The word convention has frequently been used, for it best describes the fixed authority for conduct and ethics which has been set up by the tacit consensus of public opinion, and which people accept and obey without inquiry. This force--for it amounts to a force--drives the great body of uneducated, under-educated, and ill-educated people, who never stop to inquire or investigate. If a stick is put across a gap in a hedge and a flock of sheep is driven through, the first few sheep will jump the stick, and then, even after the stick has been removed, the rest of the flock will all jump when they come to the gap, and not one will stop to see if there is any reason or necessity for the jump. So it is with human beings, who find it easier to do as others do rather than take the trouble to exercise any separate powers of discrimination which might convince them of the necessity of striking out a different line of their own. One line of conduct may suit a large number of individuals, but it is inconceivable that it should suit all, and there is a great revivification of the faculties in a man when he first realises that what may be right for others need not be right for him. A lady once remarked, with a sigh, while arranging her drawing-room, “One must have a silver table,” meaning that a small table on which could be displayed various gimcracks of silver was a necessity of fashion in the disposition of drawing-room furniture. If she had said, “I won’t have a silver table,” or, “I’m going to have twenty silver tables,” she would have been an exceptional and original being exercising an independent judgment at the risk of being thought eccentric. But her only desire, and the only desire of the majority of her fellows, is to conform. Another cause of mischief is that most people have their eyes turned towards those who are better off than they are themselves, and they continually and instinctively make mental comparisons which serve only to increase their longing. Seldom do they turn their eyes to the millions who are less fortunate in the way of wealth and make comparisons in that direction, else they might come to the unpleasant conclusion that they have themselves already more than enough, and perhaps too much. To live simply they foolishly suspect means something disagreeable, unattractive, tedious, and arduous; whereas if they only gave it a trial, they might find that the very simplification of their manner of living would set free their energies and attract them to new and absorbing interests, and a kind of happiness might become theirs which far surpasses in intensity the greatest pleasures wealth ever bought, and which, instead of being transitory and ephemeral, is lasting.