Page:The kernel and the husk (Abbott, 1886).djvu/328

312 one to be selfish and luxurious or idle now, in the hope that he will be let off easily hereafter? Have I not said that there will be no "letting off"? That God will do the best thing for Nero—is that do you think likely to make Nero altogether an optimist in the life to come? I think He will do the best thing for me; but I sometimes shiver when I say it; awe possesses me, awe mingled with trust, but certainly not without a touch of fear. Assuredly the certainty of retribution in heaven makes me no optimist for myself or others, as to the life after death. In one sense only am I an optimist, that I believe that the best will ultimately prevail, and that faith, hope, and love, will prove the dominant powers in the Universe. This I believe, and to this belief I cling as a most precious hope, to be cherished by action as well as by meditation; but this is not, I think, what is ordinarily meant by optimism; and certainly it does not encourage the spirit of laissez faire which optimism is supposed to breed.

Next as to "compromise." The ordinary cant about "compromise" is sometimes the lazy expedient of those who wish to avoid the trouble of coming to a decision, and to shelter their indolence under a noble censoriousness. What they mean by "compromise" is any theory that attributes results to more than one cause. It is generally very easy to elaborate some extreme theory which shall explain almost everything by some single cause, by Faith, for example, on the one side, or by Reason on the other; and it is equally easy for the advocates on either side to demolish the theory of their adversaries; but it is far from easy afterwards to shew how, and to what extent, both causes are accountable for the result which has been fictitiously attributed to a single cause. Now the two extreme parties, in their contests, afford us fine cut-and-thrust exhibitions; the via media exhibits an organized