of enjoyment that the human race possesses.  Here, then, is a distinct and intelligible task that the positive thinkers have set themselves.  They have taken everything away from life that to wise men hitherto has seemed to redeem it from vanity.  They have to prove to us that they have not left it vain.  They have to prove those things to be solid that have hitherto been thought hollow; those things to be serious that have hitherto been thought contemptible.  They must prove to us that we shall be contented with what has never yet contented us, and that the widest minds will thrive within limits that have hitherto been thought too narrow for the narrowest.

Now, of course, so far as we can tell without examining the matter, they may be able to accomplish this revolution.  There is nothing on the face of it that is impossible.  It may be that our eyes are only blinded to the beauty of the earth by having gazed so long and so vainly into an empty heaven, and that when we have learnt to use them a little more to the purpose, we shall see close at hand in this life what we had been looking for, all this while, in another.  But still, even if this revolution be possible, the fact remains that it is a revolution, and it cannot be accomplished without some effort.  Our positive thinkers have a case to be proved.  They must not beg the very point that is most open to contradiction, and which, when once duly apprehended, will be most sure to provoke it.  If this life be not incapable of satisfying us, let them show us conclusively that it is not.  But they can hardly expect that, without any such showing at all, the world will deliberately repel as a blasphemy what it has hitherto accepted as a commonplace.

This objection is itself so obvious that it has not escaped notice.  But the very fact of its obviousness has tended to hide the true force of it, and coming so readily to the surface, it has been set down as superficial.  It is, however, very constantly recognised, and is being met on all sides with a very elaborate answer.  It is this answer that I shall now proceed to consider.  It is a very important one, and it deserves our most close attention, as it contains the chief present argument for the positive faith in life.  I shall show how this argument is vitiated by a fundamental fallacy.

It is admitted that to a hasty glance there may certainly seem some danger of our faith in life’s value collapsing, together with our belief in God.  It is admitted that this is not in the least irrational.  But it is contended that a scientific study of the past will show us that these fears are groundless, and will reassure us as to the future.  We are referred to a new branch of knowledge, the philosophy of history, and we are assured that by this all our doubts will be set at rest.  This philosophy of history resembles, on an extended scale, the practical wisdom learnt by the man of the world.  As long as a man is inexperienced and new to life, each calamity as it comes to him seems something unique and overwhelming, but as he lives on, suffers more of them, and yet finds that he is not overwhelmed, he learns to reduce them to their right dimensions, and is able, with sufficient self-possession, to let each of them teach some useful lesson to him.