it preposterous, I say, to suppose that the goodness of that
feeling for living purposes should be held to carry no
objective significance, and especially preposterous if it
combines harmoniously with an otherwise grounded philosophy
of objective truth."

That is a very large and tolerant utterance, both in its suspension of
impatient certainties and in its beautiful sympathy with all ardent
visions that cannot clearly and convincingly find logical utterance.

What I am trying to say in this little book is not addressed to
professional philosophers or men of science, who are concerned with
intellectual investigation, but to those who have to live life as it
is, as the vast majority of men must always be. What I rather beg of
them is not to be alarmed and bewildered by the statements either of
scientific or religious dogmatists. No doubt we should like to know
everything, to have all our perplexities resolved; but we have reached
that point neither in religion nor in philosophy, nor even in science.
We must be content not to know. But because we do not know, we need
not therefore refuse to feel; there is no excuse for us to thrust the
whole tangle away and out of sight, and just to do as far as possible
what we like. We may admire and hope and love, and it is our business
to do all three. The thing that seems to me--and I am here only
stating a personal view--both possible and desirable, is to live as
far as we can by the law of beauty, not to submit to anything by which
our soul is shamed and insulted, not to be drawn into strife, not to
fall into miserable fault-finding, not to allow ourselves to be
fretted and fussed and agitated by the cares of life; but to say
clearly to ourselves, "that is a petty, base, mean thought, and I will
not entertain it; this is a generous and kind and gracious thought,
and I will welcome it and obey it."

One of the clearly discernible laws of life is that we can both check
and contract habits; and when we begin our day, we can begin it if we
will by prayer and aspiration and resolution, as much as we can begin
it with bath and toilet. We can say, "I will live resolutely to-day in
joy and good-humour and energy and kindliness." Those powers and
possibilities are all there; and even if we are overshadowed by
disappointment and anxiety and pain, we can say to ourselves that we
will behave as if it were not so; because there is undoubtedly a very
real and noble ple