Men continually forget that Happiness is a condition of Mind and not a
disposition of circumstances, and one of the most common of errors is
that of confusing happiness with the means of happiness, sacrificing the
first for the attainment of the second. It is the error of the miser,
who begins by seeking money for the enjoyment it procures and ends by
making the mere acquisition of money his sole object, pursuing it to the
sacrifice of all rational ends and pleasures. Circumstances and
Character both contribute to Happiness, but the proportionate attention
paid to one or other of these great departments not only varies largely
with different individuals, but also with different nations and in
different ages. Thus Religion acts mainly in the formation of
dispositions, and it is especially in this field that its bearing on
human happiness should be judged. It influences, it is true, vastly and
variously the external circumstances of life, but its chief power of
comforting and supporting lies in its direct and immediate action upon
the human soul. The same thing is true of some systems of philosophy of
which Stoicism is the most conspicuous. The paradox of the Stoic that
good and evil are so entirely from within that to a wise man all
external circumstances are indifferent, represents this view of life in
its extreme form. Its more moderate form can hardly be better expressed
than in the saying of Dugald Stewart that 'the great secret of
happiness is to study to accommodate our own minds to things external
rather than to accommodate things external to ourselves.'[2] It is
eminently the characteristic of Eastern nations to place their ideals
mainly in states of mind or feeling rather than in changes of
circumstances, and in such nations men are much less desirous than in
European countries of altering the permanent conditions of their lives.
On the other hand, the tendency of those philosophies which treat
man--his opinions and his character--essentially as the result of
circumstances, and which aggrandise the influence of the external world
upon mankind, is in the opposite direction. All the sensational
philosophies from Bacon and Locke to our own day tend to concentrate
attention on the external circumstances and conditions of happiness. And
the same tendency will be naturally found in the most active, industrial
and progressive nations; where life is very full and busy; where its
competitions are most keen; where scientific discoveries are rapidly
multiplying pleasures or diminishing pains; where town life with its
constant hurry and change is the most prominent. In such spheres men
naturally incline to seek happiness from without rather than from
within, or, in other words, to seek it much less by acting directly on
the mind and character than through the indirect method of improved
circumstances.
English character on both sides of the Atlantic is an eminently
objective one--a character in which thoughts, interests and emotions
are most habitually thrown on that which is without. Introspection and
self-analysis are not congenial to it. No one can compare English life
with life even in the Continental nations which occupy the same rank in
civilisation without perceiving how much less Englishmen are accustomed
either to dwell upon their emotions or to give free latitude to their
expression. Reticence and self-restraint are the lessons most constantly
inculcated. The whole tone of society favours it. In times of great
sorrow a degree of shame is attached to demonstrations of grief which in
other countries would be deemed perfectly natural. The disposition to
dilate upon and perpetuate an old grief by protracted mournings, by
carefully observed anniversaries, by long periods of retirement from the
world, is much less common than on the Continent and it is certainly
diminishing. The English tendency is to turn away speedily from the
past, and to seek consolation in new fields of activity. Emotions
translate themselves speedily into action, and they lose something of
their intensity by the transformation. Philanthropy is nowhere more
active and more practical, and religion has in few countries a greater
hold on the national life, but English Protestantism reflects very
clearly the national characteristics. It, no doubt, like all religions,
lays down rules for the government of thought and feeling, but these are
of a very general character. Preeminently a regulator of conduct, it
lays comparatively little stress upon the inner life. It discourages, or
at least neglects that minutely introspective habit of thought which the
confessional is so much calculated to promote, which appears so
prominently in the writings of the Catholic Saints, and which finds its
special representation in the mystics and the religious contemplative
orders. Improved conduct and improved circumstances are to an English
mind the chief and almost the only measures of progress.
That this tendency is on the whole a healthy one, I, at least, firmly
believe, but it brings with it certain manifest limitations and somewhat
incapacitates men from judging other types of character and happiness.
The part that circumstances play in the formation of our characters is
indeed very manifest, and it is a humiliating truth that among these
circumstances mere bodily conditions which we share with the animals
hold a foremost place. In the long run and to the great majority of men
health is probably the most important of all the elements of happiness.
