THE SECRET OF HAPPINESS 245 



happiness he has the capacity for. We cannot be 

 permanently set up or cast down. A healthful na- 

 ture, in the vicissitudes of experience, is not made 

 permanently unhappy, nor, on the other hand, is its 

 water level permanently raised. Deplete us and we 

 fill up ; flood us and we quickly run down. We 

 think that if a certain event were to come to pass, 

 if some rare good fortune should befall us, our stock 

 of happiness would be permanently increased, but 

 the chances are that it would not ; after a time we 

 should settle back to the old everyday level. We 

 should get used to the new conditions, the new pros- 

 perity, and find life wearing essentially the same 

 tints as before. Our pond is fed from hidden springs ; 

 happiness is from within, and outward circumstances 

 have but little power over it. The poor man thinks 

 how happy he would be with the possessions of his 

 rich neighbor, but it is one of the commonplace say- 

 ings of the preacher that he would not be. Wealth 

 would not change his nature. His wants, his long- 

 ings, would still run on as before. It would be high 

 water with him for a season, but it could not last. 



I have been told that, as a rule, the millionaires 

 are the unhappiest of men. Kestless, suspicious, 

 sated, ennuied, they are like a sick man who can 

 find no position in which he can rest. Our real 

 and necessary wants are so few and so easily met, 

 — food, clothes, shelter! If a little money will 

 bring us such comfort, what will not riches do? 

 So we multiply our possessions many fold, hoping 

 thereby to multiply our happiness. But it does not 



