{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_17882/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_17882","id":"gutenberg_17882","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/17882","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Travel Writing","Chemists -- Great Britain -- Biography","Davy, Humphry, Sir, 1778-1829"],"text":"Transcribed from the 1889 Cassell & Company edition by David Price, email\nccx074@coventry.ac.uk\n\n\n\n\n\nCONSOLATIONS IN TRAVEL;\nOR, THE LAST DAYS OF A PHILOSOPHER.\n\n\nBY SIR HUMPHRY DAVY, BART.,\n_Late President of the Royal Society_.\n\nCASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED:\n_LONDON, PARIS, NEW YORK & MELBOURNE_. 1889\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION.\n\n\nHumphry Davy was born at Penzance, in Cornwall, on the 17th of December,\n1778, and died at Geneva on the 29th of May, 1829, at the age of fifty.\nHe was a philosopher who turned knowledge to wisdom; he was one of the\nforemost of our English men of science; and this book, written when he\nwas dying, which makes Reason the companion of Faith, shows how he passed\nthrough the light of earth into the light of heaven.\n\nHis father had a small patrimony at Varfell, in Ludgvan.  His mother had\nlost in early childhood both her parents within a few hours of each\nother, and had been adopted by John Tonkin, an eminent surgeon in\nPenzance, to whom, therefore, so to speak, Humphry Davy became grandson\nby adoption.  There were five such grandchildren--Humphry, the elder of\ntwo boys, the other boy being named John, and three girls.\n\nAt a preparatory school and at the Penzance Grammar School Humphry Davy\nwas a noticeable boy.  He read eagerly and showed great quickness of\nimagination, delighted in legends, when eight years old told stories to\nhis companions, and as a boy wrote verse.  There was a Quaker saddler who\nmade for himself an electrical machine and mechanical models, in which\nyoung Davy took keen interest, and from that saddler, Robert Dunkin, came\nthe first impulse towards experiments in science.  At fifteen Davy was\nplaced for further education at a school in Truro.  A year later his\nfather died, and John Tonkin apprenticed him, on the 10th of February,\n1795, to Dr. Borlase, a surgeon in large practice at Penzance.  Medical\npractitioners in those days dispensed their own medicines, and the\ninquiring mind of this young apprentice being let loose upon a store-room\nof chemicals, experimental chemistry became his favourite pursuit.  His\ngrandfather, by adoption, allowed him to fit up a garret as a laboratory,\nnotwithstanding the fears of the household that \"This boy, Humphry, will\nblow us all into the air.\"\n\nActivity and originality of mind, with a persistent habit of inquiry and\nexperiment, brought Davy friends who could appreciate and help him.  When\nDr. Beddoes, of Bristol, was examining the Cornish coast, in 1798, he\ncame upon young Humphry Davy, was told of researches made by him, and\nurged to engage him as laboratory assistant in a Pneumatic Institution\nthat he was then establishing in Bristol.  Davy went in October, 1798,\nthen in his twentieth year; but his good friend, and grandfather by\nadoption, had set his heart upon Humphry's becoming an eminent burgeon,\nand even altered his will when his boy yielded to the temptation of a\nlaboratory for research.  Men also know something of the trouble of the\nhen who has a chance duckling in her brood, and sees that contumacious\nchicken run into the water deaf to all the warnings of her love.\n\nAt Bristol Humphry Davy came into companionship with Coleridge and\nSouthey, who were then also at the outset of their career, and there are\npoems of his in the Poetical Anthology then published by Southey.  But at\nthe same time Davy contributed papers on \"Heat, Light, and the\nCombinations of Light,\" on \"Phos-Oxygen and its Combinations,\" and on\n\"The Theory of Respiration,\" to a volume of West Country Collections,\nthat filled more than half the volume.  He was experimenting then on\ngases and on galvanism, and one day by experiment upon himself, in the\nbreathing of carburetted hydrogen, he almost put an end to his life.\n\nIn 1799 Count Rumford was founding the Royal Institution, and its home in\nAlbemarle Street was then bought for it.  The first lecturer appointed\nwas in bad health, and in 1801 he was obliged to resign.  Young Davy was\nnow known to men of science for the number and freshness of his\nexperiments, and for the substantial value of his chemical discoveries.\nIt was resolved by the managers, in July, 1801, that Humphry Davy be\nappointed Assistant-Lecturer in Chemistry, Director of the Chemical\nLaboratory, and assistant-editor of the journals of the Royal\nInstitution.  His first remuneration was a room in the house, coals and\ncandles, and 100 pounds a year.  Count Rumford held out the prospect of a\nprofessorship with 300 pounds a year, and the certainty of full support\nin the use of the laboratory for his own private research.  His age then\nwas twenty-three.  He at once satisfied men of science and amused people\nof fashion.  His energy was unbounded; there was a fascination in his\npersonal character and manner.  He was a genial and delightful lecturer,\nand his inventive genius was continually finding something new.  A first\nsuggestion of the process of photography was dropped incidentally among\nthe records of researches that attracted more attention.  Davy had been\nlittle more than a year at the Royal Institution when he was made its\nProfessor of Chemistry.  After another year he was made a Fellow.  Dr.\nParis, his biographer, says that \"the enthusiastic admiration which his\nlectures obtained is at this period scarcely to be imagined.  Men of the\nfirst rank and talent--the literary and the scientific, the practical,\nthe theoretical--blue-stockings and women of fashion, the old and the\nyoung, all crowded--eagerly crowded--the lecture-room.\"  At the beginning\nof the year 1805 his salary was raised to 400 pounds a year.  In May of\nthat year the Royal Society awarded to him the Copley Medal.  Within the\nnext two years he was elected Secretary of the Royal Society.  Since 1800\nhe had been advancing knowledge by experiments with galvanism.  The Royal\nInstitution raised a special fund to place at his disposal a more\npowerful galvanic battery than any that had been constructed.  The fame\nof his discoveries spread over Europe.\n\nThe Institute of France gave Davy the Napoleon Prize of three thousand\nfrancs for the best experiments in galvanism.  Dublin, in 1810, paid Davy\nfour hundred guineas for some lectures upon his discoveries.  The Farming\nSociety of Ireland gave him 750 pounds for six lectures on chemistry\napplied to agriculture.  In the following year he received more than a\nthousand pounds for two courses of lectures at Dublin, and was sent home\nwith the honorary degree of LL.D.  In April, 1812, he was knighted,\nresigned his professorship at the Royal Institution, and \"in order more\nstrongly to mark the high sense of his merits\" he was elected Honorary\nProfessor of Chemistry.  In the same month Davy married a young and rich\nwidow, who had charmed all Edinburgh by her beauty and her wit.  Two\nmonths after marriage Sir Humphry Davy dedicated to his wife his\n\"Elements of Chemical Philosophy.\"  In March, 1813, he published his\n\"Elements of Agricultural Chemistry.\"  He travelled abroad, and was\nreceived with honour by the chief men of science in all places that he\nvisited.  When, at Pavia, he first met Volta: he found that Volta had put\non full-dress to receive him.\n\nIn August, 1815, Davy's attention was drawn to the loss of life by\nexplosions of fire-damp, and by the end of the year he had devised his\nsafety-lamp.  The coal owners subscribed 1,500 pounds for a testimonial,\ngave him also a dinner and a service of plate.  In October, 1818, he was\nmade a baronet.  In November, 1820, he was elected President of the Royal\nSociety.\n\nHis next researches were chiefly on electro-magnetism and the protection\nof the copper sheathing on ships' bottoms.  At the end of 1826 his health\nfailed seriously.  He went to Italy; resigned, in July, 1827, the\nPresidency of the Royal Society; came back to England, longing for \"the\nfresh air of the mountains;\" wrote and published his \"Salmonia, or Days\nof Fly-fishing.\"  In the spring of 1828 he left England again.  He was at\nRome in the winter of 1829, still engaged in quiet research, and it was\nthen that he wrote his \"Consolations in Travel; or, the Last Days of a\nPhilosopher.\"  His wife, who shone in London society, did not go with him\nupon this last journey, but travelled day and night to reach him when\nword came to her and to his brother John, who was a physician, that he\nhad again been struck with palsy and was dying.  That stroke of palsy\nfollowed immediately upon the finishing of the book now in the reader's\nhand.  Davy lived to see again his wife and brother, rallied enough to\nleave Rome with them, and had got as far as Geneva on the 28th of May,\n1829.  He died in the next night.\n\nH. M.\n\n\n\n\nA NOTE,\n\n\n_Prefixed to the First Edition, by Sir Humphry Davy's Brother_.\n\nAs is stated in the Preface which follows, this work was composed during\na period of bodily indisposition;--it was concluded at the very moment of\nthe invasion of the Author's last illness.  Had his life been prolonged,\nit is probable that some additions and some changes would have been made.\nThe editor does not consider himself warranted to do more than give to\nthe world a faithful copy, making only a few omissions and a few verbal\nalterations.  The characters of the persons of the dialogue were intended\nto be ideal, at least in great part such they should be considered by the\nreader; and, it is to be hoped, that the incidents introduced, as well as\nthe persons, will be viewed only as subordinate and subservient to the\nsentiments and doctrines.  The dedication, it may be specially noticed,\nis the author's own, and in the very words dictated by him, at a time\nwhen he had lost the power of writing except with extreme difficulty,\nowing to the paralytic attack, although he retained in a very remarkable\nmanner all his mental faculties unimpaired and unclouded.\n\nJOHN DAVY.\n_London_,\n_January 6th_, 1830.\n\nTO THOMAS POOLE, ESQ. OF NETHER STOWEY\nIN REMEMBRANCE OF\nTHIRTY YEARS OF CONTINUED AND FAITHFUL\nFRIENDSHIP.\n\n\n\n\nAUTHOR'S PREFACE.\n\n\nSalmonia was written during the time of a partial recovery from a long\nand dangerous illness.  The present work was composed immediately after,\nunder the same unfavourable and painful circumstances, and at a period\nwhen the constitution of the Author suffered from new attacks.  He has\nderived some pleasure and some consolation, when most other sources of\nconsolation and pleasure were closed to him, from this exercise of his\nmind; and he ventures to hope that these hours of sickness may be not\naltogether unprofitable to persons in perfect health.\n\n_Rome_,\n_February_ 21, 1829.\n\n\n\n\nDIALOGUE THE FIRST.  THE VISION.\n\n\nI passed the autumn and the early winter of the years 18-- and 18-- at\nRome.  The society was, as is usual in that metropolis of the old\nChristian world, numerous and diversified.  In it there were found many\nintellectual foreigners and amongst them some distinguished Britons, who\nhad a higher object in making this city their residence than mere\nidleness or vague curiosity.  Amongst these my countrymen, there were two\ngentlemen with whom I formed a particular intimacy and who were my\nfrequent companions in the visits which I made to the monuments of the\ngrandeur of the old Romans and to the masterpieces of ancient and modern\nart.  One of them I shall call Ambrosio: he was a man of highly\ncultivated taste, great classical erudition, and minute historical\nknowledge.  In religion he was of the Roman Catholic persuasion; but a\nCatholic of the most liberal school, who in another age might have been\nsecretary to Ganganelli.  His views upon the subjects of politics and\nreligion were enlarged; but his leaning was rather to the power of a\nsingle magistrate than to the authority of a democracy or even of an\noligarchy.  The other friend, whom I shall call Onuphrio, was a man of a\nvery different character.  Belonging to the English aristocracy, he had\nsome of the prejudices usually attached to birth and rank; but his\nmanners were gentle, his temper good, and his disposition amiable.  Having\nbeen partly educated at a northern university in Britain, he had adopted\nviews in religion which went even beyond toleration and which might be\nregarded as entering the verge of scepticism.  For a patrician he was\nvery liberal in his political views.  His imagination was poetical and\ndiscursive, his taste good and his tact extremely fine, so exquisite,\nindeed, that it sometimes approached to morbid sensibility, and disgusted\nhim with slight defects and made him keenly sensible of small perfections\nto which common minds would have been indifferent.\n\nIn the beginning of October on a very fine afternoon I drove with these\ntwo friends to the Colosaeum, a monument which, for the hundredth time\neven, I had viewed with a new admiration; my friends partook of my\nsentiments.  I shall give the conversation which occurred there in their\nown words.  Onuphrio said, \"How impressive are those ruins!--what a\ncharacter do they give us of the ancient Romans, what magnificence of\ndesign, what grandeur of execution!  Had we not historical documents to\ninform us of the period when this structure was raised and of the\npurposes for which it was designed, it might be imagined the work of a\nrace of giants, a Council Chamber for those Titans fabled to have warred\nagainst the gods of the pagan mythology.  The size of the masses of\ntravertine of which it is composed is in harmony with the immense\nmagnitude of the building.  It is hardly to be wondered at that a people\nwhich constructed such works for their daily sports, for their usual\namusements, should have possessed strength, enduring energy, and\nperseverance sufficient to enable them to conquer the world.  They appear\nalways to have formed their plans and made their combinations as if their\npower were beyond the reach of chance, independent of the influence of\ntime, and founded for unlimited duration--for eternity!\"\n\nAmbrosio took up the discourse of Onuphrio, and said, \"The aspect of this\nwonderful heap of ruins is so picturesque that it is impossible to regret\nits decay; and at this season of the year the colours of the vegetation\nare in harmony with those of the falling ruins, and how perfectly the\nwhole landscape is in tone!  