What
constitutes pleasure and what pain varies in the different stages of
racial and individual development. In civilized man we have the
pleasures of mind supplementing and in some cases replacing the
pleasures of sense. We talk, therefore, of the higher pleasures--the
pleasures of knowledge and learning, of wider sympathies and love, of
the contemplation of extended prosperity and concord, of hope for
international fraternity and peace, and for a life beyond the grave.
Happiness to the highly civilized will consist, therefore, of the
surplus of these pleasures over the pains of their negation.
Self-preservation is the basal law of life, and to preserve one's-self
in happiness, the completest preservation, for happiness promotes
health, and health longevity.
The first law of living nature then is to preserve life and the
enjoyment of it, and the pleasures sought, to increase the sum of
happiness will depend on the sentiments and emotions, _i.e._, on the
faculties of mind that education and experience have developed, in the
race, or in the individual.
My first thought is for myself, and my duty is to increase the sum of my
happiness. But the mental state we call happiness is relative to the
presence or absence of this state in others.
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