Happiness: Essays on the meaning of life — Reading Notes

HAPPINESS: BY CARL HILTY

ESSAYS ON THE MEANING OF LIFE BY CARL HILTY

PROFESSOR OF CONSTITUTIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY OF BERN. TRANSLATED BY FRANCIS GREENWOOD PEABODY PROFESSOR OF CHRISTIAN MORALS IN HARVARD UNIVERSITY, CAMBRIDGE

NEW YORK: THE MACMILLAN CO. LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., L^{TD.} 1903

COPYRIGHT, 1903, BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY

Set up and electrotyped January, 1903. Reprinted June, October, 1903.

Norwood Press: Berwick & Smith Co., Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.

ESSAY I PAGE THE ART OF WORK 3

ESSAY II HOW TO FIGHT THE BATTLES OF LIFE 25

ESSAY III GOOD HABITS 45

ESSAY IV THE CHILDREN OF THIS WORLD ARE WISER THAN THE CHILDREN OF LIGHT 61

ESSAY V THE ART OF HAVING TIME 73

ESSAY VI HAPPINESS 97

ESSAY VII THE MEANING OF LIFE 127

_Great numbers of thoughtful people are just now much perplexed to know what to make of the facts of life, and are looking about them for some reasonable interpretation of the modern world. They cannot abandon the work of the world, but they are conscious that they have not learned the art of work. They have to fight the battle of life, but they are not sure what weapons are fit for that battle. They are so beset by the cares of living that they have no time for life itself. They observe that happiness often eludes those who most eagerly pursue it; and that the meaning of life is often hidden from those whose way would seem to be most free. To this state of mind--hesitating, restless, and dissatisfied, in the world but not content to be of the world--the reflections of Professor Hilty, as published in Switzerland and Germany, have already brought much reassurance and composure; and their message seems hardly less applicable to English and American life. Here also the fever of commercialism threatens the vitality of idealism, and here also the art of life is lost in the pace of living. Religion to a great many educated people still seems, as Bishop Butler wrote in 1736, “not so much as a subject of inquiry. This seems agreed among persons of discernment”; and a book about religion might still begin with the words which Schleiermacher wrote in 1806: “It may well surprise the wise men of this age that any one should still venture to ask their attention for a subject which they have so wholly abandoned.” And yet, in regions of experience which no one fails sooner or later to enter,--regions of great joy and sorrow, experiences of serious duty and bewildering doubts of the meaning of life,--many a mind that has seemed to itself to have outgrown religion looks about for a religion that is real. Such a mind will not be satisfied with a left-over faith; it will not be tempted by an ecclesiastical omniscience. It demands sanity, reserve, wisdom, and insight, a competent witness of the things of the Spirit. This is the state of mind to which this little book is addressed. The author makes his appeal not to discussion, but to life. He reports the story of a rational experience. He walks with confidence because he knows the way. He accepts the saying of Pico della Mirandola: “Philosophia veritatem quaerit, ... religio possidet.” Let us take life, he says, just as it is and must be, and observe that the doors which lead into its inner meaning open only to the key of a reasonable faith._

_It might be fancied that a writer thus described must be a recluse or mystic, remote from the spirit of the modern world and judging experiences which he does not share. Quite the contrary is the fact. The philosophy of life which he teaches is wrought out of large experience, both of academic and political affairs, and that which draws readers to the author is his capacity to maintain in the midst of important duties of public service an unusual detachment of desire and an interior quietness of mind. His short Essays are the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, told in the language of modern life; the Imitation of Christ, expressed with the academic reserve of a modern gentleman._

_Some years ago I obtained permission from Professor Hilty to translate for English and American readers a few of these Essays which had found such acceptance in Switzerland and Germany; and the present volume, containing his first series, has been a pleasant occupation of some vacation days. I have found it necessary, however, to use much freedom in dealing with his idiomatic and epigrammatic style, and have perhaps exceeded the legitimate right of a translator in the attempt to reproduce the tone and temper of the author. Nothing, I think, is here which Professor Hilty has not said; but there are many shiftings of phrase and many ruptures of German sentences; and here and there a passage has been omitted which seemed important to Swiss readers only. The Essay on Epictetus, being rather a compilation and review than an illustration of Hilty’s own philosophy of life, is omitted; as are also the copious and discursive footnotes which enrich the original. I trust that these liberties and omissions may not obscure the qualities of Professor Hilty’s mind--its insight, sagacity, humor, and devoutness--which no one who has had the privilege of his personal acquaintance can recall without affection and gratitude._

