History of the Intellectual Development of Europe, Volume II (of 2)
Of evil beings and hell. Still more, a thousand facts of our life teach us that we are exposed to influences of an evil nature as well as to those that are good. How often, in our dreams, does it happen that we are terror-stricken by the approach of hideous forms, faces of fearful appearance, from which we vainly struggle to escape. Is it not natural for us to attribute the evil we see in the world to these as the good to those? and, since we can not conceive of the existence of beings without assigning them a place, where shall we find for these malignant spirits a habitation? Is it not in the dark region beneath the ground, far away from the realms of light – a region from which, through the volcano, smoke and burning sulphur are cast into this upper world – a place of everlasting fire and darkness, whose portals are in caves and solitudes of unutterable gloom?
Of man, the supernatural. Placed thus on the boundary between such opposing powers, man is the sport of circumstances, sustained by beings who seek his happiness, and tempted by those who desire his destruction. Is it at all surprising that, guided by such obvious thoughts and simple reasonings, he becomes superstitious? that he sees in every shadow a spirit, and peoples every solitary place with invisibles? that he casts a longing look to the good beings who can protect him, seeking to invoke their aid by entreaties, and to propitiate their help by free-will sacrifices of things that are pleasant and valuable? Open to such influences himself, why should he not believe in the efficacy of prayer? His conscious superiority lends force to his suspicion that he is a worthy object for the opposing powers to contend for, a conclusion verified by the inward strifes he feels, as well as by the trials of life to which he is exposed.
His immortality and future life. But dreams at night, and sometimes visions by day, serve to enforce the conclusion that life is not limited to our transitory continuance here, but endures hereafter. How often at night do we see the well-known forms of those who have been dead a long time appearing before us with surprising vividness, and hear their almost forgotten voices? These are admonitions full of the most solemn suggestions, profoundly indicating to us that the dead still continue to exist, and that what has happened to them must also happen to us, and we too are destined for immortality. Perhaps involuntarily we associate these conclusions with others, expecting that in a future life good men will enjoy the society of good beings like themselves, the evil being dismissed to the realms of darkness and despair. And, as human experience teaches us that a final allotment can only be made by some superior power, we expect that He who was our Creator shall also be our Judge; that there is an appointed time and a bar at which the final destination of all who have lived shall be ascertained, and eternal justice measure out its punishments and rewards.
Inducements to morality. From these considerations there arises an inducement for us to lead a virtuous life, abstaining from wickedness and wrong; to set apart a body of men who may mediate for us, and teach us by precept and example the course it is best for us to pursue; to consecrate places, such as groves or temples, as the more immediate habitations of the Deity to which we may resort.
Such are the leading doctrines of Natural Theology of primitive man both in the old and new continent. They arise from the operations of the human mind considering the fitness of things.
Just as we have in Comparative Anatomy the structure of different animals examined, and their identities and differences set forth, thereby establishing their true relations; just as we have in Comparative Physiology the functions of one organic being compared with those of another, to the end that we may therefrom deduce their proper connexions, so, from the mythologies of various races of men, a Comparative Theology may be constructed. Course of Comparative Theology. Through such a science alone can correct conclusions be arrived at respecting this, the most important of the intellectual operations of man – the definite process of his religious opinions. But it must be borne in mind that Comparative Theology illustrates the result or effect of the phase of life, and is not its cause.
Corrections of anthropocentric ideas. As man advances in knowledge he discovers that of his primitive conclusions some are doubtless erroneous, and many require better evidence to establish their truth incontestably. A more prolonged and attentive examination gives him reason, in some of the most important particulars, to change his mind. He finds that the earth on which he lives is not a floor covered over with a starry dome, as he once supposed, but a globe self-balanced in space. The crystalline vault, or sky, is recognized to be an optical deception. It rests upon the earth nowhere, and is no boundary at all; there is no kingdom of happiness above it, but a limitless space, adorned with planets and suns. Instead of a realm of darkness and woe in the depths on the other side of the earth, men like ourselves are found there, pursuing, in Australia and New Zealand, the innocent pleasures and encountering the ordinary labours of life. By the aid of such lights as knowledge gradually supplies, he comes at last to discover that this, our terrestrial habitation, instead of being a chosen, a sacred spot, is only one of similar myriads, more numerous than the sands of the sea, and prodigally scattered through space.
Consequence of discovering the form of the earth. Never, perhaps, was a more important truth discovered. All the visible evidence was in direct opposition to it. Detection of its insignificance. The earth, which had hitherto seemed to be the very emblem of immobility, was demonstrated to be carried with a double motion, with prodigious velocity, through the heavens; the rising and setting of the stars were proved to be an illusion; and, as respects the size of the globe, it was shown to be altogether insignificant when compared with multitudes of other neighbouring ones – insignificant doubly by reason of its actual dimensions, and by the countless numbers of others like it in form, and doubtless, like it, the abodes of many orders of life.
