THE PAST AISD THE FUTURE

Southland Times, Volume I, Issue 13, 23 December 1862, Page 2

THE PAST AISD THE FUTURE

(From the Press.)

To a certain extent all men are prophets, and all men would like to be more prophetic than they are. The question has sonii^imes struck us whether we might not .attain lo a greater knowledge of futurity tban most men conceive to be possible. Have we done all we can do towards penetrating out the secret of futurity? And how far is this limit assignable lo the prophetic powers of man ? Man can prophecy now many things which a hundred years ago it would have heen deemed madness to speculate upon. By the help of Admiral Fitzroy, a captain of a ship at Liverpool may prophecy a storm many hours before there is the slightest symptom of it. The barometer, too, is a great telescope into futurity as far as atmospheric changes are concerned. Instances will occur to every reader which will remind him how far more prophetic an age we live in than any which has preceded us, and it will be accordingly unnecessary to waste space in enumerating (hem here. The question is, what is the cause of all this, and how are we to make still further progress in unravelling the mysteries of futurity ? Every one knows the answer to these questions ; every one acts in accordance with that answer : yet most men know, without knowing that they know; and act, without knowing why they act. They know empirically, and act empirically, and perhaps act with just as much wisdon as though they referred themselves to their first principles ; still, we shall venture to remind those who care to read this article, that insight into futurity is only to be gained in one way, and that that way is tedious and difficult.

The reader knows as well as we do that the knowledge of the future is only attainable through the knowledge of the past. The unanimous verdict of all ages has found that like combinations of circumstances are attended with like results; or, in other words, that like causes produce like effects He sets himself therefore to examine those past combinations that are most likely to reflect light upon the object of his researches.

He assumes the proposition that like agents acting in a like nanner upon like subjects will generate like results. It is on the faith of this law, known or supposed to be known, that all men act in all things whatsoever that they do. This is the key which unlocks the chamber ef the future, and without which the past would be valueless and the future inscrutable. For of what use would the past be if we could make no use of it? And how could we make any use of it if it were an uncertain and variable guide? Why should the statesman study the history of bygone ages if they throw no light upon the immediate or even remote future with which he is concerned? The past is good if studied with a view to present and future, but absolutely worthless if studied simply and solely for itself. We should look into it as into a mirror which will reflect futurity, not possibly at first, but more perfectly the more studious!}* we examine it ; some men will look into this magic glass for some end, and some for another ; but if they will only ask long enough, and lie sufficiently patient, they will get some kind of answer, even though they may fail in obtaining the full knowledge which they require. There Ls no such thing as caprice of vacillation in the action of this law. We will suppose the wind to blow a tile from off the roof of a house, and to deposit it upon a greenhouse hard by, and we will suppose that neither tile nor glass are broken; the owiipv of the greenhouse will talk about the fickleness and caprice of the wind ; yet if ten thousand years hence, and ten thousand miles away, a wind in every way similar blows upon a similar tile in exactly the same manner (we must suppose the similarity to be absolutely perfect in all these respects), and if we also suppose that tlipre is a similar greenhouse in every way similarly situated with the other, and so forth — surly this fickle capricious wind will have remembered what it did tun thonsand years ago, ten thousand miles off, and will do the identical same thing again. No '. No ! There is no caprice in ( .he matter :we think there is fickleness because our senses are to gross to enable us to detect innumerable slight variations cither in agent or subject, or manner of application. And this grossness of our senses, coupled with the variety' or rather variation, of the agents, and the manner of their cooperation, is the true causeof our ignorance of the future. For the future is till contained in the loins of the past if we could only see it there. It is in the pastas the children of Israel were in the loins of Abraham, or as the chicken in the new laid eg^ : but in nature, and amid the varied airangmen Is of the world in which we exist, it so seldom happens that (he same agents and subjects repeat themselves in exactly the same manner of combination so as to reproduce exactly any pre-existing result, that not even are two acorns exactly alike up;>n the same oak tree; nay, not even two peas in a pod are perfectly similar. Man must therefore content himself with approximations, and his senses being very gross, approximations serve him for all practical purposes. Machinery affords a very good illustration of the unswervableness of the law of like causes producing like effects; inasmuch by its agency the conditions are reproduced with the most perfect precision to which we can attain. For instance the plough turns up furrow after furrow, and each furrow is similar to the one that proceeded it as long as the land is similar and the action of the horses and the depth of the plough similar ; a stocking machine produces row upon row with nearly absolute similarity, inasmuch as the conditions requisite for the formation of the first row are repeated with nearly absolute similarity. Oxygen and hydrogen mixed in certain proportions always produce water. Warm rain always makes the grass to grow, and in like manner to the smoker tobacco is always more or less agreeable ; and on two similar cowards A. and B. two similar terrifying agents C. and D. acting after the same fashion X, will produce exactly the same result.

