The majority of us, I apprehend, profess neither pessimism nor optimism.
We hold that the world is neither so good, nor so bad, as it conceivably
might be; and, as most of us have reason, now and again, to discover
that it can be. Those who have failed to experience the joys that make
life worth living are, probably, in as small a minority as those who
have never known the griefs that rob existence of its savour and turn
its richest fruits into mere dust and ashes.