The remains of the palace of the Caesars and\nof the golden halls of Nero appear in the distance, their gray and\ntottering turrets and their moss-stained arches reposing, as it were,\nupon the decaying vegetation: and there is nothing that marks the\nexistence of life except the few pious devotees, who wander from station\nto station in the arena below, kneeling before the cross, and\ndemonstrating the triumph of a religion, which received in this very spot\nin the early period of its existence one of its most severe persecutions,\nand which, nevertheless, has preserved what remains of that building,\nwhere attempts were made to stifle it almost at its birth; for, without\nthe influence of Christianity, these majestic ruins would have been\ndispersed or levelled to the dust.  Plundered of their lead and iron by\nthe barbarians, Goths, and Vandals, and robbed even of their stones by\nRoman princes, the Barberini, they owe what remains of their relics to\nthe sanctifying influence of that faith which has preserved for the world\nall that was worth preserving, not merely arts and literature but\nlikewise that which constitutes the progressive nature of intellect and\nthe institutions which afford to us happiness in this world and hopes of\na blessed immortality in the next.  And, being of the faith of Rome, I\nmay say, that the preservation of this pile by the sanctifying effect of\na few crosses planted round it, is almost a miraculous event.  And what a\ncontrast the present application of this building, connected with holy\nfeelings and exalted hopes, is to that of the ancient one, when it was\nused for exhibiting to the Roman people the destruction of men by wild\nbeasts, or of men, more savage than wild beasts, by each other, to\ngratify a horrible appetite for cruelty, founded upon a still more\ndetestable lust, that of universal domination!  And who would have\nsupposed, in the time of Titus, that a faith, despised in its\ninsignificant origin, and persecuted from the supposed obscurity of its\nfounder and its principles, should have reared a dome to the memory of\none of its humblest teachers, more glorious than was ever framed for\nJupiter or Apollo in the ancient world, and have preserved even the ruins\nof the temples of the pagan deities, and have burst forth in splendour\nand majesty, consecrating truth amidst the shrines of error, employing\nthe idols of the Roman superstition for the most holy purposes and rising\na bright and constant light amidst the dark and starless night which\nfollowed the destruction of the Roman empire!\"\n\nOnuphrio now resumed the discourse.  He said, \"I have not the same\nexalted views on the subject which our friend Ambrosio has so eloquently\nexpressed.  Some little of the perfect state in which these ruins exist\nmay have been owing to causes which he has described; but these causes\nhave only lately begun to operate, and the mischief was done before\nChristianity was established at Rome.  Feeling differently on these\nsubjects, I admire this venerable ruin rather as a record of the\ndestruction of the power of the greatest people that ever existed, than\nas a proof of the triumph of Christianity; and I am carried forward in\nmelancholy anticipation to the period when even the magnificent dome of\nSt. Peter's will be in a similar state to that in which the Colosaeum now\nis, and when its ruins may be preserved by the sanctifying influence of\nsome new and unknown faith; when, perhaps, the statue of Jupiter, which\nat present receives the kiss of the devotee, as the image of St. Peter,\nmay be employed for another holy use, as the personification of a future\nsaint or divinity; and when the monuments of the papal magnificence shall\nbe mixed with the same dust as that which now covers the tombs of the\nCaesars.  Such, I am sorry to say, is the general history of all the\nworks and institutions belonging to humanity.  They rise, flourish, and\nthen decay and fall; and the period of their decline is generally\nproportional to that of their elevation.  In ancient Thebes or Memphis\nthe peculiar genius of the people has left us monuments from which we can\njudge of their arts, though we cannot understand the nature of their\nsuperstitions.  Of Babylon and of Troy the remains are almost extinct;\nand what we know of these famous cities is almost entirely derived from\nliterary records.  Ancient Greece and Rome we view in the few remains of\ntheir monuments; and the time will arrive when modern Rome shall be what\nancient Rome now is; and ancient Rome and Athens will be what Tyre or\nCarthage now are, known only by coloured dust in the desert, or coloured\nsand, containing the fragments of bricks or glass, washed up by the wave\nof a stormy sea.  I might pursue these thoughts still further, and show\nthat the wood of the cross, or the bronze of the statue, decay as quickly\nas if they had not been sanctified; and I think I could show that their\ninfluence is owing to the imagination, which, when infinite time is\nconsidered, or the course of ages even, is null and its effect\nimperceptible; and similar results occur, whether the faith be that of\nOsiris, of Jupiter, of Jehovah, or of Jesus.\"\n\nTo this Ambrosio replied, his countenance and the tones of his voice\nexpressing some emotion: \"I do not think, Onuphrio, that you consider\nthis question with your usual sagacity or acuteness; indeed, I never hear\nyou on the subject of religion without pain and without a feeling of\nregret that you have not applied your powerful understanding to a more\nminute and correct examination of the evidences of revealed religion.  You\nwould then, I think, have seen, in the origin, progress, elevation,\ndecline and fall of the empires of antiquity, proofs that they were\nintended for a definite end in the scheme of human redemption; you would\nhave found prophecies which have been amply verified; and the foundation\nor the ruin of a kingdom, which appears in civil history so great an\nevent, in the history of man, in his religious institutions, as\ncomparatively of small moment; you would have found the establishment of\nthe worship of one God amongst a despised and contemned people as the\nmost important circumstance in the history of the early world; you would\nhave found the Christian dispensation naturally arising out of the\nJewish, and the doctrines of the pagan nations all preparatory to the\ntriumph and final establishment of a creed fitted for the most\nenlightened state of the human mind and equally adapted to every climate\nand every people.\"\n\nTo this animated appeal of Ambrosio, Onuphrio replied in the most\ntranquil manner and with the air of an unmoved philosopher:--\"You mistake\nme, Ambrosio, if you consider me as hostile to Christianity.  I am not of\nthe school of the French Encyclopaedists, or of the English infidels.  I\nconsider religion as essential to man, and belonging to the human mind in\nthe same manner as instincts belong to the brute creation, a light, if\nyou please of revelation to guide him through the darkness of this life,\nand to keep alive his undying hope of immortality: but pardon me if I\nconsider this instinct as equally useful in all its different forms, and\nstill a divine light through whatever medium or cloud of human passion or\nprejudice it passes.  I reverence it in the followers of Brahmah, in the\ndisciple of Mahomet, and I wonder at in all the variety of forms it\nadopts in the Christian world.  You must not be angry with me that I do\nnot allow infallibility to your Church, having been myself brought up by\nProtestant parents, who were rigidly attached to the doctrines of\nCalvin.\"\n\nI saw Ambrosio's countenance kindle at Onuphrio's explanation of his\nopinions, and he appeared to be meditating an angry reply.  I endeavoured\nto change the conversation to the state of the Colosaeum, with which it\nhad begun.  \"These ruins,\" I said, \"as you have both observed, are highly\nimpressive; yet when I saw them six years ago they had a stronger effect\non my imagination; whether it was the charm of novelty, or that my mind\nwas fresher, or that the circumstances under which I saw them were\npeculiar, I know not, but probably all these causes operated in affecting\nmy mind.  It was a still and beautiful evening in the end of May; the\nlast sunbeams were dying away in the western sky and the first moonbeams\nshining in the eastern; the bright orange tints lighted up the ruins and\nas it were kindled the snows that still remained on the distant\nApennines, which were visible from the highest accessible part of the\namphitheatre.  In this glow of colouring, the green of advanced spring\nsoftened the grey and yellow tints of the decaying stones, and as the\nlights gradually became fainter, the masses appeared grander and more\ngigantic; and when the twilight had entirely disappeared, the contrast of\nlight and shade in the beams of the full moon and beneath a sky of the\nbrightest sapphire, but so highly illuminated that only Jupiter and a few\nstars of the first magnitude were visible, gave a solemnity and\nmagnificence to the scene which awakened the highest degree of that\nemotion which is so properly termed the sublime.  The beauty and the\npermanency of the heavens and the principle of conservation belonging to\nthe system of the universe, the works of the Eternal and Divine\nArchitect, were finely opposed to the perishing and degraded works of man\nin his most active and powerful state.  And at this moment so humble\nappeared to me the condition of the most exalted beings belonging to the\nearth, so feeble their combinations, so minute the point of space, and so\nlimited the period of time in which they act, that I could hardly avoid\ncomparing the generations of man, and the effects of his genius and\npower, to the swarms of luceoli or fire-flies which were dancing around\nme and that appeared flitting and sparkling amidst the gloom and darkness\nof the ruins, but which were no longer visible when they rose above the\nhorizon, their feeble light being lost and utterly obscured in the\nbrightness of the moonbeams in the heavens.\"\n\nOnuphrio said: \"I am not sorry that you have changed the conversation.\nYou have given us the history of a most interesting recollection and well\nexpressed a solemn though humiliating feeling.  In such moments and among\nsuch scenes it is impossible not to be struck with the nothingness of\nhuman glory and the transiency of human works.  This, one of the greatest\nmonuments on the face of the earth, was raised by a people, then its\nmasters, only seventeen centuries ago; in a few ages more it will be but\nas dust, and of all the testimonials of the vanity or power of man,\nwhether raised to immortalise his name, or to contain his decaying bones\nwithout a name, no one is known to have a duration beyond what is\nmeasured by the existence of a hundred generations; and it is only to\nmultiply centuple for instance the period of time, and the memorials of a\nvillage and the monuments of a country churchyard may be compared with\nthose of an empire and the remains of the world.\"\n\nAmbrosio, to whom the conversation seemed disagreeable, put us in mind of\nan engagement we had made to spend the evening at the conversazione of a\ncelebrated lady, and proposed to call the carriage.  The reflections\nwhich the conversation and the scene had left in my mind little disposed\nme for general society.  I requested them to keep their engagement, and\nsaid I was resolved to spend an hour amidst the solitude of the ruins,\nand desired them to send back the carriage for me.  They left me,\nexpressing a hope that my poetical or melancholy fancy might not be the\noccasion of a cold, and wished me the company of some of the spectres of\nthe ancient Romans.\n\nWhen I was left alone, I seated myself in the moonshine, on one of the\nsteps leading to the seats supposed to have been occupied by the\npatricians in the Colosaeum at the time of the public games.  The train\nof ideas in which I had indulged before my friends left me continued to\nflow with a vividness and force increased by the stillness and solitude\nof the scene; and the full moon has always a peculiar effect on these\nmoods of feeling in my mind, giving to them a wildness and a kind of\nindefinite sensation, such as I suppose belong at all times to the true\npoetical temperament.  It must be so, I thought to myself; no new city\nwill rise again out of the double ruins of this; no new empire will be\nfounded upon these colossal remains of that of the old Romans.  The\nworld, like the individual, flourishes in youth, rises to strength in\nmanhood, falls into decay in age; and the ruins of an empire are like the\ndecrepit frame of an individual, except that they have some tints of\nbeauty which nature bestows upon them.  The sun of civilisation arose in\nthe East, advanced towards the West, and is now at its meridian; in a few\ncenturies more it will probably be seen sinking below the horizon even in\nthe new world, and there will be left darkness only where there is a\nbright light, deserts of sand where there were populous cities, and\nstagnant morasses where the green meadow or the bright cornfield once\nappeared.  I called up images of this kind in my imagination.  \"Time,\" I\nsaid, \"which purifies, and as it were sanctifies the mind, destroys and\nbrings into utter decay the body; and, even in nature, its influence\nseems always degrading.  She is represented by the poets as eternal in\nher youth, but amongst these ruins she appears to me eternal in her age,\nand here no traces of renovation appear in the ancient of days.\"  I had\nscarcely concluded this ideal sentence when my reverie became deeper, the\nruins surrounding me appeared to vanish from my sight, the light of the\nmoon became more intense, and the orb itself seemed to expand in a flood\nof splendour.  At the same time that my visual organs appeared so\nsingularly affected, the most melodious sounds filled my ear, softer yet\nat the same time deeper and fuller than I had ever heard in the most\nharmonious and perfect concert.  It appeared to me that I had entered a\nnew state of existence, and I was so perfectly lost in the new kind of\nsensation which I experienced that I had no recollections and no\nperceptions of identity.  On a sudden the music ceased, but the brilliant\nlight still continued to surround me, and I heard a low but extremely\ndistinct and sweet voice, which appeared to issue from the centre of it.\nThe sounds were at first musical like those of a harp, but they soon\nbecame articulate, as if a prelude to some piece of sublime poetical\ncomposition.  \"You, like all your brethren,\" said the voice, \"are\nentirely ignorant of every thing belonging to yourselves, the world you\ninhabit, your future destinies, and the scheme of the universe; and yet\nyou have the folly to believe you are acquainted with the past, the\npresent, and the future.  