The upshot of all this rigmarole is some such thing as the following— When you read history do not read it to get the bare facts which are to be found in its pages, but study each fact and think it over and over nsain- A very little period in history thoroughly mastered is worth a very long period which has been merely examined for purposes of display. Take this American civii war for instance. Study that, not superficially so as merely to know on what day the battle of Bull's Run was fought, or what are the namesof the principle generals on either side, but fall down as it were before the whole subject, until l»y sheer intensity of importunity you make it answer }ou. Ask when it became necessary — ] lO w many years ago was it that the first symptoms displayed themselves from which a man well versed in history might have safely prophesied it \ — Sidney Smith and others did this thirty years ago. Ask what would have prevented it 1 Ask every question you can think of, and be very patient in waiting for your answer ; but when 3^0 ur answer is found " engrave it upon the mindful tablets of your heart. "

, . ;« We merely take the American crisis a 9 an % example ; almost all periods of history are $ equally full of matter for reflection, and * indeed ihe principles of history may be in ij a great measure observed in the pbsenomeno tf exhibited by the social circle. All this is J apropos t-AJlQthing, and savours sorns?»haf \ of the trite ; but it is 'so important that tre ?JP may be excused for dwelling upon it. The [6 measures made now will exercise such $ enormous influence opon the future con- \ dition of the colony, that we ccane'n nc' hav^ i$ too many amongst us studying t^e great jp laws in accordance with, or in violation of jb which, measures must certainly be taken. !ji —-—-——____-_. jjc

Parlour. Improvement. — The ladies arLi £ introducing a new and beautiful ornament for. * . the pailour, mantel, or centre table. They 1 : * take large pine burrs, sprinkle grass seeds of?? any kind in them, and place them in pots oife* 0 water. When the burrs are soaked a few?! 1111^ days they close up in the form of solid cones,^P°" then the spears of green grass begin to emergetpria from amongst the lamina?, formining ananyla ornament of rare and simple beauty. sinew Jerusalem. — The Russian journals state, '{Uf^gf j progress of works undertaken by the natifotailSatiP authorities of Jerusalem. An inclosure of 16,O0C|£c V square yards has been made, with houses ancp O | or four tanks completed, The Cathedral of tfc - Holy Trinity is ready to receive its cupolas, auj-P * a large house for the mission nearly completes^ 01 * 10 ' a large hospital progressing, and the foundaj^f C tions of an extensive asylum for male pilgrimtoria excavated. In carrying out some works btjaboi longing to the Russian Consulate within *¥«*«„ city, ground near the Holy Sepulchre was exca^' / '. vated to a depth of 35 feet, when the remains c*l "°' ! pillars and porticoes which formed part of thi«| M< principal entrance to the Holy Sepulchre kwo pc Constantine's time were come upon. ?iitfjdate< Pasha's engineer, Signer Pierotti, has doi£.j an( j much to enlighten us upon the subterranean t? ! ' pography of Jerusalem. He has discovered tliarf'^ built upon successive layers, so to say, of ruim | Ails the modern city rests upon " deeply bevelliMJiloniE and enormous stones, which he attributes to ttnfcing age of Solomon ; that above it, to the age M ' aT Z'irobabel ; that following to Herod's ti m 'an t Superimposed upon this the remn-ints of t!sj ' , city of Justinian come, to be hidden in turn fir 0 those from that of the Saracens and CrusadeiMlidate He traced a series of conduits or sewers leadi:K W from the " Dome of the Rock,', a mosque sjw reso the site of the Altar of Sacrifice, in the Temp|gj o _ to the Valley of Jehosaphnt. by means ga '. which the priests were able to flush the whifjfy ls Temple area with water, and so carry off t^Jp to. blood and offal of the sacrifices to the BroMßed; I Kedron. Two years ago Bignor Pierotti dgtote covered a fountain at the pool of Bethsai^ on which, on being opened, has continued to rv : pe The Jews are greatly excited by this discover? and regard it as ominous of the coming Messi^ W1 *" The engineer identifies it with that built jQur ov Ilezekiah, and referred to by Josephus. Th^j wr j is an immense deal to be done in the wa 7fn2B excavating at Jerusalem, which might leauff ' results not less valuable than such as were c,»?'-- o ' on ricd on at Budrum or Xanthus. the gc

