Charles Sumner; his complete works; Volume 2 (of 20)

nown to Antiquity. The ignorance and prejudice which then prevailed with regard to the earth, the heavenly bodies, and their relations to the universe, found fit companionsh

sun traversed daily in fiery chariot from east to west. So things seemed

o the operation of immutable law, but to the fortune of the Republic. And Polybius, whom Gibbon extols for wisdom and philosophical spirit, said that Carthage, being so much older than Rome, felt her decay so much the sooner; and the survivor, he announced, carried in her bosom the seeds of mortality. The image o

with many, who have not received the Law of Human Progress, teaching that all revolutions and changes are but links in the chain of development, or, it may

sociation, without discord, without care, without toil, without weariness, while good of all kinds abounded, like the plentiful fruits which the earth spontaneously supplied. This was followed by the Silver Age, with a race inferior in form and disposition. Next was the Brazen Age, still descending in the scale, when men became vehement and robust, strong in body and stern in soul, building brazen houses, wielding brazen weapons, prompt to war, bu

in flowing verses that have become a commonplace of literature. It was recognized by the tender muse of Virgil, the sportive fancy of Horace, and the stern genius of Juvenal. Songs and fables have ever exerted a powerful control over human opinion; nor is it possible to estimate the influence of this story in shaping unconsciously the thought

uid non im

tum, pejor

iores, m

vitiosio

the Evangelists, to proclaim the advent of a better age. Virgil, in his Eclogue to Pollio,-the exact meaning of which is still a riddle,-breaks forth in words of vague aspiration, which have been sometimes supposed to herald the coming of the Saviour. The blessings of Peace ar

ifes filling the lives of men were all to be lost in a blissful Sabbath of a thousand years, when Christ with the triumphant band of saints would return to reign upon earth until the last and general resurrection. Vain and irrational as was the early form of this anticipation, it was not without advantage. It filled the souls of all w

unto others what we would have them not do unto us; but the Chinese philosopher did not declare the ultimate triumph of this law. It was reserved for the Sermon on the Mount to reveal the vital truth, that all the highest commands of religion and duty, drawing in

ed, in the night of ignorance and prejudice, they were heralds of the dawn. In the advance of Modern Europe, they led the way, whispering, Onward forever! Long before Philosophy dedu

mposing procession of events, but did not discern the rule which guided the mighty series. Ascending from triumph to triumph, they saw dominion extended by the discoveries of intrepid navigators,-saw learning strengthened by the studies of accomplished scholars,-saw universities opening their portals to ingenuous youth in all corners of the land, from Aberdeen and Copenhagen to Toledo and Ferrara,-saw Art put forth new graces in the painting of Raffaelle, new grandeur in the painting, the sculpture, and the architecture of Michel Angelo,-caught the strains of poets, no longer cramped by ancient idioms, but flowing sweetly in the language learned at a mother's knee,-received the manifold revelations of science in geometry, mathematics

eration, by irresistible necessity, added to the accumulations of the Past, and in this way prepared a higher Future. To all ignorant of this tendency, history, instead of a connected chain, with cause and effect in natural order, is nothing but a disconnected, irregular series of incidents, like separate and confused circles having no common bond. It is a dark chaos, embroiled by "chance, high arbitress," or swayed by som

inciples of a New Science concerning the Common Nature of Nations,"[246] first published in 1725, constitutes an epoch in historical studies. Recent Italian admirers vindicate for its author a place among great discoverers, by the side of Descartes, Galileo, Bacon, and Newton.[247] With

in the nature of things,-excluding, of course, the idea of chance. He recognized three principles at the foundation of civilization: first, the existence of Divine Providence; secondly, the necessity of moderating the passions; and, thirdly, the immortality of the soul: three primal truths, answering to three historical facts of universal acceptance,-relig

own and infinite stages. Believing monarchy a perfect government, he did not see beyond the time of kings. Like others before him, and even in our own day, he was perplexed by the treacherous image of

eology were all equally familiar,-Leibnitz, that more than imperial conqueror in the realms of universal knowledge,-the greatest, perhaps, of Human Intelligences,-enunciated the Law of Progress in all the sciences and all the concerns of life. The Present, born of the Past, he said, is pregnant with the Future. It is by a sure series that we advanc

he had discovered. And yet, recognizing this law, the gates of the Future were open to him, and he saw Man in distant perspective, arrived at heights of happiness which he cannot now conceive. The vision of Universal Peace was to him no longer a vision, but the practical idea of humane st

