SOME GENERAL RESULTS 537 



which is thus in a broad sense the object of our existence. Happiness 

 It must be noted that harmony is a positive thing, not 

 merely the absence of friction or discomfort. Hence 

 man, having the maximum power of feeling, is capable 

 of realizing the highest and greatest harmony, or 

 happiness. By the same token, however, he is capable Piaythe 

 of the greatest amount of misery ; hence he is compelled game! 

 to play his game, as it were, to the utmost of his 

 strength, in order to realize the purpose of his existence. 

 In the past, man suffered frightfully from his ignorance 

 of the rules of the game ; that is, of the processes of 

 nature. His attempts to correct the evils he so keenly 

 felt were valiant and persistent, but largely wasted 

 through ignorance. He did not understand that he 

 was to use his mind to ascertain how things happened ; 

 he was slow to learn by experience, because he did not 

 understand his experiences. That intellectual and 

 moral striving is the price of happiness is not the fanci- 

 ful idea of some poet or philosopher, but a fact. Hu- 

 man life is necessarily dynamic. Error and sin consist 

 in failing to play our part according to the rules of 

 the game, either by breaking the rules or by failing to 

 play up. 



