stic idea of the relation between man and the world, have a
special right to a respectful hearing; for it can scarcely be denied
that their optimistic explanation is invaluable, _if it is true_--

"So might we safely mock at what unnerves
Faith now, be spared the sapping fear's increase
That haply evil's strife with good shall cease
Never on earth."[A]

[Footnote A: _Bernard de Mandeville_.]

Despair is a great clog to good work for the world, and pessimists, as a
rule, have shown much more readiness than optimists to let evil have its
unimpeded way. Having found, like Schopenhauer, that "Life is an awkward
business," they "determine to spend life in reflecting on it," or at
least in moaning about it. The world's helpers have been men of another
mould; and the contrast between Fichte and Schopenhauer is suggestive of
a general truth:--"Fichte, in the bright triumphant flight of his
idealism, supported by faith in a moral order of the world which works
for righteousness, turning his back on the darker ethics of self-torture
and mortification, and rushing into the political and social fray,
proclaiming the duties of patriotism, idealizing the soldier,
calling to and exercising an active philanthrophy, living with
his nation, and continually urging it upwards to higher levels of
self-realization--Schopenhauer recurring to the idea of asceticism,
preaching the blessedness of the quiescence of all will, disparaging
efforts to save the nation or elevate the masses, and holding that each
has enough to do in raising his own self from its dull engrossment in
lower things to an absorption in that pure, passionless being which lies
far beyond all, even the so-called highest, pursuits of practical
life."[A]

[Footnote A: _Schopenhauer_, by Prof. Wallace.]

A pessimism, which is nothing more than flippant fault-finding,
frequently gains a cheap reputation for wisdom; and, on the other hand,
an optimism, which is really the result of much reflection and
experience, may be regarded as the product of a superficial spirit that
has never known the deeper evils of life. But, if pessimism be true, it
differs from other truths by its uselessness; for, even if it saves man
from the bitterness of petty disappointments, it does so only by making
the misery universal. There is no need to specify, when "_All_ is
vanity." The drowning man does not feel the discomfort of being wet. But
yet, if we reflect on the problem of evil, we sh