On* the Thames at Midnight. — tl W s ' ■pull into Li mehouse Reach, and London the re left behind. All this while there has boiess ej nothing to see but the sky above, so thicljjjr have strewn with stars, the shimmering black wafjj folly below, and on either side barges strandfj| or i a# sulky sleeping ships, and a dark low-squi^^ a ting bank of quays and wharves indistj| c e j s r( guishable. Onr boat is the only moving tl^g p ro on the river ; and the silence is unbrote <" -, „ save by the sound of our own oars, t, little while since, indeed, the music of soj£ > y°' tavern-fiddler, the shrill, melanclioly pif| husiasl of some poor -woman singing at a tap-i\«<> vreve window for coppers (she had a voice ofuld not and wore ribbons, and sang inside for lotated to floated out upon the still warm air. Told not were the only sounds that reached us frozen hrai that vast city — these thin, miserable vo^ a b ou but I hear them still. To be sure, wej-gpgpj;, miles away from the haunts they madevtj^ pub I The fiddler's asleep with his fiddle, tg n J c ra woman has taken her * Heart bowed Dow k to her garret and her six small children <W, , orn her coppers be many ;) but their sad pin 1 * Iron and scraping seem to linger in the earf^* ers > There is a pathetic meaning in those gli^en Q° sounds, more than one can really undersized dri suggesting as they do all that might be hfljhe fron Silent as the great city seems — only one fie After a audible, — what a tumult is going on tig ten-j^ How many sighs are breaking from^ m j n( j s many hearts, each thinking itself the i& Ppr f a : sorrowful in the world? How man^yflj crying for joy, for hate, hunger, love, mw lo *° s Children -weeping themselves into the v" . c and being wept out of it ; plotters whisps nunes — poets raving, anger shreiking, guilt "nty of fessing in passionate prayers ; the aspira'ows, m< of hope, the laughter of fools, the kisso|to the sin, the cries of death. It is better , ■U?oor ti hear all this — but it is heard. . . We, MnHJTy exp e man, can only distinguishafiddler'sfiddliratiered C awoman'3 singing -, but theie are earsi|g o i,j we hive which hear every sigh -every vli|j. eturn Altogether, what a terrible humming itjj& f e }i" be! I almost think I can see it rising #o the sky. That dull hase hanging ov4(. Yei town, surely it is the host of pbai|? c rem spawned into the air from so many r 5 a heads and teaming hearts — every tli»lS" c boas every wish taking shape, and ascendinAJe. Th the weltering throng of ghosts above. Wfy to a spectale it is ! The dead returning, ||king c< embracing, parents murdered, wives t'jwutnbia erous, thefts, poisonings, a thousand ghdents of shame, a thousand hypocritical vill|sches —I will look back bo more."— -flfThe cor Magazine. _Je qutstic

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