think. It has pessimists, the whole of Europe, too, is suffering from will- not been proved that absolute well-being of mind and body, sickness. Not to take such a gloomy view, we might perhaps supposing it to be attainable, is essential to our perfect explain the phase by showing that the demands upon the efficiency; nor do men, on the whole, seem to prize it above human will were never so great as at the present moment. all other things. Is the educated man as happy as the savage? It is true that life has become in a sense more mechanical ; Are grown-up people as happy as children ? Yet, if we had the scope of the individual will is less obvious ; but for to choose, knowing all the drawbacks of our present state, we this very reason its exercise is both more essential and would not choose to be children once more. Is it, then, too more difficult. This may be one reason of the newly felt paradoxical to say that though we all want happiness, we necessity of an education of the will. But whether it be want other things besides, we want other things more ? that our wills are really weaker, or that circumstances re- quire them to be stronger than ever before, it is certain There is nothing offensive in the term Epicurean,—it has as the Stoics with whom people usually prefer to be associated.
His view of pleasure, if not very lofty in theory, would result virtues, and so far no one can find fault with them. It is merely feeling very old and their point of view, the end towards which all this self-discipline is supposed to making, that seems doubtful. The old com- What we are inclined to question is whether the state of mind
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