Now the profile that the Lunarian Professor of “Mundane Prognostication” held in his multiple hands (I shall call him the Professor hereafter) very much resembled in appearance that just described, except that instead of only one there were several profiles on this one strip of paper, one above another. In each one there was the irregular surface line accompanied with the more or less straight grade line showing cuts in some places and fills in others. The professor explained these profiles to be graphic exhibits of the state of various human institutions and conditions as they appeared during a continuous term of time beginning in the past, and extending into a far distant future.
After examining these profiles a short time, I had little difficulty in getting the ideas intended to be conveyed by them. They will be readily understood without much explanation. Thus the line of “muscular development” is shown in the remote past as being almost up to grade, but as gradually falling below it in the course of time, then rising again and coming almost to the grade line about the year 2500, but after that gradually falling away again. Selfish instinct, which has always shown heavy cutting, comes down nearly to grade, about the year 7200. While altruistic instinct that regards the common welfare and has been below grade, always, but at times higher than at present, is seen to rise and come to grade about the same time. Health has always shown a fill, often a large one, but gradually rises almost to grade about the year 2500. Crime has always been a cut, but disappears in the future about the same time as theology.
Peace, which is a condensation or composite of all the rest and the end for which they all exist, has always been a fill and always must be until human actions become absolutely instinctive and unconscious, which they never can do until men have been acted upon and molded by habit by every stimulation possible to their environment. Reasoned acts are those which arise from stimulations, that are new or unusual to us, and new stimulations will continue to come as long as knowledge increases or continues to be pursued, or to be thrust upon us. If the accumulation of knowledge should stop, actions would finally become instinctive, and unconscious. This would be complete absence of misery, and also absence of happiness, but perfect peace. So the grade line of Peace is a dead level. Above it is the ragged line of misery always a great cut, and below it is the line of happiness always a fill, somewhat lighter than the cut above the line, and terminating in grade soon after it.
I inquired of the Professor, the principle, upon which predictions of the future were worked out. He replied, that the principles were exceedingly simple, although the actual working out of any scheme of the future involved the consideration of such a vast number of details and conditions, as to render it a labor of magnitude. “Prediction,” said he, “is only past history, projected forward. If we know precisely what happened in the past, our knowledge will include the antecedent causes of the events. Events beget events, and they succeed each other as one generation succeeds another. Knowing the character and condition of one generation and the modifications that have been made in it by its environment, we have the principal data for estimating the character of its successor and so on. The principal uncertainty we encounter, is in the prediction of changes in the environment itself. Thus the invention of a self portable power like steam made the invention of railroads possible and the construction of railroads completely changed the environment of the succeeding generations.
“Now it is difficult to forecast just what particular turn invention will take, but it is not impossible, because inventions constitute a race with generations one begetting another. Knowing all that is known to-day makes it possible to see what this knowledge will lead to to-morrow. The trouble is for one to know all that is known. As I have already mentioned, our own Lunarian history greatly aids us in our study of your future, for we have passed through an experience, which, while it is different from what yours has been or will be, is parallel and comparable with it. And making due allowance for the difference in physical structure of the two races and considering that we are 500,000 years older than you, we have only to consult our past in order to get your future, or something much like it, for many generations to come.”
“These profiles of yours, Professor,” said I, “are evidently the result of much learned detail work and they are of extreme interest and value to the philosophical and scientific student. But to common people the details themselves are more interesting, because they are more easy to be understood and come nearer to the common life. Could you not favor me with some of the future history of our planet and especially of the United States and of the State of Minnesota. Any of the facts that you have prognosticated and from which you have deduced the generalizations that you embody in your profiles, would be of great interest.”
He seemed a little disappointed at this request, as no doubt his habits of thought had made him familiar with and attached to the comprehensive and wholesale treatment of these questions, and he looked upon the detailed story as a means to an end and containing but little interest in itself. But it is easier to generalize from details, than to construct the details. However he complied, observing that he would be compelled to get these details in part from his memory, which however would be prompted and refreshed by the general profile he held in his hands.
“I will take my stand,” said he, “at about the year 2,000 of your era, and then by looking forward and backward along these lines, I think I can recover the principal factors that have entered into their make-up. This will also allow me to give you the descriptions in the past tense as events that have been accomplished up to that time and from that date we will also look forward, for the events subsequent to it.”
It occurred to me that he must be tired of holding the profile so long between his outstretched hands and so I offered to hold it for him awhile, or at least hold one end of it. At that he shifted the rolls from his front to his middle pair of hands, by which maneuver he gave me to understand that he had abundant resources for resting himself without outside help. How I did envy him that extra pair of hands.
He then began as follows: