THE FUTURE.
1. We proceed then to a few reflections to which we cannot but feel
ourselves invited by the views which we have already presented in these
pages. What will be the future history of the human race, and what the
future destination of each individual, most persons will, and most
wisely, judge on far other grounds than the analogies which physical
science can supply. Analogies derived from such a quarter can throw
little light on those grave and lofty questions. Yet perhaps a few
thoughts on this subject, even if they serve only to show how little the
light thus attainable really is, may not be an unfit conclusion to what
has been said; and the more so, if these analogies of science, so far as
they have any specific tendency, tend to confirm some of the
convictions, with regard to those weighty and solemn points,--the
destiny of Man, and of Mankind,--which we derive from other and higher
sources of knowledge.
2. Man is capable of looking back upon the past history of himself, his
Race, the Earth, and the Universe. So far as he has the means of doing
so, and so far as his reflective powers are unfolded, he cannot refrain
from such a retrospect. As we have seen, man has occupied his thoughts
with such contemplations, and has been led to convictions thereupon, of
the most remarkable and striking kind. Man is also capable of looking
forwards to the future probable or possible history of himself, his
race, the earth, and the universe. He is irresistibly tempted to do
this, and to endeavor to shape his conjectures on the Future, by what he
knows of the Past. He attempts to discern what future change and
progress may be imagined or expected, by the analogy of past change and
progress, which have been ascertained. Such analogies may be necessarily
very vague and loose; but they are the peculiar ground of speculation,
with which we have here to deal. Perhaps man cannot discover with
certainty any fixed and permanent laws which have regulated those past
changes which have modified the surface and population of the earth;
still less, any laws which have produced a visible progression in the
constitution of the rest of the universe. He cannot, therefore, avail
himself of any close analogies, to help him to conjecture the future
course of events, on the earth or in the universe; still less can he
apply any known laws, which may enable him to predict the future
configurations of the elements of the world; as he can predict the
future configurations of the planets for indefinite periods. He can
foresee the astronomical revolutions of the heavens, so long as the
known laws subsist. He cannot foresee the future geological revolutions
of the earth, even if they are to be produced by the same causes which
have produced the past revolutions, of which he has learnt the series
and order. Still less can he foresee the future revolutions which may
take place in the condition of man, of society, of philosophy, of
religion; still less, again, the course which the Divine Government of
the world will take, or the state of things to which, even as now
conducted, it will lead.
3. All these subjects are covered with a veil of mystery, which science
and philosophy can do little in raising. Yet these are subjects to
which the mind turns, with a far more eager curiosity, than that which
it feels with regard to mere geological or astronomical revolutions. Man
is naturally, and reasonably, the greatest object of interest to man.
What shall happen to the human race, after thousands of years, is a far
dearer concern to him, than what shall happen to Jupiter or Sirius; and
even, than what shall happen to the continents and oceans of the globe
on which he lives, except so far as the changes of his domicile affect
himself. If our knowledge of the earth and of the heavens, of animals
and of man, of the past condition and present laws of the world, is
quite barren of all suggestion of what may or may not hereafter be the
lot of man, such knowledge will lose the charm which would have made it
most precious and attractive in the eyes of mankind in general. And if,
on such subjects, any conjectures, however dubious,--any analogies,
however loose,--can be collected from what we know, they will probably
be received as acceptable, in spite of their insecurity; and will be
deemed a fit offering from the scientific faculty, to those hopes and
expectations,--to that curiosity and desire of all knowledge,--which
gladly receive their nutriment and gratification from every province of
man's being.