I am an intelligence somewhat superior to you,\nthough there are millions of beings as much above me in power and in\nintellect as man is above the meanest and weakest reptile that crawls\nbeneath his feet; yet something I can teach you: yield your mind wholly\nto the influence which I shall exert upon it, and you shall be undeceived\nin your views of the history of the world, and of the system you\ninhabit.\"  At this moment the bright light disappeared, the sweet and\nharmonious voice, which was the only proof of the presence of a superior\nintelligence, ceased; I was in utter darkness and silence, and seemed to\nmyself to be carried rapidly upon a stream of air, without any other\nsensation than that of moving quickly through space.  Whilst I was still\nin motion, a dim and hazy light, which seemed like that of twilight in a\nrainy morning, broke upon my sight, and gradually a country displayed\nitself to my view covered with forests and marshes.  I saw wild animals\ngrazing in large savannahs, and carnivorous beasts, such as lions and\ntigers, occasionally disturbing and destroying them; I saw naked savages\nfeeding upon wild fruits, or devouring shell-fish, or fighting with clubs\nfor the remains of a whale which had been thrown upon the shore.  I\nobserved that they had no habitations, that they concealed themselves in\ncaves, or under the shelter of palm trees, and that the only delicious\nfood which nature seemed to have given to them was the date and the cocoa-\nnut, and these were in very small quantities and the object of\ncontention.  I saw that some few of these wretched human beings that\ninhabited the wide waste before my eyes, had weapons pointed with flint\nor fish-bone, which they made use of for destroying birds, quadrupeds, or\nfishes, that they fed upon raw; but their greatest delicacy appeared to\nbe a maggot or worm, which they sought for with great perseverance in the\nbuds of the palm.  When I had cast my eyes on the varied features of this\nmelancholy scene, which was now lighted by a rising sun, I heard again\nthe same voice which had astonished me in the Colosaeum, and which\nsaid,--\"See the birth of Time!  Look at man in his newly created state,\nfull of youth and vigour.  Do you see aught in this state to admire or\nenvy?\"  As the last words fell on my ear, I was again, as before, rapidly\nput in motion, and I seemed again resistless to be hurried upon a stream\nof air, and again in perfect darkness.  In a moment, an indistinct light\nagain appeared before my eyes and a country opened upon my view which\nappeared partly wild and partly cultivated; there were fewer woods and\nmorasses than in the scene which I had just before seen; I beheld men who\nwere covered with the skins of animals, and who were driving cattle to\nenclosed pastures; I saw others who were reaping and collecting corn,\nothers who were making it into bread; I saw cottages furnished with many\nof the conveniences of life, and a people in that state of agricultural\nand pastoral improvement which has been imagined by the poets as\nbelonging to the golden age.  The same voice, which I shall call that of\nthe Genius, said, \"Look at these groups of men who are escaped from the\nstate of infancy: they owe their improvement to a few superior minds\nstill amongst them.  That aged man whom you see with a crowd around him\ntaught them to build cottages; from that other they learnt to domesticate\ncattle; from others to collect and sow corn and seeds of fruit.  And\nthese arts will never be lost; another generation will see them more\nperfect; the houses, in a century more, will be larger and more\nconvenient; the flocks of cattle more numerous; the corn-fields more\nextensive; the morasses will be drained, the number of fruit-trees\nincreased.  You shall be shown other visions of the passages of time, but\nas you are carried along the stream which flows from the period of\ncreation to the present moment, I shall only arrest your transit to make\nyou observe some circumstances which will demonstrate the truths I wish\nyou to know, and which will explain to you the little it is permitted me\nto understand of the scheme of the universe.\"  I again found myself in\ndarkness and in motion, and I was again arrested by the opening of a new\nscene upon my eyes.  I shall describe this scene and the others in the\nsuccession in which they appeared before me, and the observations by\nwhich they were accompanied in the voice of the wonderful being who\nappeared as my intellectual guide.  In the scene which followed that of\nthe agricultural or pastoral people, I saw a great extent of cultivated\nplains, large cities on the sea-shore, palaces--forums and temples\nornamenting them; men associated in groups, mounted on horses, and\nperforming military exercises; galleys moved by oars on the ocean; roads\nintersecting the country covered with travellers and containing carriages\nmoved by men or horses.  The Genius now said, \"You see the early state of\ncivilisation of man; the cottages of the last race you beheld have become\nimproved into stately dwellings, palaces, and temples, in which use is\ncombined with ornament.  The few men to whom, as I said before, the\nfoundations of these improvements were owing, have had divine honours\npaid to their memory.  But look at the instruments belonging to this\ngeneration, and you will find that they are only of brass.  You see men\nwho are talking to crowds around them, and others who are apparently\namusing listening groups by a kind of song or recitation; these are the\nearliest bards and orators; but all their signs of thought are oral, for\nwritten language does not yet exist.\"  The next scene which appeared was\none of varied business and imagery.  I saw a man, who bore in his hands\nthe same instruments as our modern smiths, presenting a vase, which\nappeared to be made of iron, amidst the acclamations of an assembled\nmultitude engaged in triumphal procession before the altars dignified by\nthe name of Apollo at Delphi; and I saw in the same place men who carried\nrolls of papyrus in their hands and wrote upon them with reeds containing\nink made from the soot of wood mixed with a solution of glue.  \"See,\" the\nGenius said, \"an immense change produced in the condition of society by\nthe two arts of which you here see the origin; the one, that of rendering\niron malleable, which is owing to a single individual, an obscure Greek;\nthe other, that of making thought permanent in written characters, an art\nwhich has gradually arisen from the hieroglyphics which you may observe\non yonder pyramids.  You will now see human life more replete with power\nand activity.\"  Again, another scene broke upon my vision.  I saw the\nbronze instruments, which had belonged to the former state of society,\nthrown away; malleable iron converted into hard steel, this steel applied\nto a thousand purposes of civilised life; I saw bands of men who made use\nof it for defensive armour and for offensive weapons; I saw these iron-\nclad men, in small numbers subduing thousands of savages, and\nestablishing amongst them their arts and institutions; I saw a few men on\nthe eastern shores of Europe, resisting, with the same materials, the\nunited forces of Asia; I saw a chosen band die in defence of their\ncountry, destroyed by an army a thousand times as numerous; and I saw\nthis same army, in its turn, caused to disappear, and destroyed or driven\nfrom the shores of Europe by the brethren of that band of martyred\npatriots; I saw bodies of these men traversing the sea, founding\ncolonies, building cities, and wherever they established themselves,\ncarrying with them their peculiar arts.  Towns and temples arose\ncontaining schools, and libraries filled with the rolls of the papyrus.\nThe same steel, such a tremendous instrument of power in the hands of the\nwarrior, I saw applied, by the genius of the artist, to strike forms even\nmore perfect than those of life out of the rude marble; and I saw the\nwalls of the palaces and temples covered with pictures, in which\nhistorical events were portrayed with the truth of nature and the poetry\nof mind.  The voice now awakened my attention by saying, \"You have now\nbefore you the vision of that state of society which is an object of\nadmiration to the youth of modern times, and the recollections of which,\nand the precepts founded on these recollections, constitute an important\npart of your education.  Your maxims of war and policy, your taste in\nletters and the arts, are derived from models left by that people, or by\ntheir immediate imitators, whom you shall now see.\"  I opened my eyes,\nand recognised the very spot in which I was sitting when the vision\ncommenced.  I was on the top of an arcade under a silken canopy, looking\ndown upon the tens of thousands of people who were crowded in the seats\nof the Colosaeum, ornamented with all the spoils that the wealth of a\nworld can give; I saw in the arena below animals of the most\nextraordinary kind, and which have rarely been seen living in modern\nEurope--the giraffe, the zebra, the rhinoceros, and the ostrich from the\ndeserts of Africa beyond the Niger, the hippopotamus from the Upper Nile,\nand the royal tiger and the gnu from the banks of the Ganges.  Looking\nover Rome, which, in its majesty of palaces and temples, and in its\ncolossal aqueducts bringing water even from the snows of the distant\nApennines, seemed more like the creation of a supernatural power than the\nwork of human hands; looking over Rome to the distant landscape, I saw\nthe whole face, as it were, of the ancient world adorned with miniature\nimages of this splendid metropolis.  Where the Roman conquered, there he\ncivilised; where he carried his arms, there he fixed likewise his\nhousehold gods; and from the deserts of Arabia to the mountains of\nCaledonia there appeared but one people, having the same arts, language,\nand letters--all of Grecian origin.  I looked again, and saw an entire\nchange in the brilliant aspect of this Roman world--the people of\nconquerors and heroes was no longer visible; the cities were filled with\nan idle and luxurious population; those farms which had been cultivated\nby warriors, who left the plough to take the command of armies, were now\nin the hands of slaves; and the militia of freemen were supplanted by\nbands of mercenaries, who sold the empire to the highest bidder.  I saw\nimmense masses of warriors collecting in the north and east, carrying\nwith them no other proofs of cultivation but their horses and steel arms;\nI saw these savages everywhere attacking this mighty empire, plundering\ncities, destroying the monuments of arts and literature, and, like wild\nbeasts devouring a noble animal, tearing into pieces and destroying the\nRoman power.  Ruin, desolation, and darkness were before me, and I closed\nmy eyes to avoid the melancholy scene.  \"See,\" said the Genius, \"the\nmelancholy termination of a power believed by its founders invincible,\nand intended to be eternal.  But you will find, though the glory and\ngreatness belonging to its military genius have passed away, yet those\nbelonging to the arts and institutions, by which it adorned and dignified\nlife, will again arise in another state of society.\"  I opened my eyes\nagain, and I saw Italy recovering from her desolation--towns arising with\ngovernments almost upon the model of ancient Athens and Rome, and these\ndifferent small states rivals in arts and arms; I saw the remains of\nlibraries, which had been preserved in monasteries and churches by a holy\ninfluence which even the Goth and Vandal respected, again opened to the\npeople; I saw Rome rising from her ashes, the fragments of statues found\namidst the ruins of her palaces and imperial villas becoming the models\nfor the regeneration of art; I saw magnificent temples raised in this\ncity become the metropolis of a new and Christian world, and ornamented\nwith the most brilliant masterpieces of the arts of design; I saw a\nTuscan city, as it were, contending with Rome for pre-eminence in the\nproductions of genius, and the spirit awakened in Italy spreading its\ninfluence from the South to the North.  \"Now,\" the Genius said, \"society\nhas taken its modern and permanent aspect.  Consider for a moment its\nrelations to letters and to arms as contrasted with those of the ancient\nworld.\"  I looked, and saw, that in the place of the rolls of papyrus,\nlibraries were now filled with books.  \"Behold,\" the Genius said, \"the\nprinting-press; by the invention of Faust the productions of genius are,\nas it were, made imperishable, capable of indefinite multiplication, and\nrendered an unalienable heritage of the human mind.  By this art,\napparently so humble, the progress of society is secured, and man is\nspared the humiliation of witnessing again scenes like those which\nfollowed the destruction of the Roman Empire.  Now look to the warriors\nof modern times; you see the spear, the javelin, the shield, and the\ncuirass are changed for the musket and the light artillery.  The German\nmonk who discovered gunpowder did not meanly affect the destinies of\nmankind; wars are become less bloody by becoming less personal; mere\nbrutal strength is rendered of comparatively little avail; all the\nresources of civilisation are required to maintain and move a large army;\nwealth, ingenuity, and perseverance become the principal elements of\nsuccess; civilised man is rendered in consequence infinitely superior to\nthe savage, and gunpowder gives permanence to his triumph, and secures\nthe cultivated nations from ever being again overrun by the inroads of\nmillions of barbarians.  There is so much identity of feature in the\ncharacter of the two or three centuries that are just passed, that I wish\nyou only to take a very transient view of the political and military\nevents belonging to them.  You will find attempts made by the chiefs of\ncertain great nations to acquire predominance and empire; you will see\nthose attempts, after being partially successful, resisted by other\nnations, and the balance of power, apparently for a moment broken, again\nrestored.  Amongst the rival nations that may be considered as forming\nthe republic of modern Europe, you will see one pre-eminent for her\nmaritime strength and colonial and commercial enterprise, and you will\nfind she retains her superiority only because it is favourable to the\nliberty of mankind.  But you must not yet suffer the vision of modern\nEurope to pass from your eyes without viewing some other results of the\nefforts of men of genius, which, like those of gunpowder and the press,\nillustrate the times to which they belong, and form brilliant epochs in\nthe history of the world.  