THE DUTY OF ENJOYMENT. 643 



almost amusing to see how men will seek to excuse themselves for 

 their carelessness in these matters on the ground that they are sacri- 

 ficing themselves to some useful object, some form of public service. 

 It may often be doubted whether even success in their endeavors 

 would result in any benefits at all commensurable with the ills brought 

 on their families. And in any case it may not unreasonably be con- 

 tended that usefulness, like charity, should begin at home. A great 

 novelist and moralist has recently satirized the common neglect of 

 public interests by the ^u^y^ paterfamilias whose largest conception 

 of public good is the welfare of his family. The case is no doubt 

 common enough ; but its commonness must not make us overlook the 

 evils of the other extreme, the carrying out of something which is 

 supposed to be of public value at the cost of the comfort and enjoy- 

 ment of the public benefactor's family and friends. If moral worth is 

 to be estimated by the amount of happiness bestowed on others, it 

 may well be doubted whether some of these self-sacrificing persons of 

 large aims are not of inferior value to many a commonplace good- 

 natured citizen, who is perfectly free from all lofty aspirations, who 

 likes to live well and to surround himself by happy faces, and whose 

 healthy instinct for pleasure leads him unreflectingly to add to the 

 enjoyment of all who have to do with him. 



In many cases, then, it is clear that people do not think enough of 

 the simple pleasures of life. It may be added that, in order to realize 

 in one's self and in others the full benefit of a pleasurable existence, it 

 is necessary to pursue pleasure as something intrinsically desirable. It 

 will not do to seek it merely as a means to an end beyond itself. 

 Pleasure must be loved and sought in and for itself, if it is to be the 

 good which it is capable of becoming. A man should be steeped in 

 the atmosphere of happiness if he is to realize the efficient and benefi- 

 cent existence we have described, and this presupposes what may 

 paradoxically be called a disinterested liking for pleasure. It is by 

 no means easy to persons of a certain temperament to cultivate the 

 spirit of enjoyment in this way. In truth, it may be said to be the 

 result of a difficult art which will only be acquired by those who have 

 reached a high pitch of moral culture. To foster and manifest a 

 cheerful and gladsome mind often involves a considerable amount of 

 self-restraint in repressing and banishing those gloomy reflections to 

 which one may be constitutionally prone. There is further a certain 

 moral sluggishness and inertia in some natures which makes it a con- 

 siderable effort to rise into the pleasurable strata of the emotional at- 

 mosphere. How often, for example, is a fit of mental depression only 

 capable of being dissipated by a vigorous form of bodily exercise to 

 the idea of which the feeling of the moment is strongly opposed ! The 

 creation and sustentation of a bright and joyous consciousness is thus 

 often a matter of real difficulty, and deserves to be extolled as a moral 

 triumph over natural inclination. 