_Cambridge, Massachusetts, October 15, 1902._

_Carl Hilty was born February 28, 1833, at Chur, Switzerland. He was a student at Göttingen, Heidelberg, London, and Paris; and an advocate at Chur, 1855-1874. In 1874 he was appointed Professor of Constitutional Law (Staats- und Völkerrecht) in the University of Bern, which position he still holds. Since 1890 he has been a member of the Swiss House of Representatives (Nationalrat); and in 1901 he was Rector of the University of Bern. Among his scientific writings may be named the following: Theorists and Idealists of Democracy (Theoristen und Idealisten der Demokratie), Bern, 1868; Ideas and Ideals of Swiss Politics (Ideen und Ideale schweizerischer Politik), Bern, 1875; Lectures on the Swiss Political System (Vorlesungen über die Politik der Eidgenossenschaft), Bern, 1879; On Capital Punishment (Ueber die Wiedereinführung der Todesstrafe), Bern, 1879; The Neutrality of Switzerland (Die Neutralität der Schweiz in ihrer heutigen Auffassung), Bern, 1889 (French translation by Mentha, 1889); The Referendum in Switzerland (Das Referendum im schweizerischen Staatsrecht), Archiv für öffentliches Recht, 1887; The Boer War (Der Burenkrieg), Bern, 1900. He has also been the editor of the Journal of Swiss Jurisprudence (Politisches Jahrbuch der schweizerischen Eidgenossenschaft) since 1886._

_In the midst of this scientific activity Professor Hilty has expressed his inner life through a series of little books issued at intervals during the last ten years, as follows: Happiness (Glück), First Series, 1891, Second Series, 1895, Third Series, 1898; On Reading and Speaking (Lesen und Reden), 1891; For Sleepless Nights (Für schlaflose Nächte) [Brief Readings for each Day of the Year], 1901._

The most important of all arts is the art of work; for if one could thoroughly understand this art, all other knowledge and conduct would be infinitely simplified. Few people, however, really know how to work, and even in an age when oftener perhaps than ever before we hear of “work” and “workers” one cannot observe that the art of work makes much positive progress. On the contrary, the general inclination seems to be to work as little as possible, or to work for a short time in order to pass the remainder of one’s life in rest.

Work and rest--are they then aims in life which are positively contradictory? This must be our first inquiry; for while every one is ready with praise of work, pleasure in work does not always come with the praising. So long as the disinclination to work is so common an evil, indeed almost a disease of modern civilization, so long as every one as soon as possible endeavors to escape from the work which he thus theoretically praises, there is absolutely no hope for any bettering of our social condition. Indeed, if work and rest were contradictories, our social conditions would be wholly beyond redemption.

For every human heart longs for rest. The humblest and least intellectual know the need of it, and in its highest moods, the soul seeks relief from constant strain. Indeed, the imagination has found no better name for a future and happier existence than a state of eternal rest. If work, then, is necessary, and rest is the cessation of work, then the saying--“In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread”--is indeed a bitter curse and this earth is a “vale of tears.” In every generation there are but few who can on such terms be said to lead a worthy or a human life; and even these can do so only by dooming other human beings to the curse of work and by holding these others fast bound in its slavery. It was from this point of view that the ancient authors pictured the hopeless slavery of the many as the condition under which the few might become free citizens of a civilized State; and even in the nineteenth century, a considerable part of the population of one great nation, with Christian preachers, Bible in hand, directing them, maintained on the field of battle the proposition that one race should be from generation to generation condemned to be the slave of another. Culture, it is said, grows only under conditions of wealth, and wealth only through accumulation of capital, and capital only through accumulation of the work of those who are not justly paid; that is to say, through injustice.

