[4] For instance, we may assume that in two or three hundred years, by the improvement of telescopes, or by other means, it may be ascertained that the other planets of the Solar System are not inhabited, and that the other Stars are not the centres of regular systems.
CHAPTER XIII.
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?