want anything more than this we must deal with happiness itself, not with the negative conditions of it.  We must discern the highest good that is within the reach of each of us, and this may perhaps supply us with a motive for endeavouring to secure the same blessing for all.  But the matter depends entirely on what this highest good is—­on the end to which, given the social health, the social health will be directed.

The real answer to this question can be given, as I have said before, in terms of the individual only.  Social happiness is a mere set of ciphers till the unit of personal happiness is placed before it.  A man’s happiness may of course depend on other beings, but still it is none the less contained in himself.  If our greatest delight were to see each other dance the can-can, then it might be morality for us all to dance.  None the less would this be a happy world, not because we were all dancing, but because we each enjoyed the sight of such a spectacle.  Many young officers take intense pride in their regiments, and the character of such regiments may in a certain sense be called a corporate thing.  But it depends entirely on the personal character of their members, and all that the phrase really indicates is that a set of men take pleasure in similar things.  Thus it is the boast of one young officer that the members of his regiment all spend too much, of another that they all drink too much, of another that they are distinguished for their high rank, and of another that they are distinguished for the lowness of their sensuality.  What differentiates one regiment from another is first and before all things some personal source of happiness common to all its members.

And as it is with the character of a regiment, so too is it with the character of life in general.  When we say that Humanity may become a glorious thing as a whole, we must mean that each man may attain some positive glory as an individual.  What shall I get? and I? and I? and I?  What do you offer me? and me? and me?  This is the first question that the common sense of mankind asks. ’You must promise something to each of us,’ it says, ’or very certainly you will be able to promise nothing to all of us.’  There is no real escape in saying that we must all work for one another, and that our happiness is to be found in that.  The question merely confronts us with two other facets of itself.  What sort of happiness shall I secure for others? and what sort of happiness will others secure for me?  What will it be like?  Will it be worth having?  In the positivist Utopia, we are told, each man’s happiness is bound up in the happiness of all the rest, and is thus infinitely intensified.  All mankind are made a mighty whole, by the fusing power of benevolence.  Benevolence, however, means simply the wishing that our neighbours were happy, the helping to make them so, and lastly the being glad that they are so.  But happiness must plainly be something besides benevolence; else,