and disappointment; that whoever
expects to be happy in this world makes a mistake; that there is
nothing on the earth worth striving for; that the principal business
of mankind should be to get ready to be happy in another world;
that the great occupation is to save your soul, and when you get
it saved, when you are satisfied that you are one of the elect,
then pack up all your worldly things in a very small trunk, take
it to the dock of time that runs out into the ocean of eternity,
sit down on it, and wait for the ship of death. And of course each
church is the only one that sells a through ticket which can be
depended on. In all religions, as far as I know, is an admixture
of asceticism, and the greater the quantity, the more beautiful
the religion has been considered, The tendency of the world to-
day is to enjoy life while you have it; it is to get something out
of the present moment; and we have found that there are things
worth living for even in this world. We have found that a man can
enjoy himself with wife and children; that he can be happy in the
acquisition of knowledge; that he can be very happy in assisting
others; in helping those he loves; that there is some joy in poetry,
in science and in the enlargement and development of the mind; that
there is some delight in music and in the drama and in the arts.
We are finding, poor as the world is, that it beats a promise the
fulfillment of which is not to take place until after death. The
world is also finding out another thing, and that is that the
gentlemen who preach these various religions, and promise these
rewards, and threaten the punishments, know nothing whatever of
the subject; that they are as blindly ignorant as the people they
pretend to teach, and the people are as blindly ignorant as the
animals below them. We have finally concluded that no human being
has the slightest conception of origin or of destiny, and that this
life, not only in its commencement but in its end, is just as
mysterious to-day as it was to the first man whose eyes greeted
the rising sun. We are no nearer the solution of the problem than
those who lived thousands of years before us, and we are just as
near it as those who will live millions of years after we are dead.
So many people having arrived at the conclusion that nobody knows
and that nobody can know, like sensible folks they have made up
their minds to enjoy life. I have often said, and I say again,
that I