Is not the generous hospitality which western
countries give to these faiths due to the fact that
the burden of suffering rests so largely on western
minds also ?

Whatever the explanation of isolated experi-
ences, the argument by which pessimism justifies
itself is threefold : the testimony of others as to
the outlook,* as embodied in literature — especially
poetry and philosophy ; personal experience of
suffering with no hope of escape ; observation of
how life and the universe appear to those living in
our time. This is the argument offered. But the
causes of pessimism, other than such as are found
in the temperament, in physical disease, and in the
constancy of suffering, lie much deeper. Where
shall they be found ?

Pessimism is almost a necessity where there is
faith neither in God nor in a future life. The
gloom of existence without this light is illustrated



THE BASIS OF OPTIMISM 83

in the drama of Job, which is the sublimest study
of human suffering, and the causes of it, 0neCauseof
that the world contains. A man suffers Pesaimism -
enough to crush one who is less strong, and the
suffering is without any apparent cause. His
friends gather around him, and aggravate his
misery with the hard and cruel theology and phi-
losophy which teach that suffering is always a sign
of divine displeasure. That teaching forces the in-
quiry as to what kind of a Deity He must be who
can allow such penalties when there has been no
conscious wrongdoing. The result is that Job ap-
pears to the men of his time to be an infidel who
merits his fate. He repudiates their God ; and his
case is utterly dark until two faint gleams of light
give encouragement. The first is the conviction
that if there is a God there must some time be an
explanation of what seems to be inexplicable.
