through and through by repugnance to almost the whole human race.
Walt Whitman, on the contrary, had a warm, expansive feeling towards the vast majority of men and women. His queer catalogues seemed to him interesting because each item came before his imagination as an object of delight. The sort of joy which most people feel only in those who are exceptionally beautiful or splendid Walt Whitman felt in almost everybody. Out of this universal liking grew optimism, a belief in democracy, and a conviction that it is easy for men to live together in peace and amity. His philosophy and politics, like Carlyle's, were based upon his instinctive attitude towards ordinary men and women.
There is no objective reason to be given to show that one of these attitudes is essentially more rational than the other. If a man finds people repulsive, no argument can prove to him that they are not so. But both his own desires and other people's are much more likely to find satisfaction if he resembles Walt Whitman than if he resembles Carlyle. A world of Walt Whitmans would be happier and more capable of realizing its purposes than a world of Carlyles. For this reason, we shall desire, if we
