The Varieties of Religious Experience - Penn State University

The Varieties of Religious Experiencecoined the word fearthought to stand for the unprofitable elementof forethought, and have defined the word ‘worry’ as fearthought incontradistinction to forethought. I have also defined fearthought asthe self-imposed or self-permitted suggestion of inferiority, in orderto place it where it really belongs, in the category of harmful, unnecessary,and therefore not respectable things.”47The “misery-habit,” the “martyr-habit,” engendered by the prevalent“fearthought,” get pungent criticism from the mind-cure writers:—“Consider for a moment the habits of life into which we are born.There are certain social conventions or customs and alleged requirements,there is a theological bias, a general view of the world.There are conservative ideas in regard to our early training, our education,marriage, and occupation in life. Following close upon this,there is a long series of anticipations, namely, that we shall suffercertain children’s diseases, diseases of middle life, and of old age; thethought that we shall grow old, lose our faculties, and again becomechildlike; while crowning all is the fear of death. Then there is along line of particular tears and trouble-bearing expectations, such,for example, as ideas associated with certain articles of food, thedread of the east wind, the terrors of hot weather, the aches andpains associated with cold weather, the fear of catching cold if onesits in a draught, the coming of hay-fever upon the 14th of Augustin the middle of the day, and so on through a long list of fears,dreads, worriments, anxieties, anticipations, expectations, pessimisms,morbidities, and the whole ghostly train of fateful shapeswhich our fellow-men, and especially physicians, are ready to helpus conjure up, an array worthy to rank with Bradley’s ‘unearthlyballet of bloodless categories.’“Yet this is not all. This vast array is swelled by innumerable volunteersfrom daily life—the fear of accident, the possibility of calamity,the loss of property, the chance of robbery, of fire, or theoutbreak of war. And it is not deemed sufficient to fear for our-47 Horace Fletcher: Happiness as found in Forethought MinusFearthought, Menticulture Series, ii. Chicago and New York, Stone. 1897,pp. 21-25, abridged.94