EVOLUTION THE MASTER-KEY 



of the faith which anticipates a happy hunting- 

 ground, or a harem, or a harp, yet I believe that 

 writer and readers in good health would probably 

 each acknowledge some share in each of these va- 

 rieties of optimism that of the abdomen, that 

 of faith (or hope), and that of reason. Most will 

 offer some measure of some sort of assent to the 

 optimism of faith as expressed by Socrates "To 

 the good man no evil can happen." 



If I may be allowed yet another array of terms, I 

 will name these three varieties of optimism, accord- 

 ing to their origin, sensory optimism, emotional 

 optimism, rational optimism. 



Let us now attempt another classification, ac- 

 cording to the measure of optimism. Obviously 

 this classification will include various beliefs which 

 may be referred, in their origin, to one or all of the 

 causes named. 



We must begin with the most thorough-going 

 optimism to which alone the term can properly 

 be applied; for all the others are no more than 

 greater or less degrees of meliorism. This, then, I 

 take it, is the most universal form of the doctrine 

 which used to be known as universalism, and 

 which teaches that there is an eternally happy 

 future for all men. [It is interesting to observe 

 that modern theological teaching seems to be 

 tending towards this position. I knew a child 

 who was officially taught that though there is a 

 hell, yet there is probably no one in it but Judas 

 Iscariot.] But the most universal form of Uni- 

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