And so it turns out that our earth is a globe of about twenty-five thousand miles in circumference. The voyager who circumnavigates it spends no inconsiderable portion of his life in accomplishing his task. It moves round the sun in a year, but at so great a distance from that luminary that, if seen from him, it would look like a little spark traversing the sky. It is thus recognized as one of the members of the solar system. Other solar bodies. Other similar bodies, some of which are of larger, some of smaller dimensions, perform similar revolutions round the sun in appropriate periods of time.
Magnitude of the universe. If the magnitude of the earth be too great for us to attach to it any definite conception, what shall we say of the compass of the solar system? There is a defect in the human intellect which incapacitates us for comprehending distances and periods that are either too colossal or too minute. We gain no clearer insight into the matter when we are told that a comet which does not pass beyond the bounds of the system, may perhaps be absent on its journey for more than a thousand years. Distances and periods such as these are beyond our grasp. They prove to us how far human reason excels imagination, the one measuring and comparing things of which the other can form no conception, but in the attempt is utterly bewildered and lost.
The infinity of worlds. But as there are other globes like our earth, so too there are other worlds like our solar system. There are self-luminous suns exceeding in number all computation. The dimensions of this earth pass into nothingness in comparison with the dimensions of the solar system, and that system, in its turn, is only an invisible point if placed in relation with the countless hosts of other systems which form, with it, clusters of stars. Our solar system, far from being alone in the universe, is only one of an extensive brotherhood, bound by common laws and subject to like influences. Even on the very verge of creation, where imagination might lay the beginning of the realms of chaos, we see unbounded proofs of order, a regularity in the arrangement of inanimate things, suggesting to us that there are other intellectual creatures like us, the tenants of those islands in the abysses of space.
Though it may take a beam of light a million of years to bring to our view those distant worlds, the end is not yet. Far away in the depths of space we catch the faint gleams of other groups of stars like our own. The finger of a man can hide them in their remoteness. Their vast distances from one another have dwindled into nothing. They and their movements have lost all individuality; the innumerable suns of which they are composed blend all their collected light into one pale milky glow.
Insignificance of man. Thus extending our view from the earth to the solar system, from the solar system to the expanse of the group of stars to which we belong, we behold a series of gigantic nebular creations rising up one after another, and forming greater and greater colonies of worlds. No numbers can express them, for they make the firmament a haze of stars. Uniformity, even though it be the uniformity of magnificence, tires at last, and we abandon the survey, for our eyes can only behold a boundless prospect, and conscience tells us our own unspeakable insignificance.
Triumph of scientific truth. But what has become of the time-honoured doctrine of the human destiny of the universe? that doctrine for the sake of which the controversy I have described in this chapter was raised. It has disappeared. In vain was Bruno burnt and Galileo imprisoned; the truth forced its way, in spite of all opposition, at last. The end of the conflict was a total rejection of authority and tradition, and the adoption of scientific truth.
CHAPTER IX
THE EUROPEAN AGE OF REASON – (Continued)
HISTORY OF THE EARTH. – HER SUCCESSIVE CHANGES IN THE COURSE OF TIME
Oriental and Occidental Doctrines respecting the Earth in Time. – Gradual Weakening of the latter by astronomical Facts, and the Rise of Scientific Geology.
Impersonal Manner in which the Problem was eventually solved, chiefly through Facts connected with Heat.
Proofs of limitless Duration from inorganic Facts. – Igneous and Aqueous Rocks.
Proofs of the same from organic Facts. – Successive Creations and Extinctions of living Forms, and their contemporaneous Distribution.
Evidences of a slowly declining Temperature, and, therefore, of a long Time. – The Process of Events by Catastrophe and by Law. – Analogy of Individual and Race Development. – Both are determined by unchangeable Law.
Conclusion that the Plan of the Universe indicates a Multiplicity of Worlds of infinite Space, and a Succession of Worlds in infinite Time.
Age of the earth. A victory could not be more complete nor a triumph more brilliant than that which had been gained by science in the contest concerning the position of the earth. Though there followed closely thereupon an investigation of scarcely inferior moment – that respecting the age of the earth – so thoroughly was the ancient authority intellectually crushed that it found itself incapable of asserting by force the Patristic idea that our planet is less than six thousand years old.
The question is impersonally solved. Not but that a resistance was made. It was, however, of an indirect kind. The contest might be likened rather to a partisan warfare than to the deliberate movement of regular armies under recognized commanders. In its history there is no central figure like Galileo, no representative man, no brilliant and opportune event like the invention of the telescope. The question moves on to its solution impersonally. A little advance is made here by one, there by another. The war was finished, though no great battle was fought. In the chapter we are entering upon there is, therefore, none of that dramatic interest connected with the last. Impersonally the question was decided, and, therefore, impersonally I must describe it.