4. Now if we ask, what is likely to be the future condition of the
population of the earth as compared with the present; we are naturally
led to recollect, what has been the past condition of that population as
compared with the present. And here, our thoughts are at once struck by
that great fact, to which we have so often referred; which we conceive
to be established by irrefragable geological evidence, and of which the
importance cannot be overrated:--namely, the fact that the existence of
man upon the earth has been for only a few thousand years:--that for
thousands, and myriads, and it may be for millions of years, previous
to that period, the earth was tenanted, entirely and solely, by brute
creatures, destitute of reason, incapable of progress, and guided merely
by animal instincts, in the preservation and continuation of their
races. After this period of mere brute existence, in innumerable forms,
had endured for a vast series of cycles, there appeared upon the earth a
creature, even in his organization, superior far to all; but still more
superior, in his possession of peculiar endowments;--reason, language,
the power of indefinite progress, and of raising his thoughts towards
his Creator and Governor: in short, to use terms already employed, an
intellectual, moral, religious, and spiritual creature. After the ages
of intellectual darkness, there took place this creation of intellectual
light. After the long-continued play of mere appetite and sensual life,
there came the operation of thought, reflection, invention, art,
science, moral sentiments, religious belief and hope; and thus, life and
being, in a far higher sense than had ever existed, even in the highest
degree, in the long ages of the earth's previous existence.
5. Now, this great and capital fact cannot fail to excite in us many
reflections, which, however vaguely and dimly, carry us to the prospect
of the future. The present being _so_ related to the past, how may we
suppose that the future will be related to the present?
In the first place, _this_ is a natural reflection. The terrestrial
world having made this advance from brute to human life, can we think it
at all likely, that the present condition of the earth's inhabitants is
a final condition? Has the vast step from animal to human life,
exhausted the progressive powers of nature? or to speak more reverently
and justly, has it completed the progressive plan of the Creator? After
the great revolution by which man became what he is, can and will
nothing be done, to bring into being something better than now is;
however that future creature may be related to man? We leave out of
consideration any supposed progression, which may have taken place in
the animal creation previous to man's existence; any progression by
which the animal organization was made to approximate, gradually or by
sudden steps, to the human organization; partly, because such successive
approximation is questioned by some geologists; and is, at any rate,
obscure and perplexed: but much more, because it is not really to our
purpose. Similarity of organization is not the point in question. The
endowments and capacities of man, by which he is Man, are the great
distinction, which places all other animals at an immeasurable distance
below him. The closest approximation of form or organs, does nothing to
obliterate this distinction. It does not bring the monkey nearer to man,
that his tongue has the same muscular apparatus as man's, so long as he
cannot talk; and so long as he has not the thought and idea which
language implies, and which are unfolded indefinitely in the use of
language. The step, then, by which the earth became, a _human_
habitation, was an immeasurable advance on all that existed before; and
therefore there is a question which we are, it seems, irresistibly
prompted to ask, Is this the last such step? Is there nothing beyond it?
Man is the head of creation, in his present condition; but is that
condition the final result and ultimate goal of the progress of creation
in the plan of the Creator? As there was found and produced something so
far beyond animals, as man is, may there not also, in some course of the
revolutions of the world, be produced something far beyond what man is?
The question is put, as implying a difficulty in believing that it
should be so; and this difficulty must be very generally felt.
Considering how vast the resources of the Creative Power have been shown
to be, it is difficult to suppose they are exhausted. Considering how
great things have been done, in the progress of the work of creation, we
naturally think that even greater things than these, still remain to be
done.
6. But then, on the other hand, there is an immense difficulty in
supposing, even in imagining, any further change, at all commensurate in
kind and degree, with the step which carried the world from a mere brute
population, to a human population. In a proportion in which the two
first terms are _brute_ and _man_, what can be the third term? In the
progress from mere Instinct to Reason, we have a progress from blindness
to sight; and what can we do more than see? When pure Intellect is
evolved in man, he approaches to the nature of the Supreme Mind: how can
a creature rise higher? When mere impulse, appetite, and passion are
placed under the control and direction of duty and virtue, man is put
under Divine Government: what greater lot can any created being have?
7. And the difficulty of conceiving any ulterior step at all analogous
to the last and most wonderful of the revolutions which have taken place
in the condition of the earth's inhabitants, will be found to grow upon
us, as it is more closely examined. For it may truly be said, the change
which occurred when man was placed on the earth, was not one which could
have been imagined and constructed beforehand, by a speculator merely
looking at the endowments and capacities of the creatures which were
previously living. Even in the way of organization, could any
intelligent spectator, contemplating anything which then existed in the
animal world, have guessed the wonderful new and powerful purposes to
which it was to be made subservient in man? Could such a spectator, from
seeing the _rudiments of a Hand_, in the horse or the cow, or even from
seeing the hand of a quadrumanous animal, have conjectured, that the
Hand was, in man, to be made an instrument by which infinite numbers of
new instruments were to be constructed, subduing the elements to man's
uses, giving him a command over nature which might seem supernatural,
taming or conquering all other animals, enabling him to scrutinize the
farthest regions of the universe, and the subtlest combinations of
material things?
