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human happiness, holds that pleasures differ only in continuance and intensity.

His words are:-'In which inquiry (into the nature of happiness) I will omit much usual declamation on the dignity and capacity of our nature; the superiority of the soul to the body, of the rational to the animal part of our constitution; upon the worthiness, refinement, and delicacy of some satisfactions, or the meanness, grossness, and sensuality of others; because I hold that pleasures differ in nothing but in continuance and intensity; from a just computation of which, confirmed by what we observe of the apparent cheerfulness, tranquillity, and contentment of men of different tastes, tempers, stations, and pursuits, every question concerning human happiness must receive its decision.'--Moral Philosophy, Book I., Chap. 6.

For my own part, I doubt the completness of a theory of happiness restricted to the consideration of those two attributes. The distinction in pleasures (and in pains) between the acute and voluminous or massive (Intensity and Quantity) is pregnant with vital results. Then, again, the attribute of Endurability, or continuance without fatigue, and the farther, and related attribute of ideal persistence, are grounds of superiority in pleasures, being the main circumstances implied in refinement. Even with all these points taken into account, the problem is still burdened with serious complications that a man like Paley would rather not grapple with; I mean more particularly the nature of disinterested action, and the sway of mixed ideas.

The characters of Feeling are, 1st, those of Feeling proper, as Pleasure and Pain, which we call Emotional; * 2dly, Volitional characters, or the influence on the Will; 3dly, Intellectual characters, or the bearings upon Thought; we may add, 4thly, certain mixed characters, such as the relations to Forecasting or Sustained Volition, Desire and Belief.

See, on the use of this adjective, The Senses and the Intellect, second edition, p. 625.

FEELING AS HAPPINESS.

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Emotional characters of Feeling.

12. Every Feeling has its PHYSICAL SIDE, to which a certain share of attention is, in my judgment, always due. In the Sensations of the Senses, we can point to a distinct physical origin) or agency, as well as to a diffused wave of effects. In the Emotions, the physical origin is less definable, being a supposed coalition of sensational effects with one another and with ideas; and our knowledge is clearest as regards the diffusion, or outward manifestations. The notable contrast, on the physical side, lies between the Pleasurable and the Painful, and between their various gradations; but our power of discrimination does not stop here. Wonder, Love, and Power are all pleasurable, and yet differently embodied, or expressed Fear, Anger, and Grief are painful, but with outward characters special to each.

On the MENTAL SIDE, we recognise Quality, that is, Pleasure, Pain, or Indifference; Degree, in its two modes of Intensity and Quantity; and Speciality, or points that may distinguish states substantially equivalent in quality and in degree. These distinctions have been largely illustrated under the Muscular Feelings and the Sensations; and a very few additional observations will here suffice.

13. Feeling as Happiness or Misery. Our conscious life is made up of Pleasures, Pains, and states of Indifference. Our Happiness may be considered either as the sum of our pleasures, leaving the pains out of account, or as the surplus of pleasure over pain, representing, as it were, the value of existence to us.

The aptitude for Pleasure is the aggregate of all the sensibilities of the constitution in the degree special to each person; and the pleasure realized is according to the extent of stimulus accorded to these, with the observance of due limit and alternation.

The state of Pleasure, strange as the assertion may seem, is a state of transition and unrest; it is always coming or going; there is no complete repose except under Indifference.

The proofs are found in the nature of the state, which originates in sudden change, begins to fade as soon as manifested, and urges the will for continuance or increase.

That Pain is a state of unrest will be more willingly conceded. Here, too, there is a shock of change in some organ, the brain being necessarily included, with collateral disturbances, and a series of promptings to voluntary action for relief. The course run through is a complicated one; and it is intéresting to survey the various outgoings of the system for restoring the equilibrium. In severe pain, the violence of the gesticulations has a derivative and sedative, although exhausting, effect; the stimulus of the glandular organs brings into play some of the sources of pleasurable emotion, as in grief; the voluntary powers are engaged in alleviation; all available pleasures are sought for their neutralizing efficacy; and, finally, the nervous system, disturbed by the shock, commences a process of adjustment and adaptation to the new state of things, proceeding, it may be, to insensibility, or to death. These rectifying measures put a limit to possible agony. In attaining the maximum of pain, as of pleasure, the infliction must be remitted, the healthy condition restored, and the irritation applied to some different sensibility. It is to be hoped that the ministers of the Inquisition never understood the full bearings of the principle of Relativity as applied to human suffering.

