THE END OF THE WORLD.
Perhaps the most anxious question that has been asked of the astronomer
is when the world is to come to an end. It is a question which, of
course, he has no power to answer with truth; but it is also one that
has often been answered in good faith. It has perhaps been somewhat
natural to ask such a question of an astronomer, partly because his
science naturally deals with the structure of the universe, which might
give some light as to its future, and partly because of his connection
with astrology, whose province it was supposed to be to open the destiny
of all things. Yet the question has been answered by others than by
astronomers, on grounds connected with their faith. In the early ages of
the Church, the belief in the rapid approach of the end of the world was
universally spread amongst Christians. The Apocalypse of St. John and
the Acts of the Apostles seemed to announce its coming before that
generation passed away. Afterwards, it was expected at the year 1000;
and though these beliefs did not rest in any way on astronomical
grounds, yet to that science was recourse had for encouragement or
discouragement of the idea. The middle ages, fall of simple faith and
superstitious credulity, were filled with fear of this terrible
catastrophe.
As the year 1000 approached, the warnings became frequent and very
pressing. Thus, for example, Bernard of Thuringia, about 960, began to
announce publicly that the world was about to end, declaring that he had
had a particular revelation of the fact. He took for his text the
enigmatical words of the Apocalypse: "At the end of one thousand years,
Satan shall be loosed from his prison, and shall seduce the people that
are in the four quarters of the earth. The book of life shall be open,
and the sea shall give up her dead." He fixed the day when the
Annunciation of the Virgin should coincide with Good Friday as the end
of all things. This happened in 992, but nothing extraordinary happened.
During the tenth century the royal proclamations opened by this
characteristic phrase: _Whereas the end of the world is approaching_....
In 1186 the astrologers frightened Europe by announcing a conjunction of
all the planets. Rigord, a writer of that period, says in his _Life of
Philip Augustus_: "The astrologers of the East, Jews, Saracens, and even
Christians, sent letters all over the world, in which they predicted,
with perfect assurance, that in the month of September there would be
great tempests, earthquakes, mortality among men, seditions and
discords, revolutions in kingdoms, and the destruction of all things.
But," he adds, "the event very soon belied their predictions."
Some years after, in 1198, another alarm of the end of the world was
raised, but this time it was not dependent on celestial phenomena. It
was said that Antichrist was born in Babylon, and therefore all the
human race would be destroyed.
It would be a curious list to make of all the years in which it was said
that Antichrist was born; they might be counted by hundreds, to say
nothing of the future.
At the commencement of the fourteenth century, the alchemist Arnault of
Villeneuve announced the end of the world for 1335. In his treatise _De
Sigillis_ he applies the influence of the stars to alchemy, and expounds
the mystical formula by which demons are to be conjured.
St. Vincent Ferrier, a famous Spanish preacher, gave to the world as
many years' duration as there were verses in the Psalms--about 2537.
The sixteenth century produced a very plentiful crop of predictions of
the final catastrophe. Simon Goulart, for example, gave the world an
appalling account of terrible sights seen in Assyria--where a mountain
opened and showed a scroll with letters of Greek--"The end of the world
is coming." This was in 1532; but after that year had passed in safety,
Leovitius, a famous astrologer, predicted it again for 1584. Louis
Gayon reports that the fright at this time was great. The churches could
not hold those who sought a refuge in them, and a great number made
their wills, without reflecting that there was no use in it if the whole
world was to finish.
One of the most famous mathematicians of Europe, named Stoffler, who
flourished in the 16th century, and who worked for a long time at the
reform of the calendar proposed by the Council of Constance, predicted a
universal deluge for 1524. This deluge was to happen in the month of
February, because Saturn, Jupiter, and Mars were then together in the
sign of the Fishes. Everyone in Europe, Asia, and Africa, to whom these
tidings came, was in a state of consternation. They expected a deluge,
in spite of the rainbow. Many contemporary authors report that the
inhabitants of the maritime provinces of Germany sold their lands for a
mere trifle to those who had more money and less credulity. Each built
himself a boat like an ark. A doctor of Toulouse, named Auriol, made a
very large ark for himself, his family, and his friends, and the same
precautions were taken by a great many people in Italy. At last the
month of February came, and not a drop of rain fell. Never was a drier
month or a more puzzled set of astrologers. Nevertheless they were not
discouraged nor neglected for all that, and Stoffler himself, associated
with the celebrated Regiomontanus, predicted once more that the end of
the world would come in 1588, or at least that there would be frightful
events which would overturn the earth.
This new prediction was a new deception; nothing extraordinary occurred
in 1588. The year 1572, however, witnessed a strange phenomenon, capable
of justifying all their fears. An unknown star came suddenly into view
in the constellation of Cassiopeia, so brilliant that it was visible
even in full daylight, and the astrologers calculated that it was the
star of the Magi which had returned, and that it announced the second
coming of Jesus Christ.
