their guard against it. These are so much afraid of falling into error from the insidious influence of passion, that they run, or at least try to run into the opposite extreme, and doubt because they desire. In this way they may perhaps succeed in keeping the middle course; for if a bough incline too much in one direction, we ought to bend it in the other, more than we would otherwise wish. This line of conduct is evidently the result of reflection, and therefore not likely to be very general. But others there are whose very eagerness seems to abate their faith. They long so ardently after an object, and imagination in consequence so heightens its importance, that its attainment seems too much to be looked for. "It is too good to be true," is no unusual saying, and the sentiment is founded in nature. When we desire very strongly, we also fear that we shall not succeed; in other words, we fear disappointment, and this disappointment we are unwilling to increase by allowing ourselves to believe that we shall be fortunate. Fear of the pain of failure is then the cause of our disbelief or doubt; and the more fear prevails in the character, the more will its consequence be felt. On the same principle, some upon hearing any unhappy rumour instantly believe the worst. They are afraid of nursing desires which may terminate in more bitter anguish. The passion of fear explains these apparent anomalies, which are wholly unaccountable by reference to desire alone.

Desire being intended to lead to action, and hence to gratification, it is easy to see and admire the wisdom of the First Cause which willed that our wishes

should be bounded by our power of attainment. From a few unhappy cases we may judge what would have been the effects of an opposite law, and so find occasion to venerate the goodness of the same great Cause. Now and then we meet with hoary sinners whose powers have decayed long before their longings, and who live like some fallen spirits, mentioned by Dante, tormented with desire without hope. In all large capitals, particularly in Paris, there is also a set of men to be found, who with means very small, and minds badly regulated, are constantly hankering after the endless luxuries and amusements that are strewed around them, but of which they cannot partake. These outward sources of pleasure act as a tempting bait at which they are perpetually nibbling, yet never dare to swallow. The taste, however, is just sufficient to keep alive a desire which can never be fully gratified. Numerous objects of unattainable enjoyment acting upon a diseased state of mind sufficiently account for this phenomenon, which is so well known in Paris, that the phrase to live en rage is commonly used to express it.

There is, probably, no part of the character which can so little be modified by education as the greater or less tendency to hopefulness. It is not asserted that education can here do nothing, but nature assuredly does very much more. In nothing do we see greater differences between men. Taking the two extremes, there is no one who would not prefer the sanguine to the desponding disposition, but still it may be a question whether we can be too sanguine. Hume in his own life has said that he considered himself more fortunate with such a tendency to hope, than if he

had been born to ten thousand a year; and on the whole I doubt not he was right. The principal inconveniences attached to minds of this sort, are, first, that in constantly looking forward they are apt to disregard the present; secondly, their liability to disappointment. It follows directly from the principle of occupation to be afterwards dwelt upon, that the more we are engaged with the future the less can we be taken up with the present, and therefore we may neglect many duties, and lose many gratifications for which the present is the fit occasion. Moralists have often dwelt on the absurdity of our complaining of the general shortness of life while we are wishing it away in detail; but it is clear that if the future did not appear to us in more bright colours than the present, we should not long for its coming. Therefore it belongs to the sanguine disposition to make little of the passing hour. Again, by constantly dwelling on the future, its gratifications are forestalled, and that in two ways; first, by exaggeration, and secondly, by wearing out novelty ere the time, for what we have long thought of, when it comes is no longer new. Both lead to disappointment, for both render the promised bliss less than we had expected; and disappointment is a cause of bitterness, that gnawing canker of the soul. Some however there are whose lives may be compared to a ball of India rubber, which though constantly falling to the earth as often bounds from it again. Their hopes are for ever being blasted, but instantly they shoot out anew. Disappointment has no hold on these elastic spirits; they are restless and buoyant as a

healthy child, and their tears dry up as soon. Pleasure is their constant companion; pain but a momentary visitor; for they enjoy the advantages of hope, and scarcely know its evils."

This is an instance of the sanguine temperament pushed to its utmost extreme, and nothing, it would seem, can well be more favourable to happiness. It is apt, no doubt, to encourage very wild projects, which may end in ruin to the individual, as well as to all around him; and therefore where found, a more than usual judgment is necessary. Otherwise the extreme of hopefulness might lead to the extreme of folly. But to desire ardently and yet bear disappointment well, must be allowed to be the most happy disposition imaginable.

It will be shown under another head what is the kind of hope which chiefly contributes to our happiness, and in what way it conduces to that end. In the mean time we may observe that if a tendency to hope be good, that to fear is assuredly most unfortunate. Fear has been implanted in our nature as a preservative against danger, but when carried too far it produces just the opposite effect; for it dims the clearness of the understanding and unnerves the energy of the will. While it calls up airy spectres to haunt and torment the brain, it overlooks the substantial forms

6 At this moment I have in my eye an individual, who having suffered for years under one of the most painful diseases to which the frame is liable, and having consulted one physician after another without success, still feels confident of being cured. "L'espérance toute trompeuse qu'elle est sert au moins à nous conduire à la fin de la vie par un chemin agréable." Rochefoucauld.

which really lie in our way. It possesses the opposite qualities of a convex and a concave lens, for in magnifying certain dangers it equally diminishes the rest. The latter effect, indeed, is the necessary consequence of the former, for according to the principle of occupation, if the mind be engrossed with one thing, it must neglect another. Thus fear, which was meant for a friend, may become our worst foe.

Considered in itself and without reference to its consequences, fear is unalloyed misery. Therefore those characters and those conditions of life which are most liable to this emotion cannot be considered as enviable. Herein consists the misfortune of kings, who, as Bacon has observed, have few things to desire and many things to fear; and the same may be said of all who have reached the pinnacle of their wishes. They cannot rise, but they may fall. Therefore those pursuits are to be preferred which, instead of terminating in a fixed point, admit of an indefinite progress. We must always have an end in view, but it is well when this end serves to conduct us on to another. Moralists and satirists have often laughed at this chase which is ever ending, and yet is still beginning; but in deriding what is most agreeable to our nature, they have ridiculed that nature itself.

Were we to exercise our fancy in picturing a hell upon earth, we should search for an original in the hearts of those tyrants who having overthrown a constitution by violence, have afterwards ruled by

7 Essay on Empire.