8. Or again; could such a spectator, by dissecting the tongues of
animals, have divined that the Tongue, in man, was to be the means of
communicating the finest movements of thought and feeling; of giving one
man, weak and feeble, an unbounded ascendency over robust and angry
multitudes; and, assisted by the (writing) hand, of influencing the
intimate thoughts, laws, and habits of the most remote posterity?
9. And again, could such a spectator, seeing animals entirely occupied
by their appetites and desires, and the objects subservient to their
individual gratification, have ever dreamt that there should appear on
earth a creature who should desire to know, and should know, the
distances and motions of the stars, future as well as present; the
causes of their motions, the history of the earth, and his own history;
and even should know truths by which all possible objects and events not
only are, but must be regulated?
10. And yet again, could such a spectator, seeing that animals obeyed
their appetites with no restraint but external fear, and knew of no
difference of good and bad except the sensual difference, ever have
imagined that there should be a creature acknowledging a difference of
right and wrong, as a distinction supreme over what was good or bad to
the sense; and a rule of duty which might forbid and prevent
gratification by an internal prohibition?
11. And finally, could such a spectator, seeing nothing but animals
with all their faculties thus entirely immersed in the elements of their
bodily being, have supposed that a creature should come, who should
raise his thoughts to his Creator, acknowledge Him as his Master and
Governor, look to His Judgment, and aspire to live eternally in His
presence?
12. If it would have been impossible for a spectator of the praehuman
creation, however intelligent, imaginative, bold and inventive, to have
conjectured beforehand the endowments of such a creature as Man, taking
only those which we have thus indicated; it may well be thought, that if
there is to be a creature which is to succeed man, as man has succeeded
the animals, it must be equally impossible for us to conjecture
beforehand, what kind of creature _that_ must be, and what will be _his_
endowments and privileges.
13. Thus a spectator who should thus have studied the praehuman creation,
and who should have had nothing else to help him in his conjectures and
conceptions, (of course, by the supposition of a praehuman period, not
any knowledge of the operation of intelligence, though a most active
intelligence would be necessary for such speculations,) would not have
been able to divine the future appearance of a creature, so excellent as
Man; or to guess at his endowments and privileges, or his relation to
the previous animal creation; and just as little able may we be, even if
there is to exist at some time, a creature more excellent and glorious
than man, to divine what kind of creature he will be, and how related to
man. And here, therefore, it would perhaps be best, that we should quit
the subject; and not offer conjectures which we thus acknowledge to have
no value. Perhaps, however, the few brief remarks which we have still to
make, put forwards, as they are, merely as suggestions to be weighed by
others, can not reasonably give offence, or trouble even the most
reverent thinker.
14. To suppose a higher development of endowments which already exist in
man, is a natural mode of rising to the imagination of a being nobler
than man is; but we shall find that such hypotheses do not lead us to
any satisfactory result. Looking at the first of those features of the
superiority of man over brutes, which we have just pointed out, the
Human Hand, we can imagine this superiority carried further. Indeed, in
the course of human progress, and especially in recent times, and in our
own country, man employs instead of, or in addition to the hand,
innumerable instruments to make nature serve his needs and do his will.
He works by Tools and Machinery, derivative hands, which increase a
hundred-fold the power of the natural hand. Shall we try to ascend to a
New Period, to imagine a New Creature, by supposing this power increased
hundreds and thousands of times more, so that nature should obey man,
and minister to his needs, in an incomparably greater degree than she
now does? We may imagine this carried so far, that all need for manual
labor shall be superseded; and thus, abundant time shall be left to the
creature thus gifted, for developing the intellectual and moral powers
which must be the higher part of its nature. But still, that higher
nature of the creature itself, and not its command over external
material nature, must be the quarter in which we are to find anything
which shall elevate the creature above man, as man is elevated above
brutes.