The shock of a great irreparable loss rectifies itself in a similar manner. At first, the agony is extreme and wasting; in time, the system, adjusting itself to the altered condition, assumes a tranquil but reduced tone; there may be comparatively little pain, but the moments of pleasure, few in number and feeble in intensity, are scattered over sterile tracts of indifference; while a great expansion is given to the workings of the tender sentiment.

14. Feeling as Indifference or neutral excitement. We may be mentally alive without either pleasure or pain. A state of feeling may have considerable intensity, and yet be neutral. Surprise is a familiar instance. Some surprises give us

NEUTRAL EXCITEMENT.

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delight, others cause suffering, but many do neither yet in all cases we are emotionally moved. The diffusive wave is present; the mind is awake, alive, stirred; we are not made either happy or miserable, but we are occupied and engrossed for the time being. So Fear, essentially a painful emotion, may chance to be deprived of the sting, without ceasing to exist. The Tender feeling, which is a principal source of our happiness, may be strongly roused in circumstances devoid of that accompaniment. The mother, in her love for her child, may have much more excitement and occupation of mind than she has pleasure or pain. A man's aspirations towards a high position are not necessarily proportioned to the enjoyment he either feels or anticipates in that connexion; all that can be certainly affirmed is, that the sentiment of honour or love of power has got a footing in the mind. There is such a thing as being laid hold of, through a sort of infatuation, by a feeling that in no way contributes to our happiness. We may be unable to discard from our thoughts the image of a person that we hate; or we may be goaded on to a pursuit merely because we cannot shake ourselves free of a certain train of ideas. The fascination of a precipice, or of a serpent, belongs to this species of emotional influence. When an emotion reaches the pitch termed 'passion,' it sometimes happens that the pleasurable element, supposing that to be the character of it, rises to the same high degree, but it may also happen that the excitement is far beyond the pleasure. Insanity illustrates this position. The victim of a delusion is not happy to the degree that his mind is possessed with a fixed idea of grandeur or power, nor unhappy according as he supposes himself enchained to some horrible destiny. An emotion may seize any one as a fixed idea, and exert by that means a disproportionate influence on the conduct; be it love, self-complacency, power, malevolence, wealth, or knowledge. We shall afterwards see how the action of the Will is indirectly influenced by these pre-occupations.

The excitement now supposed having neither a pleasurable

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nor a painful quality, cannot be estimated or described otherwise than by a reference to its detaining or engrossing the mind. A shock of surprise, which may neither please nor pain me, lays hold of my mental framework, my attention and regards, preventing other influences from developing themselves, and leaving a certain impression behind, which becomes one of my recollections afterwards. A great intellectual efficiency belongs to these emotions, albeit they are neither pleasurable nor painful. Awakened attention is a consequence of every state of excitement, whether neutral or otherwise.

Volitional Characters of Feeling.

15. Although the operations of the Will are conceived by us as something distinct from, or superadded to, the operation of Feeling proper, yet in every volition, rightly so named, the stimulus, or antecedent, is some feeling. The genuine antecedents are pleasure and pain. The neutral emotions just discussed, have no immediate power of stimulating activitytheir efficacy is indirect. A pleasure, present or prospective

-a feast, a concert, or an acquisition of property-makes me go forth in a course of active pursuit; an impending evil makes me alike active in a career of avoidance. A neutral feeling spurs me in neither way by the proper stimulus of the will; nevertheless, by keeping a certain object fixed in the view, it is liable to set me to work, according to a law of the constitution different from the laws of volition, namely, the tendency to convert into actuality whatever strongly possesses us in idea. I am possessed with the notion of becoming acquainted with a secret, which, when revealed, would add nothing to my pleasure; yet, by virtue of a sort of morbid occupation of my mind on the subject, the idea shuts out my more relevant concerns, and so works itself into action.

Thus our conduct is ruled by our pleasures and pains, through the proper and legitimate operation of the Will, and by our other emotions, through the stand they take as persisting ideas. Hence, by marking the line of action dictated

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