If you look back into the schools of\nregenerated Italy, you will see in them the works of the Greek masters of\nphilosophy; and if you attend to the science taught in them, you will\nfind it vague, obscure, and full of erroneous notions.  You will find in\nthis early period of improvement branches of philosophy even applied to\npurposes of delusion; the most sublime of the departments of human\nknowledge--astronomy--abused by impostors, who from the aspect of the\nplanetary world pretended to predict the fortunes and destinies of\nindividuals.  You will see in the laboratories alchemists searching for a\nuniversal medicine, an elixir of life, and for the philosopher's stone,\nor a method of converting all metals into gold; but unexpected and useful\ndiscoveries you will find, even in this age, arise amidst the clouds of\ndeception and the smoke of the furnace.  Delusion and error vanish and\npass away, and truths seized upon by a few superior men become permanent,\nand the property of an enlightening world.  Amongst the personages who\nbelong to this early period, there are two whom I must request you to\nnotice--one an Englishman, who pointed out the paths to the discovery of\nscientific truths, and the other a Tuscan, who afforded the happiest\nexperimental illustrations of the speculative views of his brother in\nscience.  You will see academies formed a century later in Italy, France,\nand Britain, in which the sciences are enlarged by new and varied\nexperiments, and the true system of the universe developed by an\nillustrious Englishman taught and explained.  The practical results of\nthe progress of physics, chemistry, and mechanics, are of the most\nmarvellous kind, and to make them all distinct would require a comparison\nof ancient and modern states: ships that were moved by human labour in\nthe ancient world are transported by the winds; and a piece of steel,\ntouched by the magnet, points to the mariner his unerring course from the\nold to the new world; and by the exertions of one man of genius, aided by\nthe resources of chemistry, a power, which by the old philosophers could\nhardly have been imagined, has been generated and applied to almost all\nthe machinery of active life; the steam-engine performs not only the\nlabour of horses, but of man, by combinations which appear almost\npossessed of intelligence; waggons are moved by it, constructions made,\nvessels caused to perform voyages in opposition to wind and tide, and a\npower placed in human hands which seems almost unlimited.  To these novel\nand still extending improvements may be added others, whish, though of a\nsecondary kind, yet materially affect the comforts of life, the\ncollecting from fossil materials the elements of combustion, and applying\nthem so as to illuminate, by a single operation, houses, streets, and\neven cities.  If you look to the results of chemical arts you will find\nnew substances of the most extraordinary nature applied to various novel\npurposes; you will find a few experiments in electricity leading to the\nmarvellous result of disarming the thunder-cloud of its terrors, and you\nwill see new instruments created by human ingenuity, possessing the same\npowers as the electrical organs of living animals.  To whatever part of\nthe vision of modern times you cast your eyes you will find marks of\nsuperiority and improvement, and I wish to impress upon you the\nconviction that the results of intellectual labour or of scientific\ngenius are permanent and incapable of being lost.  Monarchs change their\nplans, governments their objects, a fleet or an army effect their purpose\nand then pass away; but a piece of steel toached by the magnet preserves\nits character for ever, and secures to man the dominion of the trackless\nocean.  A new period of society may send armies from the shores of the\nBaltic to those of the Euxine, and the empire of the followers of Mahomet\nmay be broken in pieces by a northern people, and the dominion of the\nBritons in Asia may share the fate of that of Tamerlane or Zengiskhan;\nbut the steam-boat which ascends the Delaware or the St. Lawrence will be\ncontinued to be used, and will carry the civilisation of an improved\npeople into the deserts of North America and into the wilds of Canada.  In\nthe common history of the world, as compiled by authors in general,\nalmost all the great changes of nations are confounded with changes in\ntheir dynasties, and events are usually referred either to sovereigns,\nchiefs, heroes, or their armies, which do, in fact, originate from\nentirely different causes, either of an intellectual or moral nature.\nGovernments depend far more than is generally supposed upon the opinion\nof the people and the spirit of the age and nation.  It sometimes happens\nthat a gigantic mind possesses supreme power and rises superior to the\nage in which he is born, such was Alfred in England and Peter in Russia,\nbut such instances are very rare; and, in general, it is neither amongst\nsovereigns nor the higher classes of society that the great improvers or\nbenefactors of mankind are to be found.  The works of the most\nillustrious names were little valued at the times when they were\nproduced, and their authors either despised or neglected; and great,\nindeed, must have been the pure and abstract pleasure resulting from the\nexertion of intellectual superiority and the discovery of truth and the\nbestowing benefits and blessings upon society, which induced men to\nsacrifice all their common enjoyments and all their privileges as\ncitizens to these exertions.  Anaxagoras, Archimedes, Roger Bacon,\nGalileo Galilei, in their deaths or their imprisonments, offer instances\nof this kind, and nothing can be more striking than what appears to have\nbeen the ingratitude of men towards their greatest benefactors; but\nhereafter, when you understand more of the scheme of the universe, you\nwill see the cause and the effect of this, and you will find the whole\nsystem governed by principles of immutable justice.  I have said that in\nthe progress of society all great and real improvements are perpetuated;\nthe same corn which four thousand years ago was raised from an improved\ngrass by an inventor worshipped for two thousand years in the ancient\nworld under the name of Ceres, still forms the principal food of mankind;\nand the potato, perhaps the greatest benefit that the Old has derived\nfrom the New World, is spreading over Europe, and will continue to\nnourish an extensive population when the name of the race by whom it was\nfirst cultivated in South America is forgotten.\n\n\"I will now call your attention to some remarkable laws belonging to the\nhistory of society, and from the consideration of which you will be able\ngradually to develop the higher and more exalted principles of being.\nThere appears nothing more accidental than the sex of an infant, yet take\nany great city or any province and you will find that the relations of\nmales and females are unalterable.  Again, a part of the pure air of the\natmosphere is continually consumed in combustion and respiration; living\nvegetables emit this principle during their growth; nothing appears more\naccidental than the proportion of vegetable to animal life on the surface\nof the earth, yet they are perfectly equivalent, and the balance of the\nsexes, like the constitution of the atmosphere, depends upon the\nprinciples of an unerring intelligence.  You saw in the decline of the\nRoman empire a people enfeebled by luxury, worn out by excess, overrun by\nrude warriors; you saw the giants of the North and East mixing with the\npigmies of the South and West.  An empire was destroyed, but the seeds of\nmoral and physical improvement in the new race were sown; the new\npopulation resulting from the alliances of the men of the North with the\nwomen, of the South was more vigorous, more full of physical power, and\nmore capable of intellectual exertion than their apparently ill-suited\nprogenitors; and the moral effects or final causes of the migration of\nraces, the plans of conquest and ambition which have led to revolutions\nand changes of kingdoms designed by man for such different objects have\nbeen the same in their ultimate results--that of improving by mixture the\ndifferent families of men.  An Alaric or an Attila, who marches with\nlegions of barbarians for some gross view of plunder or ambition, is an\ninstrument of divine power to effect a purpose of which he is wholly\nunconscious--he is carrying a strong race to improve a weak one, and\ngiving energy to a debilitated population; and the deserts he makes in\nhis passage will become in another age cultivated fields, and the\nsolitude he produces will be succeeded by a powerful and healthy\npopulation.  The results of these events in the moral and political world\nmay be compared to those produced in the vegetable kingdom by the storms\nand heavy gales so usual at the vernal equinox, the time of the formation\nof the seed; the pollen or farina of one flower is thrown upon the pistil\nof another, and the crossing of varieties of plants so essential to the\nperfection of the vegetable world produced.  In man moral causes and\nphysical ones modify each other; the transmission of hereditary qualities\nto offspring is distinct in the animal world, and in the case of\ndisposition to disease it is sufficiently obvious in the human being.  But\nit is likewise a general principle that powers or habits acquired by\ncultivation are transmitted to the next generation and exalted or\nperpetuated; the history of particular races of men affords distinct\nproofs of this.  The Caucasian stock has always preserved its\nsuperiority, whilst the negro or flat-nosed race has always been marked\nfor want of intellectual power and capacity for the arts of life.  This\nlast race, in fact, has never been cultivated, and a hundred generations,\nsuccessively improved, would be required to bring it to the state in\nwhich the Caucasian race was at the time of the formation of the Greek\nrepublics.  The principle of the improvement of the character of races by\nthe transmission of hereditary qualities has not escaped the observations\nof the legislators of the ancient people.  By the divine law of Moses the\nIsraelites were enjoined to preserve the purity of their blood, and there\nwas no higher crime than that of forming alliances with the idolatrous\nnations surrounding them.  The Brahmins of Hindostan have established\nupon the same principle the law of caste, by which certain professions\nwere made hereditary.  In this warm climate, where labour is so\noppressive, to secure perfection in any series of operations it seems\nessential to strengthen the powers by the forces acquired from this\nprinciple of hereditary descent.  It will at first perhaps strike your\nmind that the mixing or blending of races is in direct opposition to this\nprinciple of perfection; but here I must require you to pause and\nconsider the nature of the qualities belonging to the human being.  Excess\nof a particular power, which in itself is a perfection, becomes a defect;\nthe organs of touch may be so refined as to show a diseased sensibility;\nthe ear may become so exquisitely sensitive as to be more susceptible to\nthe uneasiness produced by discords than to the pleasures of harmony.  In\nthe nations which have been long civilised the defects are generally\nthose dependent on excess of sensibility--defects which are cured in the\nnext generation by the strength and power belonging to a ruder tribe.  In\nlooking back upon the vision of ancient history, you will find that there\nnever has been an instance of a migration to any extent of any race but\nthe Caucasian, and they have usually passed from the North to the South.\nThe negro race has always been driven before these conquerors of the\nworld; and the red men, the aborigines of America, are constantly\ndiminishing in number, and it is probable that in a few centuries more\ntheir pure blood will be entirely extinct.  In the population of the\nworld, the great object is evidently to produce organised frames most\ncapable of the happy and intellectual enjoyment of life--to raise man\nabove the mere animal state.  To perpetuate the advantages of\ncivilisation, the races most capable of these advantages are preserved\nand extended, and no considerable improvement made by an individual is\never lost to society.  You see living forms perpetuated in the series of\nages, and apparently the quantity of life increased.  In comparing the\npopulation of the globe as it now is with what it was centuries ago, you\nwould find it considerably greater; and if the quantity of life is\nincreased, the quantity of happiness, particularly that resulting from\nthe exercise of intellectual power, is increased in a still higher ratio.\nNow, you will say, 'Is mind generated, is spiritual power created; or are\nthose results dependent upon the organisation of matter, upon new\nperfections given to the machinery upon which thought and motion depend?'\nI proclaim to you,\" said the Genius, raising his voice from its low and\nsweet tone to one of ineffable majesty, \"neither of these opinions is\ntrue.  Listen, whilst I reveal to you the mysteries of spiritual natures,\nbut I almost fear that with the mortal veil of your senses surrounding\nyou, these mysteries can never be made perfectly intelligible to your\nmind.  Spiritual natures are eternal and indivisible, but their modes of\nbeing are as infinitely varied as the forms of matter.  They have no\nrelation to space, and, in their transitions, no dependence upon time, so\nthat they can pass from one part of the universe to another by laws\nentirely independent of their motion.  The quantity, or the number of\nspiritual essences, like the quantity or number of the atoms of the\nmaterial world, are always the same; but their arrangements, like those\nof the materials which they are destined to guide or govern, are\ninfinitely diversified; they are, in fact, parts more or less inferior of\nthe infinite mind, and in the planetary systems, to one of which this\nglobe you inhabit belongs, are in a state of probation, continually\naiming at, and generally rising to a higher state of existence.  Were it\npermitted me to extend your vision to the fates of individual existences,\nI could show you the same spirit, which in the form of Socrates developed\nthe foundations of moral and social virtue, in the Czar Peter possessed\nof supreme power and enjoying exalted felicity in improving a rude\npeople.  I could show you the monad or spirit, which with the organs of\nNewton displayed an intelligence almost above humanity, now in a higher\nand better state of planetary existence drinking intellectual light from\na purer source and approaching nearer to the infinite and divine Mind.