15. Or, looking at the second of the features of human superiority,
shall we suppose that the means of Communication of their thoughts to
each other, which exist for the human race, are to be immensely
increased, and that this is to be the leading feature of a New Period?
Already, in addition to the use of the tongue, other means of
communication have vastly multiplied man's original means of carrying on
the intercourse of thought:--writing, employed in epistles, books,
newspapers; roads, horses and posting establishments; ships; railways;
and, as the last and most notable step, made in our time, electric
telegraphs, extending across continents and even oceans. We can imagine
this facility and activity of communication, in which man so
immeasurably exceeds all animals, still further increased, and more
widely extended. But yet so long as what is thus communicated is nothing
greater or better than what is now communicated among men;--such news,
such thoughts, such questions and answers, as now dart along our
roads;--we could hardly think that the creature, whatever wonderful
means of intercourse with its fellow-creatures it might possess, was
elevated above man, so as to be of a higher nature than man is.
16. Thus, such improved endowments as we have now spoken of, increased
power over materials, and increased means of motion and communication,
arising from improved mechanism, do little, and we may say, nothing, to
satisfy our idea of a more excellent condition than that of man. For
such extensions of man's present powers are consistent with the absence
of all intellectual and moral improvement. Men might be able to dart
from place to place, and even from planet to planet, and from star to
star, on wings, such as we ascribe to angels in our imagination: they
might be able to make the elements obey them at a beck; and yet they
might not be better, nor even wiser, than they are. It is not found
generally, that the improvement of machinery, and of means of
locomotion, among men, produces an improvement in morality, nor even an
improvement in intelligence, except as to particular points. We must
therefore look somewhat further, in order to find possible characters,
which may enable us to imagine a creature more excellent than man.
17. Among the distinctions which elevate man above brutes, there is one
which we have not mentioned, but which is really one of the most
eminent. We mean, his faculty and habit of forming himself into
Societies, united by laws and language for some common object, the
furtherance of which requires such union. The most general and primary
kind of such societies, is that Civil Society which is bound together by
Law and Government, and which secures to men the Rights of property,
person, family, external peace, and the like. That this kind of society
may be conceived, as taking a more excellent character than it now
possesses, we can easily see: for not only does it often very
imperfectly attain its direct object, the preservation of Rights, but it
becomes the means and source of wrong. Not only does it often fail to
secure peace with strangers, but it acts as if its main object were to
enable men to make wars with strangers. If we were to conceive a
Universal and Perpetual Peace to be established among the nations of the
earth; (for instance by some general agreement for that purpose;) and if
we were to suppose, further, that those nations should employ all their
powers and means in fully unfolding the intellectual and moral
capacities of their members, by early education, constant teaching, and
ready help in all ways; we might then, perhaps, look forwards to a state
of the earth in which it should be inhabited, not indeed by a being
exalted above Man, but by Man exalted above himself as he now is.
18. That by such combinations of communities of men, even with their
present powers, results may be obtained, which at present appear
impossible, or inconceivable, we may find good reason to believe;
looking at what has already been done, or planned as attainable by such
means, in the promotion of knowledge, and the extension of man's
intellectual empire. The greatest discovery ever made, the discovery, by
Newton, of the laws which regulate the motions of the cosmical system,
has been earned to its present state of completeness, only by the united
efforts of all the most intellectual nations upon earth; in addition to
vast labors of individuals, and of smaller societies, voluntarily
associated for the purpose. Astronomical observatories have been
established in every land; scientific voyages, and expeditions for the
purpose of observation, wherever they could throw light upon the theory,
have been sent forth; costly instruments have been constructed,
achievements of discovery have been rewarded; and all nations have shown
a ready sympathy with every attempt to forward this part of knowledge.
Yet the largest and wisest plans for the extension of human knowledge in
other provinces of science by the like means, have remained hitherto
almost entirely unexecuted, and have been treated as mere dreams. The
exhortations of Francis Bacon to men, to seek, by such means, an
elevation of their intellectual condition, have been assented to in
words; but his plans of a methodical and organized combination of
society for this purpose, it has never been even attempted to realize.
