Part 2 (1/2)

I began by a reference to Fitz James Stephen; let me end by a quotation from him. ”What do you think {31} of yourself? What do you think of the world?... These are questions with which all must deal as it seems good to them. They are riddles of the Sphinx, and in some way or other we must deal with them.... In all important transactions of life we have to take a leap in the dark.... If we decide to leave the riddles unanswered, that is a choice; if we waver in our answer, that, too, is a choice: but whatever choice we make, we make it at our peril. If a man chooses to turn his back altogether on G.o.d and the future, no one can prevent him; no one can show beyond reasonable doubt that he is mistaken. If a man thinks otherwise and acts as he thinks, I do not see that any one can prove that _he_ is mistaken. Each must act as he thinks best; and if he is wrong, so much the worse for him. We stand on a mountain pa.s.s in the midst of whirling snow and blinding mist, through which we get glimpses now and then of paths which may be deceptive. If we stand still we shall be frozen to death. If we take the wrong road we shall be dashed to pieces. We do not certainly know whether there is any right one. What must we do? 'Be strong and of a good courage.' Act for the best, hope for the best, and take what comes.... If death ends all, we cannot meet death better.”[5]

[1] An Address to the Philosophical Clubs of Yale and Brown Universities. Published in the New World, June, 1896.

[2] Compare the admirable page 310 in S. H. Hodgson's ”Time and s.p.a.ce,”

London, 1865.

[3] Compare Wilfrid Ward's Essay, ”The Wish to Believe,” in his _Witnesses to the Unseen_, Macmillan & Co., 1893.

[4] Since belief is measured by action, he who forbids us to believe religion to be true, necessarily also forbids us to act as we should if we did believe it to be true. The whole defence of religious faith hinges upon action. If the action required or inspired by the religious hypothesis is in no way different from that dictated by the naturalistic hypothesis, then religious faith is a pure superfluity, better pruned away, and controversy about its legitimacy is a piece of idle trifling, unworthy of serious minds. I myself believe, of course, that the religious hypothesis gives to the world an expression which specifically determines our reactions, and makes them in a large part unlike what they might be on a purely naturalistic scheme of belief.

[5] Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, p. 353, 2d edition. London, 1874.

{32}

IS LIFE WORTH LIVING?[1]

When Mr. Mallock's book with this t.i.tle appeared some fifteen years ago, the jocose answer that ”it depends on the _liver_” had great currency in the newspapers. The answer which I propose to give to-night cannot be jocose. In the words of one of Shakespeare's prologues,--

”I come no more to make you laugh; things now, That bear a weighty and a serious brow, Sad, high, and working, full of state and woe,”--

must be my theme. In the deepest heart of all of us there is a corner in which the ultimate mystery of things works sadly; and I know not what such an a.s.sociation as yours intends, nor what you ask of those whom you invite to address you, unless it be to lead you from the surface-glamour of existence, and for an hour at least to make you heedless to the buzzing and jigging and vibration of small interests and excitements that form the tissue of our ordinary consciousness.

Without further explanation or apology, then, I ask you to join me in turning an attention, commonly too unwilling, to the profounder ba.s.s-note of life. Let us search the lonely depths for an hour together, and see what answers in the last folds and recesses of things our question may find.

{33}

I.

With many men the question of life's worth is answered by a temperamental optimism which makes them incapable of believing that anything seriously evil can exist. Our dear old Walt Whitman's works are the standing text-book of this kind of optimism. The mere joy of living is so immense in Walt Whitman's veins that it abolishes the possibility of any other kind of feeling:--

”To breathe the air, how delicious!

To speak, to walk, to seize something by the hand!...

To be this incredible G.o.d I am!...

O amazement of things, even the least particle!

O spirituality of things!

I too carol the Sun, usher'd or at noon, or as now, setting; I too throb to the brain and beauty of the earth and of all the growths of the earth....

I sing to the last the equalities, modern or old, I sing the endless finales of things, I say Nature continues--glory continues.

I praise with electric voice, For I do not see one imperfection in the universe, And I do not see one cause or result lamentable at last.”

So Rousseau, writing of the nine years he spent at Annecy, with nothing but his happiness to tell:--

”How tell what was neither said nor done nor even thought, but tasted only and felt, with no object of my felicity but the emotion of felicity itself! I rose with the sun, and I was happy; I went to walk, and I was happy; I saw 'Maman,' and I was happy; I left her, and I was happy. I rambled through the woods and over the vine-slopes, I wandered in the valleys, I read, I lounged, I {34} worked in the garden, I gathered the fruits, I helped at the indoor work, and happiness followed me everywhere. It was in no one a.s.signable thing; it was all within myself; it could not leave me for a single instant.”