Such are the conceptions of society which at once confront us as we approach our subject. The following pages are not, however, to be devoted to any profound consideration either of the relative or of the absolute truth of these conceptions. I suggest, at this point, only the obvious truth, that if, not some people, but all, would work and work faithfully, the “Social Question,” as it is called, would be forthwith solved; and I may add, that by no other means whatever is it likely to be solved. Faithful work, however, is not to be brought about by compulsion. Even if the physical means of universal compulsion were present, no fruitful work would come of it. It is the desire for work which must be kindled in man; and this brings us back again to consider the principles which may be applied to this desire.

The desire for work, we must, first of all, admit, cannot be attained by instruction; or even--as our daily experience sadly testifies--by mere example. It must be reached by reflection and experience; and experience thus reflected on will reveal to any serious inquirer the following facts. Rest, such as is desired, is not to be found in complete inactivity of mind or body, or in as little activity as possible. On the contrary, it is to be found only in well-adapted and well-ordered activity of both body and mind. The whole nature of man is created for activity, and Nature revenges herself bitterly on him who would rashly defy this law. Man is indeed driven out of the paradise of absolute rest, and God gives him the command to work, but with the work comes the consolation that work is essential to happiness.

True rest, therefore, issues from work. Intellectual rest occurs through the perception of fruitful progress in one’s work, and through the solving of one’s problems. Physical rest is found in those natural intermissions which are given by daily sleep and daily food, and the essential and restful pause of Sunday. Such a condition of continuous and wholesome activity, interrupted only by these natural pauses, is the happiest condition on earth, and no man should wish for himself any other outward happiness. Indeed, we may go a step farther and add that it does not very much matter what the nature of this activity may be. Genuine activity, which is not mere sport, has the property of becoming interesting as soon as a man becomes seriously absorbed in it. It is not the kind of activity which ensures happiness to us; it is the joy of action and attainment. The greatest unhappiness which one can experience is to have a life to live without a work to do, and to come to the end of life without its fruit of accomplished work.

It is, therefore, wholly justifiable to speak of the “right to work.” Indeed, it is the most primitive of all human rights. The unemployed are, we must admit, the most unfortunate of people. There are, however, quite as many of these, and perhaps more of them, in what we call the better classes than among what we call the working classes. The latter are driven to work by necessity, while the former, through their mistaken ways of education, their prejudices, and the imperious custom which in certain classes forbids genuine work, find themselves almost absolutely and by heredity condemned to this great unhappiness. Each year we see them turning their steps with spiritual weariness and _ennui_ to the Swiss mountains and health-resorts, from which in vain they anticipate refreshment. Once, the summer was enough to give them at least a temporary restoration from their disease of idleness. Now, they have to add the winter also, and soon the fair valleys which they have converted into hospitals will be open all the year to a restless throng, ever seeking rest and never finding it, because it does not seek rest in work. “Six days shalt thou labor,” not less and not more,--with this prescription most of the nervous diseases of our time would be healed, except so far as they are an inherited curse from idle ancestors. With this prescription most of the physicians in sanitariums and insane asylums would lose their practice. Life is not given to man to enjoy, but, so far as may be, to use effectively. One who does not recognize this has already lost his spiritual health. Indeed, it is not possible for him to retain even his physical health as he might under conditions of natural activity and reasonable ways of living. The days of our age are threescore years and ten, and some are so strong that they come to fourscore years; yet though there be labor and sorrow in these years of work, still they have been precious: thus we read the ancient saying. Perhaps, indeed, this was its original meaning.