If the nations of the earth were to employ, for the promotion of human
knowledge, a small fraction only of the means, the wealth, the
ingenuity, the energy, the combination, which they have employed in
every age, for the destruction of human life and of human means of
enjoyment; we might soon find that what we hitherto knew, is little
compared with what man has the power of knowing.
19. But there is another kind of Society, or another object of Society
among men, which in a still more important manner aims at the elevation
of their nature. Man sympathizes with man, not only in his intellectual
aspirations, but in his moral sentiments, in his religious beliefs and
hopes, in his efforts after spiritual life. Society, even Civil Society,
has generally recognized this sympathy, in a greater or less degree; and
has included Morality and Religion, among the objects which it
endeavored to uphold and promote. But any one who has any deep and
comprehensive perception of man's capacities and aspirations, on such
subjects, must feel that what has commonly, or indeed ever, been done by
nations for such a purpose, has been far below that which the full
development of man's moral, religious, and spiritual nature requires.
Can we not conceive a Society among men, which should have for its
purpose, to promote this development, far more than any human society
has yet done?--a Body selected from all nations, or rather, including
all nations, the purpose of which should be to bind men together by a
universal feeling of kindness and mutual regard, to associate them in
the acknowledgment of a common Divine Lawgiver, Governor, and
Father;--to unite them in their efforts to divest themselves of the evil
of their human nature, and to bring themselves nearer and nearer to a
conformity with the Divine Idea; and finally, a Society which should
unite them in the hope of such a union with God that the parts of their
nature which seem to claim immortality, the Mind, the Soul, and the
Spirit, should endure forever in a state of happiness arising from their
exalted and perfected condition? And if we can suppose such a Society;
fully established and fully operative, would not this be a condition, as
far elevated above the ordinary earthly condition of man, as that of man
is elevated above the beasts that perish?
20. Yet one more question; though we hesitate to mix such suggestions
from analogy, with trains of thought and belief, which have their proper
nutriment from other quarters. We know, even from the evidence of
natural science, that God _has_ interposed in the history of this Earth,
in order to place Man upon it. In that case, there was a clear, and, in
the strongest sense of the term, a _supernatural interposition_ of the
Divine Creative Power. God interposed to place upon the earth, Man, the
social and rational being. God thus directly instituted Human Society;
gave man his privileges and his prospects in such society; placed him
far above the previously existing creation; and endowed him with the
means of an elevation of nature entirely unlike anything which had
previously appeared. Would it then be a violation of analogy, if God
were to interpose again, to institute a Divine Society, such as we have
attempted to describe; to give to its members their privileges; to
assure to them their prospects; to supply to them his aid in pursuing
the objects of such a union with each other; and thus, to draw them, as
they aspire to be drawn, to a spiritual union with Him?
It would seem that those who believe, as the records of the earth's
history seem to show, that the establishment of Man, and of Human
Society, or of the germ of human society, upon the earth, was an
interposition of Creative Power beyond the ordinary course of nature;
may also readily believe that another supernatural Interposition of
Divine Power might take place, in order to plant upon the earth the Germ
of a more Divine Society; and to introduce a period in which the earth
should be tenanted by a more excellent creature than at present.
21. But though we may thus prepare ourselves to assent to the
possibility, or even probability, of such a Divine Interposition,
exercised for the purpose of establishing upon earth a Divine Society:
it would be a rash and unauthorized step,--especially taking into
account the vast differences between material and spiritual things,--to
assume that such an Interposition would have any resemblance to the
commencement of a New Period in the earth's history, analogous to the
Periods by which that history has already been marked. What the manner
and the operation of such a Divine Interposition would be, Philosophy
would attempt in vain to conjecture. It is conceivable that such an
event should produce its effect, not at once, by a general and
simultaneous change in the aspect of terrestrial things, but gradually,
by an almost imperceptible progression. It is possible also that there
may be such an Interposition, which is only one step in the Divine
Plan;--a preparation for some other subsequent Interposition, by which
the change in the Earth's inhabitants is to be consummated. Or it is
possible that such a Divine Interposition in the history of man, as we
have hinted at, may be a preparation, not for a new form of terrestrial
life, but for a new form of human life;--not for a new peopling of the
Earth, but for a new existence of Man. These possibilities are so vague
and doubtful, so far as any scientific analogies lead, that it would be
most unwise to attempt to claim for them any value, as points in which
Science supplies support to Religion. Those persons who most deeply feel
the value of religion, and are most strongly convinced of its truths,
will be the most willing to declare, that religious belief is, and ought
to be, independent of any such support, and must be, and may be, firmly
established on its own proper basis.
