While man wants many things there is usually one thing that he wants most of all, and which, if realized, would content him. So he thinks, but we know from experience when one want is realized a new one takes its place. Toward this special want man will react in one of several ways.

In the first place, if he wants hard enough, if his want is possible for one like himself to attain, if it is one that can be honourably attained, he may put his shoulder to the wheel, and work to the best of his ability toward reaching his goal. If he is courageous he will not be downhearted or dissuaded from his course by obstacles; these will stimulate greater effort, and make the want all the more desirable. And, if he is like the majority of ordinary mortals, his want will seem necessary to his happiness because, in his reveries, he has highly coloured it, has pictured the time when realization will replace anticipation. But, in addition, his thoughts have been constructive, directed toward removing the obstacles to attainment. His day-dreams simply serve to maintain his effort; often they are the destroyers of discouragement. The writer has in mind a physician who, having had to work his way through college, often became discouraged and thought of giving up the struggle. However, at such times, his day dreams, in which he pictured himself working among deformed children for whom he had always a tender feeling, were sufficient to stimulate him, so that he won the fight. Day-dreams that are accompanied by effort, that stimulate one to accomplish some useful work are, in every way, good for a man. Such dreams have re- } suited in inventions, works of art and literature, have peopled the professions with boys who sprang from humble homes. Work is the law, and, other things being equal, nothing exists but what can be conquered by it.

Work that requires self-sacrifice, perseverance, that is not conducive to one's constant comfort, is not, however, very popular. Thus, many who are unwilling to put forth the necessary effort, or who have not the health, or other requisites which would make the want possible of attainment will be apt to react to the want in a different way. They seek to delude themselves into the belief that what they wish is not really necessary for their happiness, but by their actions reveal that they have failed to convince themselves of this. Instead of bending their energies toward something they can attain easily, they constantly seek flaws in the want or in those that already possess it. For example, a person may desire a college education, but, because he does not care to study, or work his way, or put up with any other inconveniences that might be necessary, he seeks consolation, of the sour grape variety, in paying particular attention to the number of college graduates who have failed to make a success in life, the number of non-college men who have proved great successes; he enjoys the sarcastic remarks directed against college men by non-college men; he is every ready on the least provocation to deride the merits of any college man he meets. We hear others denouncing the rich; who know all the flaws of our prominent people. We see examples in everyday life; girls who deride the beauty or clothes of another girl; men who scoff at the wage So-and-So is said to receive, his popularity, etc.

Constructive criticism is always welcomed. Yet we fail to find any of this criticism in the few examples given above. And if those who adapted themselves to their ungranted wishes in such a way realized that they betray themselves to the well-educated person, they would not be so prone to pass their opinions. By their words and their acts they show us that they want something that some one else has; that they would really like to have what another person possesses; that the denial of the want has made them bitter. They are simply projecting their own difficulties to some one or something else. They hurt no one but themselves; their wish is real, and pretence cannot drown it. They are putting themselves in the way of becoming envious, hateful creatures. Envy simply means that we want something some one else has. If the thing is wanted badly, envy leads to hate. All hate is destructive, chiefly to one's self. Naturally wishing to believe well of ourselves, we hate because our wishes have been opposed; the hate seems to come from the hated person whereas it proceeds from within ourselves.

An adaptation which turns one into an envious and otherwise undesirable person is, of course, faulty. It does not render the want less desirable; neither does it add to one's happiness. Instead, it makes one bitter, a chronic fault-finder. Those who make such faulty adaptations are to be found among those who have never a good word to say for any one, who criticize every established institution, who peddle gossip, whose judgment and criticism are worthless because they are distorted by, and proceed from, an envious soul. These persons often wonder why they are disliked, are unpopular; the fault lies within themselves.

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The proper mental adaptation to a want which must, for one reason or other, be postponed or denied would be to reason it out something like one would a problem in arithmetic. If the want is impossible because it is -too fantastic; or one has not the ambition, or the health requisite for its realization, then let him understand these things; let him realize that the fault is within not without. Or if chance or circumstance stands in the way and cannot be put aside, then let him realize the futility of his want and seek another that is possible. But at the same time let him take the disappointment philosophically, and, when he encounters others who have what he would like to have, not show envy, conscious of the fact that to show envy would be to exhibit that envy has got the best of him, and that bitterness destroys the better self. It may be argued that a person who could so react to a denied want that he entertained kindliness toward all and malice toward none would be a remarkable person. He would be remarkable indeed, since so few of us make any attempt to understand the apparently insignificant acts of daily life. We do not know, for instance, that when we berate a chair over which we have stumbled, or attempt to excuse our indisputable errors, that we are trying to throw off our own faults upon something else. It is more pleasurable to think others to blame rather than ourselves, yet we will ever live like and act like the primitive man unless we learn to know our own failings, and strive to overcome the more or less instinctive tendencies urging us to take the easiest way. Once we know ourselves, we are less apt to make mistakes; we are more prone to correct existing errors, to go forward in life, in harmony with the world, but mostly with ourselves.