ss. It is absolutely essential in
war, in finance, in law, in every field of human activity in which the
future has to be thought of and provided for. It is just as essential in
politics. The only reason why it is not thought as essential in politics
is, the punishment for failure or neglect comes in politics more
slowly.

The pessimist has generally a bad name, but there is a good deal to be
said for him. To take a recent illustration, the man who took
pessimistic views of the silver movement was for nearly twenty years
under a cloud. This gloomy anticipation of 1873 was not realized until
1893. For a thousand years after Marcus Aurelius, the pessimist, if I
may use the expression, was "cock of the walk." He certainly has no
reason to be ashamed of his role in the Eastern world for a thousand
years after the Mohammedan Hegira. In Italy and Spain he has not needed
to hang his head since the Renaissance. In fact, if we take various
nations and long reaches of time, we shall find that the gloomy man has
been nearly as often justified by the course of events as the cheerful
one. Neither of them has any special claim to a hearing on public
affairs. A persistent optimist, although he may be a most agreeable man
in family life, is likely, in business or politics, to be just as
foolish and unbearable as a persistent pessimist. He is as much out of
harmony with the order of nature. The universe is not governed on
optimistic any more than on pessimistic principles. The best and wisest
of men make their mistakes and have their share of sorrow and sickness
and losses. So also the most happily situated nations must suffer from
internal discord, the blunders of statesmen, and the madness of the
people. What Cato said in the Senate of the conditions of success,
"vigilando, agendo, bene consulendo, prospere omnia cedunt," is as true
to-day as it was two thousand years ago. We must remember that though
the optimist may be the pleasantest man to have about us, he is the
least likely to take precautions; that is, the least likely to watch and
work for success. We owe a great deal of our slovenly legislation to his
presence in large numbers in Congress and the legislatures. The great
suffering through which we are now passing, in consequence of the
persistence in our silver purchases, is the direct result of unreasoning
optimism. Its promoters disregarded the warnings of economists and
financiers because they believed that somehow, they d