\nBut prepare your mind, and you shall at least catch a glimpse of those\nstates which the highest intellectual beings that have belonged to the\nearth enjoy after death in their transition to now and more exalted\nnatures.\"  The voice ceased, and I appeared in a dark, deep, and cold\ncave, of which the walls of the Colosaeum formed the boundary.  From\nabove a bright and rosy light broke into this cave, so that whilst below\nall was dark, above all was bright and illuminated with glory.  I seemed\npossessed at this moment of a new sense, and felt that the light brought\nwith it a genial warmth; odours like those of the most balmy flowers\nappeared to fill the air, and the sweetest sounds of music absorbed my\nsense of hearing; my limbs had a new lightness given to them, so that I\nseemed to rise from the earth, and gradually mounted into the bright\nluminous air, leaving behind me the dark and cold cavern, and the ruins\nwith which it was strewed.  Language is inadequate to describe what I\nfelt in rising continually upwards through this bright and luminous\natmosphere.  I had not, as is generally the case with persons in dreams\nof this kind, imagined to myself wings; but I rose gradually and securely\nas if I were myself a part of the ascending column of light.  By degrees\nthis luminous atmosphere, which was diffused over the whole of space,\nbecame more circumscribed, and extended only to a limited spot around me.\nI saw through it the bright blue sky, the moon and stars, and I passed by\nthem as if it were in my power to touch them with my hand.  I beheld\nJupiter and Saturn as they appear through our best telescopes, but still\nmore magnified, all the moons and belts of Jupiter being perfectly\ndistinct, and the double ring of Saturn appearing in that state in which\nI have heard Herschel often express a wish he could see it.  It seemed as\nif I was on the verge of the solar system, and my moving sphere of light\nnow appeared to pause.  I again heard the low and sweet voice of the\nGenius, which said, \"You are now on the verge of your own system: will\nyou go further, or return to the earth?\"  I replied, \"I have left an\nabode which is damp, dreary, dark and cold; I am now in a place where all\nis life, light, and enjoyment; show me, at least before I return, the\nglimpse which you promised me of those superior intellectual natures and\nthe modes of their being and their enjoyments.\"  \"There are creatures far\nsuperior,\" said the Genius, \"to any idea your imagination can form in\nthat part of the system now before you, comprehending Saturn, his moons\nand rings.  I will carry you to the verge of the immense atmosphere of\nthis planet.  In that space you will see sufficient to wonder at, and far\nmore than with your present organisation it would be possible for me to\nmake you understand.\"  I was again in motion, and again almost as\nsuddenly at rest.  I saw below me a surface infinitely diversified,\nsomething like that of an immense glacier covered with large columnar\nmasses, which appeared as if formed of glass, and from which were\nsuspended rounded forms of various sizes, which, if they had not been\ntransparent, I might have supposed to be fruit.  From what appeared to me\nto be analogous to masses of bright blue ice, streams of the richest tint\nof rose-colour or purple burst forth and flowed into basins, forming\nlakes or seas of the same colour.  Looking through the atmosphere towards\nthe heavens, I saw brilliant opaque clouds of an azure colour that\nreflected the light of the sun, which had to my eyes an entirely new\naspect, and appeared smaller, as if seen through a dense blue mist.  I\nsaw moving on the surface below me immense masses, the forms of which I\nfind it impossible to describe; they had systems for locomotion similar\nto those of the morse or sea-horse, but I saw with great surprise that\nthey moved from place to place by six extremely thin membranes, which\nthey used as wings.  Their colours were varied and beautiful, but\nprincipally azure and rose-colour.  I saw numerous convolutions of tubes,\nmore analogous to the trunk of the elephant than to anything else I can\nimagine, occupying what I supposed to be the upper parts of the body, and\nmy feeling of astonishment almost became one of disgust, from the\npeculiar character of the organs of these singular beings; and it was\nwith a species of terror that I saw one of them mounting upwards,\napparently flying towards those opaque clouds which I have before\nmentioned.  \"I know what your feelings are,\" said the Genius; \"you want\nanalogies and all the elements of knowledge to comprehend the scene\nbefore you.  You are in the same state in which a fly would be whose\nmicroscopic eye was changed for one similar to that of man; and you are\nwholly unable to associate what you now see with your former knowledge.\nBut those beings who are before you, and who appear to you almost as\nimperfect in their functions as the zoophytes of the Polar Sea, to which\nthey are not unlike in their apparent organisation to your eyes, have a\nsphere of sensibility and intellectual enjoyment far superior to that of\nthe inhabitants of your earth.  Each of those tubes which appears like\nthe trunk of an elephant is an organ of peculiar motion or sensation.\nThey have many modes of perception of which you are wholly ignorant, at\nthe same time that their sphere of vision is infinitely more extended\nthan yours, and their organs of touch far more perfect and exquisite.  It\nwould be useless for me to attempt to explain their organisation, which\nyou could never understand; but of their intellectual objects of pursuit\nI may perhaps give you some notion.  They have used, modified, and\napplied the material world in a manner analogous to man; but with far\nsuperior powers they have gained superior results.  Their atmosphere\nbeing much denser than yours and the specific gravity of their planet\nless, they have been enabled to determine the laws belonging to the solar\nsystem with far more accuracy than you can possibly conceive, and any one\nof those beings could show you what is now the situation and appearance\nof your moon with a precision that would induce you to believe that he\nsaw it, though his knowledge is merely the result of calculation.  Their\nsources of pleasure are of the highest intellectual nature; with the\nmagnificent spectacle of their own rings and moons revolving round them,\nwith the various combinations required to understand and predict the\nrelations of these wonderful phenomena their minds are in unceasing\nactivity and this activity is a perpetual source of enjoyment.  Your view\nof the solar system is bounded by Uranus, and the laws of this planet\nform the ultimatum of your mathematical results; but these beings catch a\nsight of planets belonging to another system and even reason on the\nphenomena presented by another sun.  Those comets, of which your\nastronomical history is so imperfect, are to them perfectly familiar, and\nin their ephemerides their places are shown with as much accurateness as\nthose of Jupiter or Venus in your almanacks; the parallax of the fixed\nstars nearest them is as well understood as that of their own sun, and\nthey possess a magnificent history of the changes taking place in the\nheavens and which are governed by laws that it would be vain for me to\nattempt to give you an idea of.  They are acquainted with the revolutions\nand uses of comets; they understand the system of those meteoric\nformations of stones which have so much astonished you on earth; and they\nhave histories in which the gradual changes of nebulas in their progress\ntowards systems have been registered, so that they can predict their\nfuture changes.  And their astronomical records are not like yours which\ngo back only twenty centuries to the time of Hipparchus; they embrace a\nperiod a hundred times as long, and their civil history for the same time\nis as correct as their astronomical one.  As I cannot describe to you the\norgans of these wonderful beings, so neither can I show to you their\nmodes of life; but as their highest pleasures depend upon intellectual\npursuits, so you may conclude that those modes of life bear the strictest\nanalogy to that which on the earth you would call exalted virtue.  I will\ntell you however that they have no wars, and that the objects of their\nambition are entirely those of intellectual greatness, and that the only\npassion that they feel in which comparisons with each other can be\ninstituted are those dependent upon a love of glory of the purest kind.\nIf I were to show you the different parts of the surface of this planet,\nyou would see marvellous results of the powers possessed by these highly\nintellectual beings and of the wonderful manner in which they have\napplied and modified matter.  Those columnar masses, which seem to you as\nif arising out of a mass of ice below, are results of art, and processes\nare going on in them connected with the formation and perfection of their\nfood.  The brilliant coloured fluids are the results of such operations\nas on the earth would be performed in your laboratories, or more properly\nin your refined culinary apparatus, for they are connected with their\nsystem of nourishment.  Those opaque azure clouds, to which you saw a few\nminutes ago one of those beings directing his course, are works of art\nand places in which they move through different regions of their\natmosphere and command the temperature and the quantity of light most\nfitted for their philosophical researches, or most convenient for the\npurposes of life.  On the verge of the visible horizon which we perceive\naround us, you may see in the east a very dark spot or shadow, in which\nthe light of the sun seems entirely absorbed; this is the border of an\nimmense mass of liquid analogous to your ocean, but unlike your sea it is\ninhabited by a race of intellectual beings inferior indeed to those\nbelonging to the atmosphere of Saturn, but yet possessed of an extensive\nrange of sensations and endowed with extraordinary power and\nintelligence.  I could transport you to the different planets and show\nyou in each peculiar intellectual beings bearing analogies to each other,\nbut yet all different in power and essence.  In Jupiter you would see\ncreatures similar to those in Saturn, but with different powers of\nlocomotion; in Mars and Venus you would find races of created forms more\nanalogous to those belonging to the earth; but in every part of the\nplanetary system you would find one character peculiar to all intelligent\nnatures, a sense of receiving impressions from light by various organs of\nvision, and towards this result you cannot but perceive that all the\narrangements and motions of the planetary bodies, their satellites and\natmospheres are subservient.  The spiritual natures therefore that pass\nfrom system to system in progression towards power and knowledge preserve\nat least this one invariable character, and their intellectual life may\nbe said to depend more or less upon the influence of light.  As far as my\nknowledge extends, even in other parts of the universe the more perfect\norganised systems still possess this source of sensation and enjoyment;\nbut with higher natures, finer and more ethereal kinds of matter are\nemployed in organisation, substances that bear the same analogy to common\nmatter that the refined or most subtle gases do to common solids and\nfluids.  The universe is everywhere full of life, but the modes of this\nlife are infinitely diversified, and yet every form of it must be enjoyed\nand known by every spiritual nature before the consummation of all\nthings.  You have seen the comet moving with its immense train of light\nthrough the sky; this likewise has a system supplied with living beings\nand their existence derives its enjoyment from the diversity of\ncircumstances to which they are exposed; passing as it were through the\ninfinity of space they are continually gratified by the sight of new\nsystems and worlds, and you can imagine the unbounded nature of the\ncircle of their knowledge.  My power extends so far as to afford you a\nglimpse of the nature of a cometary world.\"  I was again in rapid motion,\nagain passing with the utmost velocity through the bright blue sky, and I\nsaw Jupiter and his satellites and Saturn and his ring behind me, and\nbefore me the sun, no longer appearing as through a blue mist but in\nbright and unsupportable splendour, towards which I seemed moving with\nthe utmost velocity; in a limited sphere of vision, in a kind of red hazy\nlight similar to that which first broke in upon me in the Colosaeum, I\nsaw moving round me globes which appeared composed of different kinds of\nflame and of different colours.  In some of these globes I recognised\nfigures which put me in mind of the human countenance, but the\nresemblance was so awful and unnatural that I endeavoured to withdraw my\nview from them.  \"You are now,\" said the Genius, \"in a cometary system;\nthose globes of light surrounding you are material forms, such as in one\nof your systems of religious faith have been attributed to seraphs; they\nlive in that element which to you would be destruction; they communicate\nby powers which would convert your organised frame into ashes; they are\nnow in the height of their enjoyment, being about to enter into the blaze\nof the solar atmosphere.  These beings so grand, so glorious, with\nfunctions to you incomprehensible, once belonged to the earth; their\nspiritual natures have risen through different stages of planetary life,\nleaving their dust behind them, carrying with them only their\nintellectual power.  You ask me if they have any knowledge or\nreminiscence of their transitions; tell me of your own recollections in\nthe womb of your mother and I will answer you.  It is the law of divine\nwisdom that no spirit carries with it into another state and being any\nhabit or mental qualities except those which may be connected with its\nnew wants or enjoyments; and knowledge relating to the earth would be no\nmore useful to these glorified beings than their earthly system of\norganised dust, which would be instantly resolved into its ultimate atoms\nat such a temperature; even on the earth the butterfly does not transport\nwith it into the air the organs or the appetites of the crawling worm\nfrom which it sprung.  There is, however, one sentiment or passion which\nthe monad or spiritual essence carries with it into all its stages of\nbeing, and which in these happy and elevated creatures is continually\nexalted; the love of knowledge or of intellectual power, which is, in\nfact, in its ultimate and most perfect development the love of infinite\nwisdom and unbounded power, or the love of God.  