Acute physical suffering or shattered health will more than
counterbalance the best gifts of fortune, and the bias of our nature and
even the processes of our reasoning are largely influenced by physical
conditions. Hume has spoken of that 'disposition to see the favourable
rather than the unfavourable side of things which it is more happiness
to possess than to be heir to an estate of 10,000_l._ a year;' but this
gift of a happy temperament is very evidently greatly due to bodily
conditions. On the other hand, it is well known how speedily and how
powerfully bodily ailments react upon our moral natures. Every one is
aware of the morbid irritability that is produced by certain maladies of
the nerves or of the brain; of the deep constitutional depression which
often follows diseases of the liver, or prolonged sleeplessness and
other hypochondriacal maladies, and which not only deprives men of most
of their capacity of enjoyment, but also infallibly gives a colour and a
bias to their reasonings on life; of the manner in which animal passions
as well as animal spirits are affected by certain well-known conditions
of age and health. In spite of the 'coelum non animum mutant' of
Horace, few men fail to experience how different is the range of spirits
in the limbo-like atmosphere of a London winter and beneath the glories
of an Italian sky or in the keen bracing atmosphere of the mountain
side, and it is equally apparent how differently we judge the world when
we are jaded by a long spell of excessive work or refreshed after a
night of tranquil sleep. Poetry and Painting are probably not wrong in
associating a certain bilious temperament with a predisposition to envy,
or an anæmic or lymphatic temperament with a saintly life, and there are
well-attested cases in which an acute illness has fundamentally altered
characters, sometimes replacing an habitual gloom by buoyancy and
light.[3] That invaluable gift which enables some men to cast aside
trouble and turn their thoughts and energies swiftly and decisively into
new channels can be largely strengthened by the action of the will, but
according to some physiologists it has a well-ascertained physical
antecedent in the greater or less contractile power of the blood-vessels
which feed the brain causing the flow of blood into it to be stronger or
less rapid. If it be true that 'a healthy mind in a healthy body' is the
supreme condition of happiness, it is also true that the healthy mind
depends more closely than we like to own on the healthy body.
These are but a few obvious instances of the manner in which the body
acts upon happiness. They do not mean that the will is powerless in the
face of bodily conditions, but that in the management of character it
has certain very definite predispositions to encounter. In reasonings on
life, even more than on other things, a good reasoner will consider not
only the force of the opposing arguments, but also the bias to which his
own mind is subject. To raise the level of national health is one of the
surest ways of raising the level of national happiness, and in
estimating the value of different pleasures many which, considered in
themselves, might appear to rank low upon the scale, will rank high, if
in addition to the immediate and transient enjoyment they procure, they
contribute to form a strong and healthy body. No branch of legislation
is more really valuable than that which is occupied with the health of
the people, whether it takes the form of encouraging the means by which
remedies may be discovered and diffused, or of extirpating by combined
efforts particular diseases, or of securing that the mass of labour in
the community should as far as possible be carried on under sound
sanitary conditions. Fashion also can do much, both for good and ill. It
exercises over great multitudes an almost absolute empire, regulating
their dress, their education, their hours, their amusements, their food,
their scale of expenditure; determining the qualities to which they
principally aspire, the work in which they may engage, and even the form
of beauty which they most cultivate. It is happy for a nation when this
mighty influence is employed in encouraging habits of life which are
beneficial or at least not gravely prejudicial to health. Nor is any
form of individual education more really valuable than that which
teaches the main conditions of a healthy life and forms those habits of
temperance and self-restraint that are most likely to attain it.
With its great recuperative powers Youth can do with apparent impunity
many things which in later life bring a speedy Nemesis; but on the other
hand Youth is pre-eminently the period when habits and tastes are
formed, and the yoke which is then lightly, willingly, wantonly assumed
will in after years acquire a crushing weight. Few things are more
striking than the levity of the motives, the feebleness of the impulses
under which in youth fatal steps are taken which bring with them a
weakened life and often an early grave. Smoking in manhood, when
practised in moderation, is a very innocent and probably beneficent
practice, but it is well known how deleterious it is to young boys, and
how many of them have taken to it through no other motive than a desire
to appear older than they are--that surest of all signs that we are very
young. How often have the far more pernicious habits of drinking, or
gambling, or frequenting corrupt society been acquired through a similar
motive, or through the mere desire to enjoy the charm of a forbidden
pleasure or to stand well with some dissipated companions! How large a
proportion of lifelong female debility is due to an early habit of tight
lacing, springing only from the silliest vanity! How many lives have
been sacrificed through the careless recklessness which refused to take
the trouble of changing wet clothes! How many have been shattered and
shortened by excess in things which in moderation are harmless, useful,
or praiseworthy,--by the broken blood-vessel, due to excess in some
healthy athletic exercise or game; by the ruined brain overstrained in
order to win some paltry prize! It is melancholy to observe how many
lives have been broken down, ruined or corrupted in attempts to realise
some supreme and unattainable desire; through the impulse of
overmastering passion, of powerful and perhaps irresistible temptation.
It is still sadder to observe how large a proportion of the failures of
life may be ultimately traced to the most insignificant causes and might
have been avoided without any serious effort either of intellect or
will.
The success with which medicine and sanitary science have laboured to
prolong life, to extirpate or diminish different forms of disease and to
alleviate their consequences is abundantly proved. In all civilised
countries the average of life has been raised, and there is good reason
to believe that not only old age but also active, useful, enjoyable old
age has become much more frequent. It is true that the gain to human
happiness is not quite as great as might at first sight be imagined.
Death is least sad when it comes in infancy or in extreme old age, and
the increased average of life is largely due to the great diminution in
infant mortality, which is in truth a very doubtful blessing. If extreme
old age is a thing to be desired, it is perhaps chiefly because it
usually implies a constitution which gives many earlier years of robust
and healthy life. But with all deductions the triumphs of sanitary
reform as well as of medical science are perhaps the brightest page in
the history of our century. Some of the measures which have proved most
useful can only be effected at some sacrifice of individual freedom and
by widespread coercive sanitary regulations, and are thus more akin to
despotism than to free government. How different would have been the
condition of the world, and how far greater would have been the
popularity of strong monarchy if at the time when such a form of
government generally prevailed rulers had had the intelligence to put
before them the improvement of the health and the prolongation of the
lives of their subjects as the main object of their policy rather than
military glory or the acquisition of territory or mere ostentatious and
selfish display!