Oriental and Western doctrines of the age of the earth. In Oriental countries, where the popular belief assigns to the creation of man a very ancient date, and even asserts for some empires a duration of hundreds of thousands of years, no difficulty as respects the age of the earth was felt, there seeming to have been time enough for every event that human researches have detected to transpire. But in the West, where the doctrine that not only the earth, but the universe itself, was intended for man, has been carried to its consequences with exacting rigour, circumstances forbid us to admit that there was any needless delay between the preparation of the habitation and the introduction of the tenant. They also force upon us the conclusion that a few centuries constitute a very large portion of the time of human existence, since, if we adopt the doctrine of an almost limitless period, we should fall into a difficulty in explaining what has become of the countless myriads of generations in the long time so past, and, considering that we are taught that the end of the world is at hand, and must be expected in a few years at the most, we might seem to arraign the goodness of God in this, that He has left to their fate immeasurably the larger proportion of our race, and has restricted His mercy to us alone, who are living in the departing twilight of the evening of the world.
Correction of the European doctrine. But in this, as in the former case, a closer examination of the facts brings us to the indisputable conclusion that we have decided unworthily and untruly; that our guiding doctrine of the universe being intended for us is a miserable delusion; that the scale on which the world is constructed as to time answers to that on which it is constructed as to space; that, as respects our planet, its origin dates from an epoch too remote for our mental apprehension; that myriads of centuries have been consumed in its coming to its present state; that, by a slow progression, it has passed from stage to stage, uninhabited, and for a long time uninhabitable by any living thing; that in their proper order and in due lapse of time, the organic series have been its inhabitants, and of these a vast majority, whose numbers are so great that we cannot offer an intelligible estimate of them, have passed away and become extinct, and that finally, for a brief period, we have been its possessors.
Of the intentions of God it becomes us, therefore, to speak with reverence and reserve. In those ages when there was not a man upon the earth, what was the object? Was the twilight only given that the wolf might follow his fleeing prey, and the stars made to shine that the royal tiger might pursue his midnight maraudings? Where was the use of so much that was beautiful and orderly, when there was not a solitary intellectual being to understand and enjoy? Even now, when we are so much disposed to judge of other worlds from their apparent adaptedness to be the abodes of a thinking and responsible order like ourselves, it may be of service to remember that this earth itself was for countless ages a dungeon of pestiferous exhalations and a den of wild beasts.
It elevates rather than degrades the position of man. It might moreover appear that the conclusions to which we come, both as respects the position and age of the world, must necessarily have for their consequences the diminution and degradation of man, the rendering him too worthless an object for God's regard. But here again we fall into an error. True, we have debased his animal value, and taught him how little he is – how insignificant are the evils, how vain the pleasures of his life. But, as respects his intellectual principle, how does the matter stand? What is it that has thus been measuring the terrestrial world, and weighing it in a balance? What is it that has been standing on the sun, and marking out the orbits and boundaries of the solar system? What is it that has descended into the infinite abysses of space, examined the countless worlds that they contain, and compared and contrasted them together? What is it that has shown itself capable of dealing with magnitudes that are infinite, even of comparing infinites together! What is it that has not hesitated to trace things in their history through a past eternity, and been found capable of regarding equally the transitory moment and endless duration? That which is competent to do all this, so far from being degraded, rises before us with an air of surpassing grandeur and inappreciable worth. It is the soul of man.
Relations of the earth in time. From the facts given in the last chapter respecting the relations of the earth in space, we are next led to her relations in time.
So long as science was oppressed with the doctrine of the human destiny of the universe, which, as its consequence, made this earth the great central body, and elevated man to supreme importance, there was much difficulty in treating the problem of the age of the world. The history of the earth was at first a wild and fictitious cosmogony. Scientific cosmogony arose, not from any theological considerations, but from the telescopic ascertainment of the polar compression of the planet Jupiter, and the consequent determination by Newton that the earth is a spheroid of revolution. With a true cosmogony came a better chronology. Anthropocentric ideas of the beginning and end of the world. The patristic doctrine had been that the earth came into existence but little more than five thousand years ago, and to this a popular opinion long current was added, that its end might be very shortly expected. From time to time periods were set by various authorities determining the latter event, and, as true knowledge was extinguished, the year 1000 came to be the universally appointed date. In view of this, it was not an uncommon thing for persons to commence their testamentary bequests with the words, "In expectation of the approaching end of the world." But the tremendous moment passed by, and still the sun rose and set, still the seasons were punctual in their courses, and Nature wore her accustomed aspect. A later day was then predicted, and again and again disappointment ensued, until sober-minded men began to perceive that the Scriptures were never intended to give information on such subjects, and predictions of the end of the world fell into discredit, abandoned to the illiterate, whose morbid anticipations they still amuse.