Even in the imperfect\nlife that belongs to the earth this passion exists in a considerable\ndegree, increases even with age, outlives the perfection of the corporeal\nfaculties, and at the moment of death is felt by the conscious being, and\nits future destinies depend upon the manner in which it has been\nexercised and exalted.  When it has been misapplied and assumed the forms\nof vague curiosity, restless ambition, vain glory, pride or oppression,\nthe being is degraded, it sinks in the scale of existence and still\nbelongs to the earth or an inferior system, till its errors are corrected\nby painful discipline.  When, on the contrary, the love of intellectual\npower has been exercised on its noblest objects, in discovering and in\ncontemplating the properties of created forms and in applying them to\nuseful and benevolent purposes, in developing and admiring the laws of\nthe eternal Intelligence, the destinies of the sentient principle are of\na nobler kind, it rises to a higher planetary world.  From the height to\nwhich you have been lifted I could carry you downwards and show you\nintellectual natures even inferior to those belonging to the earth, in\nyour own moon and in the lower planets, and I could demonstrate to you\nthe effects of pain or moral evil in assisting in the great plan of the\nexaltation of spiritual natures; but I will not destroy the brightness of\nyour present idea of the scheme of the universe by degrading pictures of\nthe effects of bad passions and of the manner in which evil is corrected\nand destroyed.  Your vision must end with the glorious view of the\ninhabitants of the cometary worlds; I cannot show you the beings of the\nsystem to which I, myself, belong, that of the sun; your organs would\nperish before our brightness, and I am only permitted to be present to\nyou as a sound or intellectual voice.  _We_ are likewise in progression,\nbut we see and know something of the plans of infinite wisdom; we feel\nthe personal presence of that supreme Deity which you only imagine; to\nyou belongs faith, to us knowledge; and our greatest delight results from\nthe conviction that we are lights kindled by His light and that we belong\nto His substance.  To obey, to love, to wonder and adore, form our\nrelations to the infinite Intelligence.  We feel His laws are those of\neternal justice and that they govern all things from the most glorious\nintellectual natures belonging to the sun and fixed stars to the meanest\nspark of life animating an atom crawling in the dust of your earth.  We\nknow all things begin from and end in His everlasting essence, the cause\nof causes, the power of powers.\"\n\nThe low and sweet voice ceased; it appeared as if I had fallen suddenly\nupon the earth, but there was a bright light before me and I heard my\nname loudly called; the voice was not of my intellectual guide--the\ngenius before me was my servant bearing a flambeau in his hand.  He told\nme he had been searching me in vain amongst the ruins, that the carriage\nhad been waiting for me above an hour, and that he had left a large party\nof my friends assembled in the Palazzo F---.\n\n\n\n\nDIALOGUE THE SECOND.  DISCUSSIONS CONNECTED WITH THE VISION IN THE\nCOLOSAEUM.\n\n\nThe same friends, Ambrosio and Onuphrio, who were my companions at Rome\nin the winter, accompanied me in the spring to Naples.  Many\nconversations occurred in the course of our journey which were often to\nme peculiarly instructive, and from the difference of their opinions\ngenerally animated and often entertaining.  I shall detail one of these\nconversations, which took place in the evening on the summit of Vesuvius,\nand the remembrance of which from its connection with my vision in the\nColosaeum has always a peculiar interest for me.  We had reached with\nsome labour the edge of the crater and were admiring the wonderful scene\naround us.  I shall give the conversation in the words of the persons of\nthe drama.\n\n_Philalethes_.--It is difficult to say whether there is more of sublimity\nor beauty in the scene around us.  Nature appears at once smiling and\nfrowning, in activity and repose.  How tremendous is the volcano, how\nmagnificent this great laboratory of Nature in its unceasing fire, its\nsubterraneous lightnings and thunder, its volumes of smoke, its showers\nof stones and its rivers of ignited lava!  How contrasted the darkness of\nthe scoriae, the ruins and the desolation round the crater with the scene\nbelow!  There we see the rich field covered with flax, or maize, or\nmillet, and intersected by rows of trees which support the green and\ngraceful festoons of the vine; the orange and lemon tree covered with\ngolden fruit appear in the sheltered glens; the olive trees cover the\nlower hills; islands purple in the beams of the setting sun are scattered\nover the sea in the west, and the sky is tinted with red softening into\nthe brightest and purest azure; the distant mountains still retain a part\nof the snows of winter, but they are rapidly melting and they absolutely\nseem to melt reflecting the beams of the setting sun, glowing as if on\nfire.  And man appears emulous of Nature, for the city below is full of\nactivity; the nearest part of the bay is covered with boats, busy\nmultitudes crowd the strand, and at the same time may be seen a number of\nthe arts belonging to civilised society in operation--house-building,\nship-building, rope-making, the manipulations of the smith and of the\nagriculturist, and not only the useful arts, but even the amusements and\nluxuries of a great metropolis may be witnessed from the spot in which we\nstand; that motley crowd is collected round a policinello, and those\nsmaller groups that surround the stalls are employed in enjoying the\nfavourite food and drink of the lazzaroni.\n\n_Ambrosio_.--We see not only the power and activity of man, as existing\nat present, and of which the highest example may be represented by the\nsteam-boat which is now departing for Palermo, but we may likewise view\nscenes which carry us into the very bosom of antiquity, and, as it were,\nmake us live with the generations of past ages.  Those small square\nbuildings, scarcely visible in the distance, are the tombs of\ndistinguished men amongst the early Greek colonists of the country; and\nthose rows of houses, without roofs, which appear as if newly erecting,\nconstitute a Roman town restored from its ashes, that remained for\ncenturies as if it had been swept from the face of the earth.  When you\nstudy it in detail you will hardly avoid the illusion that it is a rising\ncity; you will almost be tempted to ask where are the workmen, so perfect\nart the walls of the houses, so bright and uninjured the painting upon\nthem.  Hardly anything is wanting to make this scene a magnificent\nepitome of all that is most worthy of admiration in Nature and art; had\nthere been in addition to the other objects a fine river and a waterfall\nthe epitome would, I think, have been absolutely perfect.\n\n_Phil_.--You are most unreasonable in imagining additions to a scene\nwhich it is impossible to embrace in one view, and which presents so many\nobjects to the senses, the memory, and to the imagination; yet there is a\nriver in the valley between Naples and Castel del Mare; you may see its\nsilver thread and the white foam of its torrents in the distance, and if\nyou were geologists you would find a number of sources of interest, which\nhave not been mentioned, in the scenery surrounding us.  Somma which is\nbefore us, for instance, affords a wonderful example of a mountain formed\nof marine deposits, and which has been raised by subterraneous fire, and\nthose large and singular veins which you see at the base and rising\nthrough the substance of the strata are composed of volcanic porphyry,\nand offer a most striking and beautiful example of the generation and\nstructure of rocks and mineral formations.\n\n_Onuphrio_.--As we passed through Portici, on the road to the base of\nVesuvius, it appeared to me that I saw a stone which had an ancient Roman\ninscription upon it, and which occupied the place of a portal in the\nmodern palace of the Barberini.\n\n_Phil_.--This is not an uncommon circumstance: Most of the stones used in\nthe palaces of Portici had been employed more than two thousand years\nbefore in structures raised by the ancient Romans or Greek colonists; and\nit is not a little remarkable that the buildings of Herculaneum, a town\ncovered with ashes, tufa, and lava, from the first recorded eruption of\nVesuvius more than seventeen hundred years ago, should have been\nconstructed of volcanic materials produced by some antecedent igneous\naction of the mountain in times beyond the reach of history; and it is\nstill more remarkable that men should have gone on for so many ages\nmaking erections in spots where their works have been so often destroyed,\ninattentive to the voice of time or the warnings of nature.\n\n_Onu_.--This last fact recalls to my recollection an idea which\nPhilalethes started in the remarkable dream which he would have us\nbelieve occurred to him in the Colosaeum, namely--that no important facts\nwhich can be useful to society are ever lost; and that, like these\nstones, which though covered with ashes or hidden amongst ruins, they are\nsure to be brought forward again and made use of in some new form.\n\n_Amb_.--I do not see the justness of the analogy to which Onuphrio\nrefers; but there are many parts of that vision on which I should wish to\nhear the explanations of Philalethes.  I consider it in fact as a sort of\npoetical epitome of his philosophical opinions, and I regard this vision\nor dream as a mere web of his imagination in which he intended to catch\nus, his summer-flies and travelling companions.\n\n_Phil_.--There, Ambrosio, you do me wrong.  I will acknowledge, if you\nplease, that the vision in the Colosaeum is a fiction; but the most\nimportant parts of it really occurred to me in sleep, particularly that\nin which I seemed to leave the earth and launch into the infinity of\nspace under the guidance of a tutelary genius.  And the origin and\nprogress of civil society form likewise parts of another dream which I\nhad many years ago, and it was in the reverie which happened when you\nquitted me in the Colosaeum that I wove all these thoughts together, and\ngave them the form in which I narrated them to you.\n\n_Amb_.--Of course we may consider them as an accurate representation of\nyour waking thoughts.\n\n_Phil_.--I do not say that they strictly are so, for I am not quite\nconvinced that dreams are always representations of the state of the mind\nmodified by organic diseases or by associations.  There are certainly no\nabsolutely new ideas produced in sleep, yet I have had more than one\ninstance, in the course of my life, of most extraordinary combinations\noccurring in this state, which have had considerable influence on my\nfeelings, my imagination, and my health.\n\n_Onu_.--Why Philalethes, you are becoming a visionary, a dreamer of\ndreams.  We shall perhaps set you down by the side of Jacob Behmen or of\nEmanuel Swedenbourg, and in an earlier age you might have been a prophet,\nand have ranked perhaps with Mahomet.  But pray give us one of these\ninstances in which such a marvellous influence was produced on your\nimagination and your health by a dream that we may form some judgment of\nthe nature of your second sight or inspirations; and whether they have\nany foundation, or whether they are not, as I believe, really unfounded,\ninventions of the fancy, dreams respecting dreams.\n\n_Phil_.--I anticipate unbelief, and I expose myself to your ridicule in\nthe statement I am about to make, yet I shall mention nothing but a\nsimple fact.  Almost a quarter of a century ago, as you know, I\ncontracted that terrible form of typhus-fever known by the name of gaol-\nfever, I may say, not from any imprudence of my own, but whilst engaged\nin putting in execution a plan for ventilating one of the great prisons\nof the metropolis.  My illness was severe and dangerous.  As long as the\nfever continued, my dreams or delirium were most painful and oppressive;\nbut when the weakness consequent to exhaustion came on, and when the\nprobability of death seemed to my physicians greater than that of life,\nthere was an entire change in all my ideal combinations.  I remained in\nan apparently senseless or lethargic state, but in fact my mind was\npeculiarly active; there was always before me the form of a beautiful\nwoman, with whom I was engaged in the most interesting and intellectual\nconversation.\n\n_Amb_.--The figure of a lady with whom you were in love.\n\n_Phil_.--No such thing; I was passionately in love at the time, but the\nobject of my admiration was a lady with black hair, dark eyes, and pale\ncomplexion; this spirit of my vision, on the contrary, had brown hair,\nblue eyes, and a bright rosy complexion, and was, as far as I can\nrecollect, unlike any of the amatory forms which in early youth had so\noften haunted my imagination.  Her figure for many days was so distinct\nin my mind, as to form almost a visual image.  As I gained strength, the\nvisits of my good angel (for so I called it) became less frequent, and\nwhen I was restored to health they were altogether discontinued.\n\n_Onu_.--I see nothing very strange in this--a mere reaction of the mind\nafter severe pain--and, to a young man of twenty-five, there are few more\npleasurable images than that of a beautiful maiden with blue eyes,\nblooming cheeks, and long nut-brown hair.\n\n_Phil_.--But all my feelings and all my conversations with this visionary\nmaiden were of an intellectual and refined nature.\n\n_Onu_.--Yes, I suppose, as long as you were ill.\n\n_Phil_.--I will not allow you to treat me with ridicule on this point\ntill you have heard the second part of my tale.  Ten years after I had\nrecovered from the fever, and when I had almost lost the recollection of\nthe vision, it was recalled to my memory by a very blooming and graceful\nmaiden, fourteen or fifteen years old, that I accidentally met during my\ntravels in Illyria; but I cannot say that the impression made upon my\nmind by this female was very strong.  Now comes the extraordinary part of\nthe narrative.  Ten years after, twenty years after my first illness, at\na time when I was exceedingly weak from a severe and dangerous malady,\nwhich for many weeks threatened my life, and when my mind was almost in a\ndesponding state, being in a course of travels ordered by my medical\nadvisers, I again met the person who was the representative of my\nvisionary female, and to her kindness and care I believe I owe what\nremains to me of existence.  