The Art of Happiness prescribes that instead of cultivating a limited number of pleasurable impressions up to a high degree of intensity, we should seek a large variety, diverse in quality, moderate in intensity, considerable in persistence. This precept, properly understood, is consistent not only with a high, but perhaps with the highest degree of gratification, for it is supported by another physiological law of the greatest interest. This is, that the utmost zest of pleasure is invariably conditioned on the entire novelty of the sensation. This fact is so familiar that it is embalmed in common proverbs, as that “Variety is the spice of life,” and the like. But the deep significance and the manifold applications of these sayings are rarely considered. Entire novelties are within the reach of few, and come of themselves but seldom. Fortunately, their agreeable effect can be closely imitated by influences quite within our own control; that is, by the remission and alternation of the pleasures already our own. This alone will maintain the efficacy of any pleasure, for it is a sad fact that in impressions on the nervous system, persistence can never become permanence. Remission and reaction in all sensations are demanded by that eternal and infinite law of Periodicity, or Rhythmical Recurrence, which is the last and highest in the Universe of mind or matter. This in turn enforces on us the importance of aiming for a multiplicity of sources of pleasure, so that we may heighten their impressions by frequent variety. Here again we come into conflict with that cherished delusion which makes contentment and tranquillity the chief elements of happiness. With political economists, it often arises from a confusion of the spheres of the State and the Individual. The State properly aims at peace, established order, routine, and material ends; but the Individual should seek variety and activity, he should try untrodden paths and risk unknown crises. This alone will make him a many-sided, strong character, responsive up to the full measure of his powers to all impressions of natural enjoyment. The foe he has to guard against in this joyous quest is Habit. This is the tyrant whose iron scepter enslaves most men. The promptings of pleasure and pain are far from being the only incentives; probably they are by no means the most numerous or potent. The “ruling motives” of most persons are simply the associations, customs, ideas, and aims with which they have been longest in contact. A given mental tendency soon becomes predominant, its easy yoke becomes adjusted to the neck, and the man pursues his way in life without more resistance than the ox to the wain. Vain the attempt to break his fetters and sever the bonds of his habits. He is satisfied to reply, as the Arab to the visitor, who would teach him a better agriculture――“Thus did my father before me and thus my mother taught me; and in this manner shall I continue.”