How to be happy though human / by W. Béran Wolfe.

being deep in the useless problems of metaphysics or theological doctrine you may well suspect that he is neither paying his bills, nor adequately educating his children, nor helping his city clean up its slums. This does not mean that we should not attempt to search the Unknown and bring it within our reach by scientific and artistic research, or that we should take every mystery for granted. These are the good uses of thought. A practical principle to use if you are in doubt whether you are misusing thought for some futile end, is to ask yourself, “ What difference will it make to my neighbours if this proposition is true or untrue ? ” Does this knowledge make man's communal life on this crust of earth easier ? ” Only when we are utilizing the faculty of thought either in a creative, artistic activity or in work which helps us to understand the world in which we live and strive, and make it a better place to live in, can we be happy. The elevation of a technique, a device, a tool of life, to the status of a goal of life is one of the favourite forms of false compensation for the inferiority feeling. A child is faced with the problem of passing an examination in arithmetic. He is afraid he will not pass, and he wishes to avoid the final test of his personality. He develops a headache. He fools his parents and the teachers, but he does not succeed in deluding himself, because he senses the fact that the difficulty of passing the examina¬ tion is just as great as ever. But he has established a working principle of life : “ If you plead sickness you can avoid unpleasant tests of your self-esteem, and still retain the feeling that you could have passed the test if you had not been ill. Sickness is a good tool. It is worth cultivating." This child goes through life fighting all his battles by running to the sick room and pleading for leniency and special privilege. Even though he does meet certain tests in his later life, they are usually preceded or followed by sickness. Finally he becomes a hypochondriac, a walking encyclopaedia of pains and symptoms. He has succeeded