My despondency gradually disappeared, and\nthough my health still continued weak, life began to possess charms for\nme which I had thought were for ever gone; and I could not help\nidentifying the living angel with the vision which appeared as my\nguardian genius during the illness of my youth.\n\n_Onu_.--I really see nothing at all in this fact, whether the first or\nthe second part of the narrative be considered, beyond the influence of\nan imagination excited by disease.  From youth, even to age, women are\nour guardian angels, our comforters; and I dare say any other handsome\nyoung female, who had been your nurse in your last illness, would have\ncoincided with your remembrance of the vision, even though her eyes had\nbeen hazel and her hair flaxen.  Nothing can be more loose than the\nimages represented in dreams following a fever, and with the nervous\nsusceptibility produced by your last illness, almost any agreeable form\nwould have become the representative of your imaginary guardian genius.\nThus it is, that by the power of fancy, material forms are clothed in\nsupernatural attributes; and in the same manner imaginary divinities have\nall the forms of mortality bestowed upon them.  The gods of the pagan\nmythology were in all their characters and attributes exalted human\nbeings; the demon of the coward, and the angelic form that appears in the\ndream of some maid smitten by devotion, and who, having lost her earthly\nlover, fixes her thoughts on heaven, are clothed in the character and\nvestments of humanity changed by the dreaminess of passion.\n\n_Amb_.--With such a tendency, Philalethes, as you have shown to believe\nin something like a supernatural or divine influence on the human mind, I\nam astonished there should be so much scepticism belonging to your vision\nin the Colosaeum.  And your view of the early state of man, after his\nfirst creation, is not only incompatible with revelation, but likewise\nwith reason and everything that we know respecting the history or\ntraditions of the early nations of antiquity.\n\n_Phil_.--Be more distinct and detailed in your statements, Ambrosio, that\nI may be able to reply to them; and whilst we are waiting for the sunrise\nwe may discuss the subject, and for this, let us seat ourselves on these\nstones, where we shall be warmed by the vicinity of the current of lava.\n\n_Amb_.--You consider man, in his early or first created state, a savage,\nlike those who now inhabit New Holland or New Zealand, acquiring by the\nlittle use that they make of a feeble reason the power of supporting and\nextending life.  Now, I contend, that if man had been so created, he must\ninevitably have been destroyed by the elements or devoured by savage\nbeasts, so infinitely his superiors in physical force.  He must,\ntherefore, have been formed with various instinctive faculties and\npropensities, with a perfection of form and use of organs fitting him to\nbecome the master of the earth; and, it appears to me, that the account\ngiven in Genesis of the first parents of mankind having been placed in a\ngarden fitted with everything necessary to their existence and enjoyment,\nand ordered to increase and multiply there, is strictly in harmony with\nreason, and accordant with all just metaphysical views of the human mind.\nMan as he now exists can only be raised with great care and difficulty\nfrom the infant to the mature state; all his motions are at first\nautomatic, and become voluntary by association; he has to learn\neverything by slow and difficult processes, many months elapse before he\nis able to stand, and many years before he is able to provide for the\ncommon wants of life.  Without the mother or the nurse in his infant\nstate, he would die in a few hours; and without the laborious discipline\nof instruction and example, he would remain idiotic and inferior to most\nother animals.  His reason is only acquired gradually, and when in its\nhighest perfection is often uncertain in its results.  He must,\ntherefore, have been created with instincts that for a long while\nsupplied the want of reason, and which enabled him from the first moment\nof his existence to provide for his wants, to gratify his desires, and\nenjoy the power and the activity of life.\n\n_Phil_.--I acknowledge that your objection has some weight, but not so\nmuch as you would attribute to it.  I will suppose that the first created\nman or men had certain powers or instincts, such as now belong to the\nrudest savages of the southern hemisphere; I will suppose them created\nwith the use of their organs for defence and offence and with passions\nand propensities enabling them to supply their own wants.  And I oppose\nthe fact of races who are now actually in this state to your vague\nhistorical or traditionary records; and their gradual progress or\nimprovement from this early state of society to that of the highest state\nof civilisation or refinement may, I think, be easily deduced from the\nexertions of reason assisted by the influence of the moral powers and of\nphysical circumstances.  Accident, I conceive, must have had some\ninfluence in laying the foundations of certain arts; and a climate in\nwhich labour was not too oppressive, and in which the exertion of\nindustry was required to provide for the wants of life must have fixed\nthe character of the activity of the early improving people; where nature\nis too kind a mother, man is generally a spoiled child; where she is\nsevere, and a stepmother, his powers are usually withered and destroyed.\nThe people of the south and the north and those between the tropics\noffer, even at this day, proof of the truth of this principle; and it is\neven possible now to find on the surface of the earth, all the different\ngradations of the states of society, from that in which man is scarcely\nremoved above the brute, to that in which he appears approaching in his\nnature to a divine intelligence.  Besides, reason being the noblest gift\nof God to man, I can hardly suppose that an infinitely powerful and all-\nwise Creator would bestow upon the early inhabitants of the globe a\ngreater proportion of instinct than was at first necessary to preserve\ntheir existence, and that he would not leave the great progress of their\nimprovement to the development and exaltation of their reasoning powers.\n\n_Amb_.--You appear to me in your argument to have forgotten the influence\nthat any civilised race must possess over savages; and many of the\nnations which you consider as in their original state, may have descended\nfrom nations formerly civilised; and, it is quite as easy to trace the\nretrograde steps of a people as their advances; the savage hordes who now\ninhabit the northern coast of Africa are probably descended from the\nopulent, commercial, and ingenious Carthaginians who once contended with\nRome for the empire of the world; and even nearer home, we might find in\nSouthern Italy and her islands, proofs of a degradation not much\ninferior.  What I contend for is the civilisation of the first\npatriarchal races who peopled the East, and who passed into Europe from\nArmenia, in which paradise is supposed to have been placed.  The early\ncivilisation of this race could only have been in consequence of their\npowers and instincts having been of a higher character than those of\nsavages.  They appear to have been small families--a state not at all\nfitted for the discovery of arts by the exercise of the mind; and they\nprofessed the most sublime form of religion, the worship of one Supreme\nIntelligence--a truth which, after a thousand years of civilisation, was\nwith difficulty attained by the most powerful efforts of reasoning by the\nGreek sages.  It appears to me, that in the history of the Jews, nothing\ncan be more in conformity to our ideas of just analogy than this series\nof events.  Our first parents were created with everything necessary for\ntheir wants and their happiness; they had only one duty to perform, by\ntheir obedience to prove their love and devotion to their Creator.  In\nthis they failed, and death--or the fear of death--became a curse upon\ntheir race; but the father of mankind repented, and his instinctive or\nintellectual powers given by revelation were transmitted to his offspring\nmore or less modified by their reason, which they had gained as the fruit\nof their disobedience.  One branch of his offspring, however, in whom\nfaith shone forth above reason, retained their peculiar powers and\ninstitutions and preserved the worship of Jehovah pure, whilst many of\nthe races sprung from their brethren became idolatrous, and the clear\nlight of heaven was lost through the mist of the senses; and that Being,\nworshipped by the Israelites only as a mysterious word, was forgotten by\nmany of the nations who lived in the neighbouring countries, and men,\nbeasts, the parts of the visible universe, and even stocks and stones,\nwere set up as objects of adoration.  The difficulty which the divine\nlegislators of the Jewish people had to preserve the purity of their\nreligion amongst the idolatrous nations by whom they were surrounded,\nproves the natural evil tendency of the human mind after the fall of man.\nAnd, whoever will consider the nature of the Mosaical or ceremonial law\nand the manner in which it was suspended before the end of the Roman\nEmpire, the expiatory sacrifice of the Messiah, the fear of death\ndestroyed by the blessed hopes of immortality established by the\nresurrection of Jesus Christ, the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, and\nthe triumphs of Christianity over paganism in the time of Constantine,\ncan I think, hardly fail to acknowledge the reasonableness of the truth\nof revealed religion as founded upon the early history of man; and\nwhoever acknowledges this reasonableness and this truth, must I think be\ndissatisfied with the view which Philalethes or his genius has given of\nthe progress of society, and will find in it one instance, amongst many\nothers that might be discovered, of the vague and erring results of his\nso much boasted human reason.\n\n_Onu_.--I fear I shall shock Ambrosio, but I cannot help vindicating a\nlittle the philosophical results of human reason, which it must be\nallowed are entirely hostile to his ideas.  I agree with Philalethes that\nit is the noblest gift of God to man; and I cannot think that Ambrosio's\nview of the paradisaical condition and the fall of man and the progress\nof society is at all in conformity with the ideas we ought to form of the\ninstitutions of an infinitely wise and powerful Being.  Besides, Ambrosio\nspeaks of the reasonableness of his own opinions; of course his notions\nof reason must be different from mine, or we have adopted different forms\nof logic.  I do not find in the biblical history any idea of the supreme\nIntelligence conformable to those of the Greek philosophers; on the\ncontrary, I find Jehovah everywhere described as a powerful material\nbeing, endowed with organs, feelings, and passions similar to those of a\ngreat and exalted human agent.  He is described as making man in His own\nimage, as walking in the garden in the cool of the evening, as being\npleased with sacrificial offerings, as angry with Adam and Eve, as\npersonally cursing Cain for his crime of fratricide, and even as\nproviding our first parents with garments to hide their nakedness; then\nHe appears a material form in the midst of flames, thunder and lightning,\nand was regarded by the Levites as having a fixed residence in the Ark.\nHe is contrasted throughout the whole of the Old Testament with the gods\nof the heathens, only as being more powerful; and in the strange scene\nwhich took place in Pharaoh's court He seemed to have measured His\nabilities with those of certain seers or magicians, and to have proved\nHis superiority only by producing greater and more tremendous plagues.  In\nall the early history of the Jewish nation there is no conception\napproaching to the sublimity of that of Anaxagoras, who called God the\nIntelligence or [Greek text].  He appears always, on the contrary, like\nthe genii of Arabian romance, living in clouds, descending on mountains,\nurging His chosen people to commit the most atrocious crimes, to destroy\nall the races not professing the same worship, and to exterminate even\nthe child and the unborn infant.  Then, I find in the Old Testament no\npromise of a spiritual Messiah, but only of a temporal king, who, as the\nJews believe, is yet to come.  The serpent in Genesis has no connection\nwith the spirit of evil, but is described only as the most subtle beast\nof the field, and, having injured man, there was to be a perpetual enmity\nbetween their races--the serpent when able was to bite the heel of the\nman, and the man when an opportunity occurred was to bruise the head of\nthe serpent.  I will allow, if you please, that an instinct of religion\nor superstition belongs to the human mind, and that the different forms\nwhich this instinct assumes depend upon various circumstances and\naccidents of history and climate; but I am not sure that the religion of\nthe Jews was superior to that of the Sabaeans who worshipped the stars,\nor the ancient Persians who adored the sun as the visible symbol of\ndivine power, or the eastern nations who in the various forms of the\nvisible universe worshipped the powers and energies of the Divinity.  I\nfeel like the ancient Romans with respect to toleration; I would give a\nplace to all the gods in my Pantheon, but I would not allow the followers\nof Brahmah or of Christ to quarrel about the modes of incarnation or the\nsuperiority of the attributes of their trien God.\n\n_Amb_.--You have mistaken me, Onuphrio, if you think I am shocked by your\nopinions; I have seen too much of the wanderings of human reason ever to\nbe surprised by them, and the views you have adopted are not uncommon\namongst young men of very superior talents, who have only slightly\nexamined the evidences of revealed religion.  But I am glad to find that\nyou have not adopted the code of infidelity of many of the French\nrevolutionists and of an English school of sceptics, who find in the\nancient astronomy all the germs of the worship of the Hebrews, who\nidentify the labours of Hercules with those of the Jewish heroes, and who\nfind the life, death and resurrection of the Messiah in the history of\nthe solar day.  You, at least, allow the existence of a peculiar\nreligious instinct, or, as you are pleased to call it, superstition,\nbelonging to the human mind, and I have hopes that upon this foundation\nyou will ultimately build up a system of faith not unworthy a philosopher\nand a Christian.  Man, with whatever religious instincts he was created,\nwas intended to communicate with the visible universe by sensations and\nact upon it by his organs, and in the earliest state of society he was\nmore particularly influenced by his gross senses.  