22. We find no encouragement, then, for any attempt to obtain, from
Science, by the light of the analogy of the past, any definite view of a
future condition of the Creation. And that this is so, we cannot, for
reasons which have been given, feel any surprise. Yet the reasonings
which we have, in various parts of this Essay, pursued, will not have
been without profit, even in their influence upon our religious
thoughts, if they have left upon our minds these convictions:--That if
the analogy of science proves anything, it proves that the Creator of
man can make a Creator as far superior to Man, as Man, when most
intellectual, moral, religious, and spiritual, is superior to the
brutes:--and again, That Man's Intellect is of a divine, and therefore
of an immortal nature. Those persons who can, on any basis of belief,
combine these two convictions, so as to feel that they have a personal
interest in both of them;--those who have such grounds as Religion,
happily appealed to, can furnish, for hoping that their imperishable
element may, hereafter, be clothed with a new and more glorious apparel
by the hand of its Almighty Maker;--may be well content to acknowledge
that Science and Philosophy could not give them this combined
conviction, in any manner in which it could minister that consolation,
and that trust in the Divine Power and Goodness, which human nature, in
its present condition, requires.
THE END.
Transcriber's Notes.
Spelling irregularities where there was no obviously preferred version
were left as is. Variants include: "embedded" and "imbedded;" "a
hypothesis" and "an hypothesis;" "inexhausted" and "unexhausted;"
"volcanos" and "volcanoes."
Changed "intelligencies" to "intelligences" on page xvi: "may be
rational intelligences."
Changed "familar" to "familiar" on page 43: "had been familiar."
Changed "Chalmer's" to "Chalmers'" on page 67: "Chalmers' reasonings."
Inserted missing period after "live in the sea" on page 78.
Changed "disapear" to "disappear" on page 82: "at last they disappear."
Changed "natturally" to "naturally" on page 84: "we may naturally ask."
Changed "planets" to "plants" on page 91: "plants and animals."
Changed "intelligenee" to "intelligence" on page 125: "intelligence,
morality, religion."
Changed "crystaline" to "crystalline" on page 126: "of crystalline
powers."
Changed "dissimiliar" to "dissimilar" on page 128: "perpetually
dissimilar."
Changed "words" to "worlds" on page 135: "plurality of worlds."
Changed "insignificent" to "insignificant" on page 151: "insignificant
and insensible."
Changed "tales" to "tails" on page 170: "tails of comets."
Changed "Chambers'" to "Chalmers'" in the footnote on page 175:
"Chalmers' Astron. Disc."
In the footnote on page 177, "the times of the warning" might be a
typographic error for "the times of the waning," but was not changed.
Changed "disaprove" to "disprove" on page 185: "prove or disprove."
Changed "one-thirteenth" to "one-thirtieth" on page 194: "be
one-thirtieth as large."
Changed "skeletous" to "skeletons" on page 208: "Can they have
skeletons."
In the footnote from page 217, "Schroeter" appears with the oe-ligature;
elsewhere it does not. The ligature was replaced by the two separate
characters in the footnote.
Changed "how-however" to "however" in the footnote from page 233: "This,
however."
Changed "hisorians" to "historians" on page 253: "natural-historians."
Changed "Meaning" to "meaning" at the beginning of page 261, since it's
not a new sentence.
Changed "crystalizes" to "crystallizes" and "crystaline" to
"crystalline" on page 265: "Ice crystallizes;" "crystalline aggregation."
Changed "Artic" to "Arctic" in the footnote from page 265: "Account of
the Arctic Regions."
Changed "kingdon" to "kingdom" on page 267: "the animal kingdom."
Changed "splendour" to "splendor" on page 273: "the material splendor."
Changed "hightest" to "highest" on page 295: "the highest degree."
Changed "deely" to "deeply" on page 305: "who most deeply feel."