The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were filled with new
predictions of great variety.
Even our own century has not been without such. A religious work,
published in 1826, by the Count Sallmard Montfort, demonstrated
perfectly that the world had no more than ten years to exist. "The
world," he said, "is old, and its time of ending is near, and I believe
that the epoch of that terrible event is not far off. Jacob, the chief
of the twelve tribes of Israel, and consequently of the ancient Church,
was born in 2168 of the world, _i.e._, 1836 B.C. The ancient Church,
which was the figure of the new, lasted 1836 years. Hence the new one
will only last till 1836 A.D."
Similar prophecies by persons of various nations have in like manner
been made, without being fulfilled. Indeed, we have had our own
prophets; but they have proved themselves incredulous of their own
predictions, by taking leases that should _commence_ in the year of the
world's destruction.
But we have one in store for us yet. In 1840, Pierre Louis of Paris
calculated that the end would be in 1900, and he calculated in this
way:--The Apocalypse says the Gentiles shall occupy the holy city for
forty-two months. The holy city was taken by Omar in 636. Forty-two
months of years is 1260, which brings the return of the Jews to 1896,
which will precede by a few years the final catastrophe. Daniel also
announces the arrival of Antichrist 2,300 days after the establishment
of Artaxerxes on the throne of Persia, 400 B.C., which again brings us
to 1900.
Some again have put it at 2000 A.D., which will make 6,000 years, as
they think, from the creation; these are the days of work; then comes
the 1,000 years of millennial sabbath.
We are led far away by these vain speculations from the wholesome study
of astronomy; they are useful only in showing how by a little latitude
that science may wind itself into all the questions that in any way
affect the earth.
Indeed, since the world began, the world will doubtless end, and
astronomers are still asked how could it be brought about?
Certainly it is not an impossible event, and there are only too many
ways in which it has been imagined it might occur.
The question is one that stands on a very different footing from that it
occupied before the days of Galileo and Copernicus. _Then_ the earth was
believed to be the centre of the universe, and all the heavens and stars
created for it. _Then_ the commencement of the world was the
commencement of the universe, its destruction would be the destruction
of all. _Now_, thanks to the revolution in feeling that has been
accomplished by the progress of astronomy, we have learned our own
insignificance, and that amongst the infinite number of stars, each
supporting their own system of inhabited planets, our earth occupies an
infinitesimally small portion, and the destruction of it would make no
difference whatever--still less its becoming uninhabitable. It is an
event which must have happened and be happening to other worlds, without
affecting the infinite life of the universe in any marked degree.
Nevertheless, for ourselves, the question remains as interesting as if
we were the all in all, but must be approached in a different manner.
Numerous hypotheses have been put forth on the question but they may
mostly be dismissed as vain.
Buffon calculated that it had taken 74,832 years for the earth to cool
down to its present temperature, and that it will take 93,291 years
more before it would be too cold for men to live upon it. But Sir
William Thomson has shown that the internal heat of the earth, supposed
to be due to its cooling from fusion, cannot have seriously modified
climate for a long series of years, and that life depends essentially on
the heat of the sun.
Another hypothesis, the most ancient of all, is that which supposes the
earth will be destroyed by fire. It comes down from Zoroaster and the
Jews; and on the improbable supposition of the thin crust of the earth
over a molten mass, this is thought possible. However, as the tendency
in the past has been all the other way, namely, to make the effect of
the inner heat of the earth less marked on the surface, we have no
reason to expect a reversal.
A third theory would make the earth die more gradually and more surely.
It is known that by the wearing down of the surface by the rains and
rivers, there is a tendency to reduce mountains and all high parts of
the earth to a uniform level, a tendency which is only counteracted by
some elevating force within the earth. If these elevating forces be
supposed to be due to the internal heat--a hypothesis which cannot be
proved--then with the cooling of the earth the elevating forces would
cease, and, finally, the whole of the continent would be brought beneath
the sea and terrestrial life perish.
Another interesting but groundless hypothesis is that of Adhemar on the
periodicity of deluges. This theory depends on the fact of the unequal
length of the seasons in the two hemispheres. Our autumn and our winter
last 179 days. In the southern hemisphere they last 186 days. These
seven days, or 168 hours, of difference, increase each year the coldness
of the pole. During 10,500 years the ice accumulates at one pole and
melts at the other, thereby displacing the earth's centre of gravity.
Now a time will arrive when, after the maximum of elevation of
temperature on one side, a catastrophe will happen, which will bring
back the centre of gravity to the centre of figure, and cause an immense
deluge. The deluge of the north pole was 4,200 years ago, therefore the
next will be 6,300 hence. It is very obvious to ask on this--_Why_
should there be a _catastrophe_? and why should not the centre of
gravity return _gradually_ as it was gradually displaced?