There is, however, some reason to believe that the diminution of disease
and the prolongation of average human life are not necessarily or even
generally accompanied by a corresponding improvement in general health.
'Acute diseases,' says an excellent judge, 'which are eminently fatal,
prevail, on the contrary, in a population where the standard of health
is high.... Thus a high rate of mortality may often be observed in a
community where the number of persons affected with disease is small,
and on the other hand general physical depression may concur with the
prevalence of chronic maladies and yet be unattended with a great
proportion of deaths.'[4] An anæmic population, free from severe
illness, but living habitually at a low level of health and with the
depressed spirits and feeble capacity of enjoyment which such a
condition produces, is far from an ideal state, and there is much reason
to fear that this type is an increasing one. Many things in modern life,
among which ill-judged philanthropy and ill-judged legislation have no
small part, contribute to produce it, but two causes probably dominate
over all others. The one is to be found in sanitary science itself,
which enables great numbers of constitutionally weak children who in
other days would have died in infancy to grow up and marry and propagate
a feeble offspring. The other is the steady movement of population from
the country to the towns, which is one of the most conspicuous features
of modern civilisation. These two influences inevitably and powerfully
tend to depress the vitality of a nation, and by doing so to lower the
level of animal spirits which is one of the most essential elements of
happiness. Whether our improved standards of living and our much greater
knowledge of sanitary conditions altogether counteract them is very
doubtful.
In this as in most questions affecting life there are opposite dangers
to be avoided, and wisdom lies mainly in a just sense of proportion and
degree. That sanitary reform, promoted by governments, has on the whole
been a great blessing seems to me scarcely open to reasonable question,
but many of the best judges are of opinion that it may easily be pushed
to dangerous extremes. Few things are more curious than to observe how
rapidly during the past generation the love of individual liberty has
declined; how contentedly the English race are submitting great
departments of their lives to a web of regulations restricting and
encircling them. Each individual case must be considered on its merits,
and few persons will now deny that the right of adult men and women to
regulate the conditions of their own work and to determine the risks
that they will assume may be wisely infringed in more cases than the
Manchester School would have admitted. At the same time the marked
tendency of this generation to extend the stringency and area of
coercive legislation in the fields of industry and sanitary reform is
one that should be carefully watched. Its exaggerations may in more ways
than one greatly injure the very classes it is intended to benefit.
A somewhat corresponding statement may be made about individual sanitary
education. It is, as I have said, a matter of the most vital importance
that we should acquire in youth the knowledge and the habits that lead
to a healthy life. The main articles of the sanitary creed are few and
simple. Moderation and self-restraint in all things--an abundance of
exercise, of fresh air, and of cold water--a sufficiency of steady work
not carried to excess--occasional change of habits and abstinence from a
few things which are manifestly injurious to health, are the cardinal
rules to be observed. In the great lottery of life, men who have
observed them all may be doomed to illness, weak vitality, and early
death, but they at least add enormously to the chances of a strong and
full life. The parent will need further knowledge for the care of his
children, but for self-guidance little more is required, and with early
habits an observance of the rules of health becomes almost instinctive
and unconscious. But while no kind of education is more transcendently
important than this, it is not unfrequently carried to an extreme which
defeats its own purpose. The habit that so often grows upon men with
slight chronic maladies, or feeble temperament, or idle lives, of making
their own health and their own ailments the constant subject of their
thoughts soon becomes a disease very fatal to happiness and positively
injurious to health. It is well known how in an epidemic the
panic-stricken are most liable to the contagion, and the life of the
habitual valetudinarian tends promptly to depress the nerve energy which
provides the true stamina of health. In the words of an eminent
physician, 'It is not by being anxious in an inordinate or unduly fussy
fashion that men can hope to live long and well. The best way to live
well is to work well. Good work is the daily test and safeguard of
personal health.... The practical aim should be to live an orderly and
natural life. We were not intended to pick our way through the world
trembling at every step.... It is worse than vain, for it encourages and
increases the evil it attempts to relieve.... I firmly believe one half
of the confirmed invalids of the day could be cured of their maladies if
they were compelled to live busy and active lives and had no time to
fret over their miseries.... One of the most seductive and mischievous
of errors in self-management is the practice of giving way to inertia,
weakness and depression.... Those who desire to live should settle this
well in their minds, that nerve power is the force of life and that the
will has a wondrously strong and direct influence over the body through
the brain and the nervous system.'[5]
FOOTNOTES:
[2] _Active and Moral Powers_, ii. 312.
[3] Much curious information on this subject will be found in Cabanis'
_Rapports du physique et du moral de l'homme_.
[4] Kay's _Moral and Physical Condition of the Working Classes_, p. 75.
[5] Mortimer Granville's _How to Make the Best of Life_.