or no, there must have been an end in contemplation. Now no one can
believe that, in similar cases, any man would voluntarily devote all
his days to the adding link after link to an endless chain, for
the mere pleasure of labor. It is true he may be aware of the
wholesomeness of such labor as one of the means of cheerfulness; but,
if he have no further aim, his being aware of this result makes an
equable flow of spirits a positive object. Without _hope_,
uncompelled labor is an impossibility; and hope implies an object. Nor
would the veriest idler, who passes a whole day in whittling a stick,
if he could be brought to look into himself, deny it. So far from
having no object, he would and must acknowledge that he was in
fact hoping to relieve himself of an oppressive portion of time by
whittling away its minutes and hours. Here we have an extreme instance
of that which constitutes the real business of life, from the most
idle to the most industrious; namely, to attain to a _satisfying
state_.

But no one will assert that such a state was ever a consequence of the
attainment of any object, however exalted. And why? Because the motive
of action is left behind, and we have nothing before us.

Something to desire, something to look forward to, we _must_
have, or we perish,--even of suicidal rest. If we find it not here in
the world about us, it must be sought for in another; to which, as we
conceive, that secret ruler of the soul, the inscrutable, ever-present
spirit of Harmony, for ever points. Nor is it essential that the
thought of harmony should even cross the mind; for a want may be
felt without any distinct consciousness of the form of that which is
desired. And, for the most part, it is only in this negative way that
its influence is acknowledged. But this is sufficient to account