8 io THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



It must be considered, therefore, as certain that to some minds a 

 philosophy which sets the happiness of self and others as a worthy- 

 end must appear unworthy. Such minds find something pig-like in 

 the desire to see the happiness of the world increased. Yet grunting 

 and groaning are at least as characteristic of the porcine race as any 

 desire to increase the comfort of their fellow-creatures or even their 

 own. Mr. Herbert Spencer's lightsome pleasure-doctrine, the essence 

 of which is that we should strive to diminish pain and sorrow (our 

 own included) and to increase joy and happiness, is less suggestive 

 of porcine ways (at least to those who have noted what such ways 

 are) than for instance the following cheerful address to Man : 

 " Despicable biped ! what is the sum total of the worst that lies be- 

 fore thee ? Death ? Well, Death ; and say the pangs of Tophet, 

 too, and all that the Devil and Man may, will, or can do against 

 thee ! Hast thou not a heart ; canst thou not suffer whatsoever it 

 be ; and, as a Child of Freedom, though outcast, trample Tophet 

 itself under thy feet, while it consumes thee ? " Were this but stern 

 resolution to endure patiently, and even cheerfully, such sorrows as 

 befall man, it were well. Nay, it would fall in with the philosophy 

 of happiness, which enjoins that for their own sake as for the sake of 

 those around them men should bear as lightly as they may their burden 

 of inevitable sorrow. But what Carlyle calls the New-birth or Ba- 

 phometic Fire-baptism is not Patience but Indignation and Defiance. 

 This is the veritable Pig-philosophy : the " Everlasting No " (das 

 ewige Nein) is in truth the Everlasting Grunt of dyspeptic disgust, 

 the constant Oh-Goroo-Goroo of a jaundiced soul. 



Are the teachings of living professors of the Everlasting Groan 

 school brighter than those of the gloomy Scotsman ? Here are some 

 of the latest utterings of the chief among them : " Loss of life ! " 

 exclaims Mr. Ruskin, cheerfully. " By the ship overwhelmed in the 

 river, shattered on the sea ; by the mine's blast, the earthquake's 

 burial you mourn for the multitude slain. You cheer the life-boat's 

 crew ; you: hear with praise and joy the rescue of one still breathing 

 body more at the pit's mouth ; and all the while, for one soul that is 

 saved from the momentary passing away (according to your creed, to 

 be with its God), the lost souls yet locked in their polluted flesh 

 haunt, with worse than ghosts, the shadows of your churches and the 

 corners of your streets ; and your weary children watch, with no 

 memory of Jerusalem, and no hope of return from their captivity, the 

 weltering to the sea of your Waters of Babylon." Oh! Goroo ! 

 Goroo-oo ! 



Any philosophy which hopes for other than misery and disgust in 

 life must indeed seem strange doctrine to teachers such as these 

 even as the smiles of the cheerful seem unmeaning and offensive to 

 those whose souls are overcast with gloom and discontent. Sir Walter 

 Scott tells a story of his childhood which well illustrates the unreason- 



