532 /'//A ./.l/AAVcV/A' JOURNAL OF SOCfOLOC, }
perforce subjective. Me is by sensibility and by logic egocentric. / first, others afterwards. . . . The thinkers that exercise their ingenuity in adapting him to the conditions of existence, in creating for him a world of his own, in laying down the rules for his conduct, and in seeking foundations for it least open to attack, must not forget that his only cherished aim is his own happiness." '
The happiness that man has always sought and is still seek- ing is, however, more or less relative. I have shown what is the condition of the animal in the wild state and how far short it falls of a state of ideal happiness. While man through his reason has undoubtedly improved upon that state, has reduced the enormous death rate, and has both lessened his pains and increased his pleasures, he has, to offset these gains, the evils of an intensified memory, the new powers of imagination and of anticipation, and a swarm of delicate mental capacities for feel- ing unknown to humbler creatures. And what has been his real condition from this point of view ? A single glance into the lower strata of society even today is sufficient to show that it represents a pain economy. The leading motive still is fear, and the chief effort is not to enjoy, but simply to live. With all due allowance made for the superior "contentment" of the lower classes, and of their incapacity to enjoy the things that the more favored chiefly value, it must still be admitted that the great mass even in civilized countries lead a negative rather than a positive existence.
While it may not be possible to draw any line, it is evident that there exists somewhere a line that separates the negative from the positive state of existence- the pain from the pleasure economy. If we call all pains minus and all pleasures//^, that line will fall at the point where the algebraic sum of pains and pleasures is equal to zero. Any society below that line repre- sents a pain economy, and only those societies that lie above that line represent a pleasure economy. There are certain tests which may be applied in trying to decide on which side of the
' The Monisl, Vol. VI, No. i, Chicago, October, 1895, pp. 46, 49.