Another theory has been that it would perish by a comet. That it will
not be by the shock we have already seen from the light weight of the
comet and from experience; but it has been suggested that the gas may
combine with the air, and an explosion take place that would destroy us
all; but is not that also contradicted by experience?
Another idea is that we shall finally fall into the sun by the
resistance of the ether to our motion. Encke's comet loses in
thirty-three years a thousandth part of its velocity. It appears then
that we should have to wait millions of centuries before we came too
near the sun.
In reality, however, we are simply dependent on our sun, and our destiny
depends upon that.
In the first place, in its voyage through space it might encounter or
come within the range of some dark body we at present know nothing of,
and the attraction might put out of harmony all our solar system with
calamitous results. Or since we are aware that the sun is a radiating
body giving out its heat on all sides, and therefore growing colder, it
may one day happen that it will be too cold to sustain life on the
earth. It is, we know, a variable star, and stars have been seen to
disappear, or even to have a catastrophe happen to them, as the kindling
of enormous quantities of gas. A catastrophe in the sun will be our own
end.
Fontenelle has amusingly described in verse the result of the sun
growing cold, which may be thus Englished:--
"Of this, though, I haven't a doubt,
One day when there isn't much light,
The poor little sun will go out
And bid us politely--good-night.
Look out from the stars up on high,
Some other to help you to see;
I can't shine any longer, not I,
Since shining don't benefit me.
"Then down on our poor habitation
What numberless evils will fall,
When the heavens demand liquidation,
Why all will go smash, and then all
Society come to an end.
Soon out of the sleepy affair
His way will each traveller wend,
No testament leaving, nor heir."
The cooling of the sun must, however, take place very gradually, as no
cooling has been perceived during the existence of man; and the growth
of plants in the earliest geological ages, and the life of animals,
prove that for so long a time it has been within the limits within which
life has been possible--and we may look forward to as long in the
future.
It is not of course the time when the sun will become a dark ball,
surrounded by illuminated planets, that we must reckon as the end of the
earth. Life would have ceased long before that stage--no man will
witness the death of the sun.
[Illustration: PLATE XVI.--THE END OF THE WORLD.]
The diminution of the sun's heat would have for its natural effect the
enlargement of the glacial zones! the sea and the land in those parts of
the earth would cease to support life, which would gradually be drawn
closer to the equatorial belt. Man, who by his nature and his
intelligence is best fitted to withstand cold climates, would remain
among the last of the inhabitants, reduced to the most miserable
nourishment. Drawn together round the equator, the last of the sons of
earth would wage a last combat with death, and exactly as the shades
approached, would the human genius, fortified by all the acquirements of
ages past--give out its brightest light, and attempt in vain to throw
off the fatal cover that was destined to engulf him. At last, the earth,
fading, dry, and sterile, would become an immense cemetery. And it would
be the same with the other planets. The sun, already become red, would
at last become black, and the planetary system would be an assemblage of
black balls revolving round a larger black ball.
Of course this is all imaginary, and cannot affect ourselves, but the
very idea of it is melancholy, and enough to justify the words of
Campbell:--
"For this hath science searched on weary wing
By shore and sea--each mute and living thing,
Or round the cope her living chariot driven
And wheeled in triumph through the signs of heaven.
Oh, star-eyed science, hast thou wandered there
To waft us home the message of despair?"
In reality, as we know nothing of the origin, so we know nothing of the
end of the world; and where so much has been accomplished, there are
obviously infinite possibilities enough to satisfy the hopes of every
one.
While some stars may be fading, others may be rising into their place,
and man need not be identified with one earth alone, but may rest
content in the idea that the life universal is eternal.
THE END.
LONDON: P. CLAY, SONS, AND TAYLOR, PRINTERS.
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:
1. Passages in italics are surrounded by _underscores_.
2. Images have been moved from the middle of a paragraph to the closest
paragraph break.
3. The original text includes Greek characters. For this text version
these letters have been replaced with transliterations, for example,
[Greek: a] represents first Greek letter alpha.
3. The original text includes certain symbols for planets and zodiac
signs. For this text version these symbols are replaced by text name
of the corresponding symbol. For example, [symbol: sun] replaces the
symbolic representation of sun.
4. In this text version, fractions are represented using hyphen and
forward slash. For example, 3-1/2 stands for three and a half.
5. Certain words use oe ligature in the original.
6. Obvious errors in punctuation and a few misprints have been silently
corrected.
7. Other than the corrections listed above, printer's inconsistencies in
hyphenation and ligature usage have been retained.