History" portrays Humanity in its incessant progress from small beginnings of ignorance and barbarism, when wrong and war and slavery prevail, to the recognition of reason and justice as the rule of life. "There is nothing enthusiastical," he says in that work, which is a classic of German prose,

which will be very useful to life, and that we may yet discover methods by which man, comprehending the force and the action of fire, water, air, stars, skies, and all the other bodies which environ us, as distinctly as we comprehend the different trades of our artisans, shall be able to employ them in the same fashion for all the uses to which they are appropriate, and thus shall render himself master and possessor of Nature." In these new triumphs of knowledge, he says, "men may learn to enjoy the fruits of the earth without trouble; their health will be preserved, and they will be able to exempt thems

ity in Matters of Philosophy, was in this early edition suppressed. Not until the next century was the testimony of Pascal disclosed to the world. "By a special prerogative of the human race," says he, "not only each man advances day by day in the sciences, but all men together make continual progress therein, as the universe grows old; because the same thing happens in the succession of men which takes place in the different ages of an individual. So that the whole succession of men in the course of so many ages may be regarded as one man who lives always and who learns continually. From this we see with what injustice we respect Antiquity in its philosophers; for, since old age is the period most distant from infancy, who doe

author of those Fairy Tales, including "Cinderella" and "Bluebeard," which have given him a fame not inferior to that of his brother, Claude Perrault, with whom he is sometimes confounded, to whom France is indebted for that perpetual triumph in architecture, the unsurpassed front of the Louvre. In an elaborate work, published in 1688-92, entitled "Parallel between the Ancients and Moderns in regard to the Arts and Sciences,"[252] where the debate is in the form of dialogue, he vindicates the Moderns in comparison wi

s had his infancy, when he was occupied only with the more pressing wants of life,-his youth, when he has succeeded pretty well in matters of imagination, such as poesy and eloquence, and when he has even begun to reason, but with less solidity than fire. He has now reached the age of manhood, when he reasons with more force and more intelligence than ever; but he would be yet further advanced, if the passion for war had not for a long time possessed him, and given him a contempt for the sciences, to which he has at last returned.... This man will have no old age; he will be ever equa

cceptance of this law was first announced in an essay[254] written in 1750, at the age of twenty-three, while he was yet at the Sorbonne. Let it be mentioned in his praise, that, as he grew in years, in power, and in fame, he did not depart from the happy intuitions of early life, or forget the visions which, as a young man, he had seen. Perceiving clearly the advance already made, he drew from it the assurance of yet further advance. In reason, knowledge, and virtue he did not hesitate to place his own age before preceding ages. "The corrupt of to-day," he was accustomed to say, "would have been Capuchins a hundred years ago." He declared the capacity for indefinite improvement a distinctive quality of the human race, belonging to the race in general, and to each individual in particular. He did not doubt that the progress of the physica

yman to the bishop. All ages, says Turgot, are enchained by a succession of causes and effects uniting the present with what has preceded, and all accumulated knowledge is a common treasure, transmitted from generation to generation, as an inheri

last proscribed, and compelled to flee for life,-pursued by the very dogs he had helped to arouse, but was impotent to restrain,-sought shelter with a friend, where, in concealment, he passed the last eight months before his mournful death. His first thought was, to send forth a vindication of himself, addressed to his fellow-citizens; but soon renouncing this design, he devoted what remained to him of life-during that most hateful passage of human history, the Reign of Terror-to the preparation of a work in which he brought his various powers to the development of the La

republican schools by an unfortunate philosopher, that everywhere in it the improvement of society was recognized as the object most deserving the activity of the human intelligence, and that pupils studying here the history of the sciences and the a

eau, but by a succession of masters who are our acknowledged guides in science, philosophy, and history. In Italy the torch was held aloft by Vico; i

es, vita? lampad

d into his aspiration to deliver man from present weakness by extending his power over Nature. It is foreshadowed in his great declaration, antedating Pascal, that Antiquity was the youth of the world,-"Antiquitas s?culi, juventus mundi."[259] For a time Bacon had no successors in England. At a later day this law wa

ved by men. Writers in our own age, of much ability and unexampled hardihood, while adopting this fundamental law, proceed to arraign existing institutions of society. My present purpose does not require me to consider these, whether for censure or praise,-abounding as they