We do well, however, to add at once one limitation. Not all work is of equal value, and there is spurious work which is directed to fictitious ends, and work which is itself fictitious in its form. Much, for instance, of the sewing and embroidering done by cultivated women, much of the parading of soldiers, much of what is called art, like the useless drumming on the piano by persons with no musical sense, a considerable part of the sportsman’s life, and, not least, the time devoted to keeping one’s accounts,--all these are occupations of this fictitious nature. A sagacious and wide-awake person must look for something more satisfying than these. Here also is the reason why factory labor, and, in short, all mechanical occupation in which one does but a part of the work, gives meagre satisfaction, and why an artisan who completes his work, or an agricultural laborer, is, as a rule, much more contented than factory operatives, among whom the social discontent of the modern world first uttered itself. The factory workman sees little of the outcome of his work. It is the machine that works, and he is a part of it. He contributes to the making of one little wheel, but he never makes a whole clock, which might be to him his work of art and an achievement worthy of a man. Mechanical work like this fails to satisfy because it offends that natural consciousness of human worth which the humblest human being feels. On the other hand, the happiest workmen are those who can absolutely lose themselves in their work: the artist whose soul must be wholly occupied with his subject, if he hopes to grasp and reproduce it; the scholar who has no eye for anything beyond his special task. Indeed, the same thing is to be said of those people whom we call “one-idea-ed” and who have created their own little world within one narrow sphere. All these have at least the feeling--sometimes, no doubt, without adequate reason--that they are accomplishing real work for the world; a true, useful, necessary work, which is not mere play; and many such persons, by this continuous, strenuous, and sometimes even physically unhealthy activity, attain great old age, while idle and luxurious men and women of society, who are, perhaps, the least useful and least productive class of the modern world, must devote much of their time to the restoration of their health.

The first thing, then, for our modern world to acquire is the conviction and experience that well-directed work is the necessary and universal condition of physical and intellectual health, and for this reason is the way to happiness. From this it necessarily follows that the idle class is to be regarded, not as a superior and favored class, but as that which they are,--spiritually defective and diseased persons who have lost the right principle for the guidance of their lives. As soon as this opinion becomes general and established, then, and only then, will the better era for the world begin. Until that time, the world will suffer from the excessive work of some, balancing the insufficient work of others, and it still remains a question which of these two types is in reality the more unfortunate.

Why is it then that these principles--to which the experience of thousands of years testifies, which any one, whether he works or does not work, can test for himself, and which all the religions and philosophies preach--have not made their just impression? Why is it, for instance, that there are still thousands of women who defend with much passion many passages of Bible-teaching, and yet, with astonishing composure and in opposition to an express command of the Bible, take one day at the most, or perhaps none at all, for work, and six for refined idleness? All this proceeds in large degree from an irrational division and arrangement of work, which thus ill-arranged may indeed become a positive burden.

And this brings me back to the title of my Essay. Instruction in the art of work is possible only for him who is already convinced of my first proposition, that some work is necessary, and who would gladly give himself to work if it were not that, to his surprise, some hindrance confronts him. Yet, work, like every other art, has its ways of dexterity, by means of which one may greatly lessen its laboriousness; and not only the willingness to work, but even the capacity to work, is so difficult to acquire that many persons fail of it altogether.

The first step, then, toward the overcoming of a difficulty is in recognizing the difficulty. And what is the difficulty which chiefly hinders work? It is laziness. Every man is naturally lazy. It always costs one an effort to rise above one’s customary condition of physical indolence. Moral laziness is, in short, our original sin. No one is naturally fond of work; there are only differences of natural and constitutional excitability. Even the most active-minded, if they yielded to their natural disposition, would amuse themselves with other things rather than with work.

Love of work must, therefore, proceed from a motive which is stronger than the motive of physical idleness. And this motive is to be found in either of two ways. It may be a low motive, as, for instance, a passion like ambition or self-seeking, or, indeed, the sense of necessity, as in the preservation of life; or it may be a high motive, like the sense of duty or love, either for the work itself, or for the persons for whom the work is done. The nobler motive has this advantage, that it is the more permanent and is not dependent on the mere success of work. It does not lose its force either through the disheartening effect of failure, or the satisfying effect of success. Thus it happens that ambitious and self-seeking persons are often very diligent workers, but are seldom continuous and evenly progressive workers. They are almost always content with that which looks like work, if it produce favorable conditions for themselves, although it does nothing of this for their neighbors. Much of our mercantile and industrial activity--and, alas! we must add, much of the work of scholars and artists--has this mark of unreality.