As it was thus with the end of our planet, so it was as regards her origin. By degrees evidence began to accumulate casting a doubt on her recent date, evidence continually becoming more and more cogent. Rise of the doctrine of illimitable age. In no insignificant manner did the establishment of the heliocentric theory, aided by the discoveries of the telescope, assist in this result. As I have said, it utterly ruined past restoration the doctrine of the human destiny of the universe. With that went down all arguments which had depended on making man the measure of things. Ideas of unexpected sublimity as to the scale of magnitude on which the world is constructed soon enforced themselves, and proved to be the precursors of similar ideas as to time. At length it was perceived by those who were in the van of the movement that the Bible was never intended to deliver a chronological doctrine respecting the beginning any more than the end of things, and that those well-meaning men who were occupied in wresting it from its true purposes were engaged in an unhappy employment, for its tendency could be no other than to injure the cause they designed to promote. Nevertheless, so strong were the ancient persuasions, that it was not without a struggle that the doctrine of a long period forced its way – a struggle for the age of the earth, which, in its arguments, in its tendencies, and in its results, forcibly recalls the preceding one respecting the position of the earth; but, in the end, truth overrode all authority and all opposition, and the doctrine of an extremely remote origin of our planet ceased to be open to dispute.
In a scientific conception of the universe, illimitable spaces are of necessity connected with limitless time.
Indications depending on the progressive motion of light. The discovery of the progressive motion of light offered the means of an absolute demonstration of this connexion. Rays emitted by an object, and making us sensible of its presence by impinging on the eye, do not reach us instantaneously, but consume a certain period in their passage.
If any sudden visible effect took place in the sun, we should not see it at the absolute moment of its occurrence, but about eight minutes and thirteen seconds later, this being the time required for light to cross the intervening distance. All phenomena take place in reality anterior to the moment at which we observe them by a time longer in proportion as the distance to be travelled is greater.
There are objects in the heavens so distant that it would take many hundreds of thousands of years for their light to reach us. Then it necessarily follows, since we can see them, that they must have been created and must have been shining so long.
The velocity with which light moves was first determined by the Danish astronomer Römer from the eclipses of Jupiter's satellites, November, 1675. It was, therefore, a determination of the rate for reflected solar light in a vacuum, and gave 198,000 miles in a second. In 1727, Bradley determined it for direct stellar light by his great discovery of the aberration of the fixed stars. More recently, the experiments of M. Foucault and those of M. Fizeau, by the aid of rotating mirrors or wheels, have confirmed these astronomical observations, Fizeau's determination of the velocity approaching that of Römer. Probably, however, the most correct is that of Struve, 191,515 miles per second.
Investigation of the age of the earth through the phenomena of heat. This astronomical argument, which serves as a general introduction, is strengthened by numerous physical and physiological facts. But of the different methods by which the age of the earth may be elucidated, I shall prefer that which approaches it through the phenomena of heat. Such a manner of viewing the problem has led to its determination in the minds of many thinking men.
Astronomical heat alone on the earth's surface. As correct astronomical ideas began to prevail, it was perceived that all the heat now on the surface of our planet is derived from the sun. Through the circumstance of the inclination of her axis of rotation to the plane of her annual motion, or through the fact of her globular form occasioning the presentation of different parts of her surface, according to their latitudes, with more or less obliquity, and hence the reception of less or more of the rays, there may be local and temporary variations. But these do not affect the general principle that the quantity of heat thus received must be the same from year to year.
The equilibrium of interior heat. This thermometric equilibrium not only holds good for the surface, it may also be demonstrated for the whole mass of the planet. The day has not shortened by the 1/200 of a second since the time of Hipparchus, and therefore the decrease of heat can not have been so much as the 1/300 of a Fahrenheit degree, on the hypothesis that the mean dilatation of all terrestrial substances is equal to that of glass, 1/180000 for one degree. If a decline had taken place in the intrinsic heat of the earth, there must have been a diminution in her size, and, as a necessary consequence, the length of the day must have become less. The earth has therefore reached a condition of equilibrium as respects temperature.
Its ancient decline. A vast body of evidence has, however, come into prominence, establishing with equal certainty that there was in ancient times a far higher temperature in the planet; not a temperature concerned with a fraction of a degree, but ranging beyond the limits of our thermometric scale. The mathematical figure of the earth offers a resistless argument for its ancient liquefied condition – that is, for its originally high temperature. But how is this to be co-ordinated with the conclusion just mentioned? Simply by the admission that there have elapsed prodigious, it might almost be said limitless, periods. Necessity for a long time. As thus the true state of affairs began to take on shape, it was perceived that the age of the earth is not a question of authority, not a question of tradition, but a mathematical problem sharply defined: to determine the time of cooling of a globe of known diameter and of given conductibility by radiation in a vacuum.