4i6 



POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



Butler was "his name) the many dif- 

 ficulties and perplexities which con- 

 front us in our study of the order of 

 Nature. What special advantage 

 flows from calling Nature a "har- 

 lot " we are at a loss to imagine ; but 

 we do not find it hard to imagine 

 what evil may ensue therefrom. If 

 that Ultimate Power into commun- 

 ion with which the professor is so 

 anxious to bring us has really given 

 us a harlot world in which to pass 

 our probation well, it would really 

 seem as if, to put it mildly, our edu- 

 cation has not been well provided 

 for. Human parents do not choose 

 such associations for their sons and 

 daughters. And yet, in spite of its 

 harlotry, " this world of Nature," we 

 are told, " is a sign of something 

 more sphitual and eternal than it- 

 self." It is also spoken of as ''a 

 mere sign or vision of a many- 

 storied universe in which spiritual 

 forces have the last word," and this 

 in spite of the assertion made in the 

 same sentence, that " circumstances 

 on the natural plane" create the 

 strongest presumption that life is 

 not worth living. Verily, " too much 

 grubbing in the abstract root of 

 things " does produce a somewbat 

 tangled condition of the understand- 

 ing, as well as an ugly bent toward 

 pessimism. 



If we once settle it in our minds 

 that pessimism, or, as Prof. James 

 otherwise describes it, the suicidal 

 tendency, is a disease, there is only 

 one question worth discussing in 

 connection with it, and that is how 

 to prevent it. It seems to us that 

 the way is indicated with great clear- 

 ness and simplicity by the philoso- 

 pher who, anticipating the Harvard 

 professor by over two thousand 

 years, briefly announced that " much 

 study is a weariness of the flesh." 

 What does that philosopher fiu'ther 

 teach ? He teaches the lesson that 

 has never yet sunk deeply enough 



into the general mind, that youth is 

 the time when the character should 

 be fortified against the trials and dis- 

 appointments of later life. His sim- 

 ple but expressive language may 

 perhaps be not improperly recalled ; 

 " Remember now thy Creator in the 

 days of thy youth, while the evil 

 days come not, nor the years draw 

 nigh when thou shalt say, I have no 

 pleasure in them." Will any one 

 say that the doctrine of evolution 

 has rendered such advice as this ob- 

 solete ? It would be a shallow per- 

 son, in our opinion, who w^ould raise 

 such an objection. What the preach- 

 er saw and felt was that youth was a 

 period which, if rightly used, would 

 establish the whole life on sure foun- 

 dations. The remembering of one's 

 Creator means little if it does not 

 mean acquiring a knowledge of and 

 reverence for the laws which ought 

 to govern human life, the formation 

 of sound physical and intellectual 

 habits, and of pure and wholesome 

 associations. It means, if it means 

 anything, the discerning of a true 

 ideal of life, and the earnest and 

 loyal adoption of that ideal as some- 

 thing to be sacredly guarded to life's 

 end. Youth is the one period of life 

 that is fully capable of this, and 

 therefore it is in youth and only in 

 youth that our nature can be ren- 

 dered, as it were, immune against 

 pessimism. Prof. James may say 

 that this is taking a religious view 

 of life, and that so far we agree with 

 him. We claim that if our view is 

 religious it is also scientific, inas- 

 much as it takes, or aims at taking, 

 full account of all the conditions of 

 the problem. The difference between 

 us, however, is, as we think, real and 

 important. He prescribes religion 

 somewhat as a doctor would a drug, 

 as a tonic for exhausted minds. We 

 postulate a certain view and govern- 

 ment of life, not as a remedy for ex- 

 isting disease, but as the condition 



