The-Conquest-of-Happiness-by-Bertrand-Russell

them, for some reason, unworthy of a grown man.
This is a complete mistake; any pleasure that does
no harm to other people is to be valued. For my
part, I collect rivers: I derive pleasure from having
gone down the Volga and up the Yangtse, and
regret very much having never seen the Amazon or
the Orinoco. Simple as these emotions are, I am
not ashamed of them. Or consider again the
passionate joy of the baseball fan: he turns to his
newspaper with avidity, and the radio affords him
the keenest thrills. I remember meeting for the first
time one of the leading literary men of America, a
man whom I had supposed from his books to be
filled with melancholy. But it so happened that at
that moment the most crucial baseball results were
coming through on the radio; he forgot me,
literature, and all the other sorrows of our
sublunary life, and yelled with joy as his favourites
achieved victory. Ever since this incident I have
been able to read his books without feeling
depressed by the misfortunes of his characters.
Fads and hobbies, however, are in many cases,