The individual, ignorant or unmindful of the true demands of his being, and intent upon self-gratification, must forever fail of obtaining happiness, because in his lustful pursuit he does not heed the real demands of his entire being, and therefore he does not minister to their needs; and hence can not obtain ease and satisfaction. All pleasure-seekers can testify as they have testified, that their pleasures are more in anticipation than participation. Their happiness is in the future, and seldom if ever in the present. The time never comes when they find every desire gratified, and consequently they are never quite contented, therefore never quite happy. The very desire after happiness is that which defeats it. The finite belongs to the present; the _past_ is his schoolmaster, teaching him in the _present_ how to receive the future. His duties and needs are of _to-day_, and those which pertain to the morrow will come on the morrow, not before. “Sufficient unto the day are the evils thereof,” and sufficient unto the day are the _duties_ and _pleasures_ thereof. Man can not take being and existence by anticipation, neither can he take their true incidents in that way. All anticipations of pleasure by which the individual is made to live in the future, to the neglect of the present, are lustful and illegitimate, and antagonize with man’s true nature and destiny, and consequently tend to defeat true happiness. That this is so, all human experience affirms. That this must be so, the philosophy of true happiness demonstrates. There is no room for controversy upon this point. It is most evident that true happiness can only flow to the finite by fulfilling the true desires of the finite, and that complete satisfaction can only take place when every true desire or demand is complied with. Now it must follow that every true desire is indicative of a real need of the being in which it exists; and consequently when every need is supplied, every true desire must be gratified, and true happiness must be the result. And as every need has respect to that which pertains to the _present_, every true desire belongs to the present, and asks present fulfillment.