t it comes either
from the stupidity which is the result of a lack of sympathy, or else
from the nobler error of holding an opinion strongly and earnestly. We
must never be betrayed into making the same mistake; we may try to
persuade, and it is better done by example than by argument, but we
must never allow ourselves to scoff and deride, and still less to
abuse and vilify. We must rather do our best to understand the other
point of view, and to acquiesce in the possibility of its being held,
even if we cannot understand it. We must take for granted that every
one whose life shows evidence of energy, unselfishness, joyfulness,
ardour, peacefulness, is truly inspired by the spirit of good. We must
believe that they have a vision of beauty and delight, born of the
spirit. We must rejoice if they are making plain to other minds any
interpretation of life, any enrichment of motive, any protest against
things coarse and low and mean. We may wish--and we may try to
persuade them--that their hopes and aims were wider, more bountiful,
and more inclusive, but if we seek to exclude those hopes and aims,
however inconsistent they may be with our own, that moment the shadow
involves our own hopes, because our desire must be that the world may
somehow become happier, fuller, more joyful, even if it is not on the
lines which we ourselves approve.

I know so many good people who are anxious to increase happiness, but
only on their own conditions; they feel that they estimate exactly
what the quantity and quality of joy ought to be, and they treat the
joy which they do not themselves feel as an offence against truth. It
is from these beliefs, I have often thought, that much of the
unhappiness of family circles arises, the elders not realising how the
world moves on, how new ideas come to the front, how the old hopes
fade or are transmuted. They see their children liking different
thoughts, different occupations, new books, new pleasures; and instead
of trying to enter into these things, to believe in their innocence
and their naturalness, they try to crush and thwart them, with the
result that the boys and girls just hide their feelings and desires,
and if they are not shamed out of them, which sometimes happens, they
hold them secretly and half sullenly, and plan how to escape as soon
as they can from the tender and anxious constraint into a real world
of their own. And the saddest part of all is that the younger
generation learn no