faculties, than at the amassing of wealth; but this must not be
mistaken as meaning that we should neglect to acquire an adequate
supply of the necessaries of life. Wealth, in the strict sense of the
word, that is, great superfluity, can do little for our happiness; and
many rich people feel unhappy just because they are without any true
mental culture or knowledge, and consequently have no objective
interests which would qualify them for intellectual occupations. For
beyond the satisfaction of some real and natural necessities, all that
the possession of wealth can achieve has a very small influence upon
our happiness, in the proper sense of the word; indeed, wealth rather
disturbs it, because the preservation of property entails a great many
unavoidable anxieties. And still men are a thousand times more intent
on becoming rich than on acquiring culture, though it is quite certain
that what a man _is_ contributes much more to his happiness than
what he _has_. So you may see many a man, as industrious as an ant,
ceaselessly occupied from morning to night in the endeavor to increase
his heap of gold. Beyond the narrow horizon of means to this end, he
knows nothing; his mind is a blank, and consequently unsusceptible to
any other influence. The highest pleasures, those of the intellect,
are to him inaccessible, and he tries in vain to replace them by the
fleeting pleasures of sense in which he indulges, lasting but a brief
hour and at tremendous cost. And if he is lucky, his struggles result
in his having a really great pile of gold, which he leaves to
his heir, either to make it still larger, or to squander it in
extravagance. A life like this, though pursued with a sense of
earnestness and an air of importance, is just as silly as many another
which has a fool's cap for its symbol.

_What a man has in himself_ is, then, the chief element in his
happiness. Because this is, as a rule, so very little, most of those