Allowing the existence\nof a supreme Intelligence and His beneficent intentions towards man, the\nideas of His presence which He might think fit to impress upon the mind,\neither for the purpose of veneration, or of love, of hope or fear, must\nhave been in harmony with the general train of His sensations--I am not\nsure that I make myself intelligible.  The same infinite power which in\nan instant could create a universe, could of course so modify the ideas\nof an intellectual being as to give them that form and character most\nfitted for his existence; and I suppose in the early state of created man\nhe imagined that he enjoyed the actual presence of the Divinity and heard\nHis voice.  I take this to be the first and simplest result of religious\ninstinct.  In early times amongst the patriarchs I suppose these ideas\nwere so vivid as to be confounded with impressions; but as religious\ninstinct probably became feebler in their posterity, the vividness of the\nimpressions diminished, and they then became visions or dreams, which\nwith the prophets seem to have constituted inspiration.  I do not suppose\nthat the Supreme Being ever made Himself known to man by a real change in\nthe order of Nature, but that the sensations of men were so modified by\ntheir instincts as to induce the belief in His presence.  That there was\na divine intelligence continually acting upon the race of Seth as his\nchosen people, is, I think, clearly proved by the events of their\nhistory, and also that the early opinions of a small tribe in Judaea were\ndesigned for the foundation of the religion of the most active and\ncivilised and powerful nations of the world, and that after a lapse of\nthree thousand years.  The manner in which Christianity spread over the\nworld with a few obscure mechanics or fishermen for its promulgators; the\nmode in which it triumphed over paganism even when professed and\nsupported by the power and philosophy of a Julian; the martyrs who\nsubscribed to the truth of Christianity by shedding their blood for the\nfaith; the exalted nature of those intellectual men by whom it has been\nprofessed who had examined all the depths of nature and exercised the\nprofoundest faculties of thought, such as Newton, Locke, and Hartley, all\nappear to me strong arguments in favour of revealed religion.  I prefer\nrather founding my creed upon the fitness of its doctrines than upon\nhistorical evidences or the nature of its miracles.  The Divine\nIntelligence chooses that men should be convinced according to the\nordinary train of their sensations, and on all occasions it appears to me\nmore natural that a change should take place in the human mind than in\nthe order of nature.  The popular opinion of the people of Judaea was\nthat certain diseases were occasioned by devils taking possession of a\nhuman being; the disease was cured by our Saviour, and this in the Gospel\nis expressed by his casting out devils.  But without entering into\nexplanations respecting the historical miracles belonging to\nChristianity, it is sufficient to say that its truth is attested by a\nconstantly existing miracle, the present state of the Jews, which was\npredicted by Jesus; their temple and city were destroyed, and all\nattempts made to rebuild it have been vain, and they remain the despised\nand outcasts of the world.\n\n_Onu_.--But you have not answered my objections with respect to the\ncruelties exercised by the Jews under the command of Jehovah, which\nappear to me in opposition to all our views of divine justice.\n\n_Amb_.--I think even Philalethes will allow that physical and moral\ndiseases are hereditary, and that to destroy a pernicious unbelief or\ndemoniacal worship it was necessary to destroy the whole race root and\nbranch.  As an example, I will imagine a certain contagions disease which\nis transmitted by parents to children, and which, like the plague, is\ncommunicated to sound persons by contact; to destroy a family of men who\nwould spread this disease over the whole earth would unquestionably be a\nmercy.  Besides, I believe in the immortality of the sentient principle\nin man; destruction of life is only a change of existence, and supposing\nthe new existence a superior one it is a gain.  To the Supreme\nIntelligence the death of a million of human beings is the mere\ncircumstance of so many spiritual essences changing their habitations,\nand is analogous to the myriad millions of larvae that leave their coats\nand shells behind them and rise into the atmosphere, as flies in a summer\nday.  When man measures the works of the Divine Mind by his own feeble\ncombinations, he must wander in gross error; the infinite can never be\nunderstood by the finite.\n\n_Onu_.--As far as I can comprehend your reasoning, the priests of\nJuggernaut might make the same defence for their idol, and find in such\nviews a fair apology for the destruction of thousands of voluntary\nvictims crushed to pieces by the feet of the sacred elephant.\n\n_Amb_.--Undoubtedly they might, and I should allow the justness of their\ndefence if I saw in their religion any germs of a divine institution\nfitted to become, like the religion of Jehovah, the faith of the whole\ncivilised world, embracing the most perfect form of theism and the most\nrefined and exalted morality.  I consider the early acts of the Jewish\nnation as the lowest and rudest steps of a temple raised by the Supreme\nBeing to contain the altar of sacrifice to His glory.  In the early\nperiods of society rude and uncultivated men could only be acted upon by\ngross and temporal rewards and punishments; severe rites and heavy\ndiscipline were required to keep the mind in order, and the punishment of\nthe idolatrous nation served as an example for the Jews.  When\nChristianity took the place of Judaism the ideas of the Supreme Being\nbecame more pure and abstracted, and the visible attributes of Jehovah\nand His angels appear to have been less frequently presented to the mind;\nyet even for many ages it seemed as if the grossness of our material\nsenses required some assistance from the eye in fixing or perpetuating\nthe character of religious instinct, and the Church to which I belong,\nand I may say the whole Christian Church in early times, allowed visible\nimages, pictures, statues, and relics as the means of awakening the\nstronger devotional feelings.  We have been accused of worshipping merely\ninanimate objects, but this is a very false notion of the nature of our\nfaith; we regard them merely as vivid characters representing spiritual\nexistences and we no more worship them than the Protestant does his Bible\nwhen he kisses it under a solemn religious adjuration.  The past, the\npresent, and the future being the same to the infinite and divine\nIntelligence, and man being created in love for the purposes of\nhappiness, the moral and religious discipline to which he was submitted\nwas in strict conformity to his progressive faculties and to the primary\nlaws of his nature.  It is but a rude analogy, yet it is the only one I\ncan find, that of comparing the Supreme Being to a wise and good father\nwho, to secure the well-being of his offspring, is obliged to adopt a\nsystem of rewards and punishments in which the senses at first and\nafterwards the imagination and reason are concerned; he terrifies them by\nthe example of others, awakens their love of glory by pointing out the\ndistinction and the happiness gained by superior men by adopting a\nparticular line of conduct; he uses at first the rod, and gradually\nsubstitutes for it the fear of immediate shame; and having awakened the\nfear of shame and the love of praise or honour with respect to temporary\nand immediate actions he extends them to the conduct of the whole of\nlife, and makes what was a momentary feeling a permanent and immutable\nprinciple.  And obedience in the child to the will of such a parent may\nbe compared to faith in and obedience to the will of the Supreme Being;\nand a wayward and disobedient child who reasons upon and doubts the\nutility of the discipline of such a father is much in the same state in\nwhich the adult man is who doubts if there be good in the decrees of\nProvidence and who questions the harmony of the plan of the moral\nuniverse.\n\n_Onu_.--Allowing the perfection of your moral scheme of religion and its\nfitness for the nature of man, I find it impossible to believe the\nprimary doctrines on which this scheme is founded.  You make the Divine\nMind, the creator of infinite worlds, enter into the form of a man born\nof a virgin, you make the eternal and immortal God the victim of shameful\npunishment and suffering death on the cross, recovering His life after\nthree days, and carrying His maimed and lacerated body into the heaven of\nheavens.\n\n_Amb_.--You, like all other sceptics, make your own interpretations of\nthe Scriptures and set up a standard for divine power in human reason.\nThe infinite and eternal mind, as I said before, fits the doctrines of\nreligion to the minds by which they are to be embraced.  I see no\nimprobability in the idea that an integrant part of His essence may have\nanimated a human form; there can be no doubt that this belief has existed\nin the human mind, and the belief constitutes the vital part of the\nreligion.  We know nothing of the generation of the human being in the\nordinary course of nature; how absurd then to attempt to reason upon the\nacts of the Divine Mind! nor is there more difficulty in imagining the\nevent of a divine conception than of a divine creation.  To God the\ninfinite, little and great, as measured by human powers, are equal; a\ncreature of this earth, however humble and insignificant, may have the\nsame weight with millions of superior beings inhabiting higher systems.\nBut I consider all the miraculous parts of our religion as effected by\nchanges in the sensations or ideas of the human mind, and not by physical\nchanges in the order of nature; a man who has to repair a piece of\nmachinery, as a clock, must take it to pieces, and, in fact, re-make it,\nbut to infinite wisdom and power a change in the intellectual state of\nthe human being may be the result of a momentary will, and the mere act\nof faith may produce the change.  How great the powers of imagination\nare, even in ordinary life, is shown by many striking facts, and nothing\nseems impossible to this imagination when acted upon by divine influence.\nTo attempt to answer all the objections which may be derived from the\nwant of conformity in the doctrines of Christianity to the usual order of\nevents would be an interminable labour.  My first principle is, that\nreligion has nothing to do with the common order of events; it is a pure\nand divine instinct intended to give results to man which he cannot\nobtain by the common use of his reason, and which at first view often\nappear contradictory to it, but which when examined by the most refined\ntests, and considered in the most extensive and profound relations, are,\nin fact, in conformity with the most exalted intellectual knowledge, so\nthat, indeed, the results of pure reason ultimately become the same with\nthose of faith--the tree of knowledge is grafted upon the tree of life,\nand that fruit which brought the fear of death into the world, budding on\nan immortal stock, becomes the fruit of the promise of immortality.\n\n_Onu_.--You derive Christianity from Judaism; I cannot see their\nconnection, and it appears to me that the religion of Mahomet is more\nnaturally a scion from the stock of Moses.  Christ was a Jew, and was\ncircumcised; this rite was continued by Mahomet, and is to this day\nadopted by his disciples, though rejected by the Christians; and the\ndoctrines of Mahomet appear to me to have a higher claim to divine origin\nthan those of Jesus; his morality is as pure, his theism purer, and his\nsystem of rewards and punishments after death as much in conformity with\nour ideas of eternal justice.\n\n_Amb_.--I will willingly make the decision of the general question\ndependent upon the decision of this particular one.  No attempts have\nbeen made by the Mahometans to find any predictions respecting their\nfounder in the Old Testament, and they have never pretended even that he\nwas the Messiah; therefore, as far as prophecy is concerned, there is no\nground for admitting the truth of the religion of Mahomet.  It has been\nthe fashion with a particular sect of infidels to praise the morality of\nthe Mahometans, but I think unjustly; they are said to be honest in their\ndealings and charitable to those of their own persuasion; but they allow\npolygamy and a plurality of women, and are despisers and persecutors of\nthe nations professing a different faith.  And what a contrast does this\nmorality present to that of the Gospel which inculcates charity to all\nmankind, and orders benevolent actions to be performed even to enemies!\nand the purity and simplicity of the infant is held up by Christ as the\nmodel of imitation for His followers.  Then, in the rewards and\npunishments of the future state of the Mahometans, how gross are all the\nideas, how unlike the promises of a divine and spiritual being; their\nparadise is a mere earthly garden of sensual pleasure, and their Houris\nrepresent the ladies of their own harems rather than glorified angelic\nnatures.  How different is the Christian heaven, how sublime in its idea,\nindefinite, yet well suited to a being of intellectual and progressive\nfaculties; \"Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it entered into\nthe heart of man to conceive the joys that He hath prepared for those who\nlove Him.\"\n\n_Onu_.--I confess your answer to my last argument is a triumphant one;\nbut I cannot allow a question of such extent and of such a variety of\nbearings to be decided by so slight an advantage as that which you have\ngained by this answer.  I will now offer another difficulty to you.  The\nlaw of the Jews, you will allow, was established by God Himself and\ndelivered to Moses from the seat of His glory amongst storms, thunder,\nand lightnings, on Mount Sinai; why should this law, if pure and divine,\nhave been overturned by the same Being who established it?  And all the\nceremonies of the Hebrews have been abolished by the first Christians.\n\n_Amb_.--I deny that the divine law of Moses was abolished by Christ, who\nHimself says, \"I came to confirm the law, not to destroy it.\"  And the\nTen Commandments form the vital parts of the foundation of the creed of\nthe true Christian.  It appears that the religion of Christ was the same\npure theism with that of the patriarchs; and the rites and ceremonies\nestablished by Moses seem to have been only adjuncts to the spiritual\nreligion intended to suit a particular climate and a particular state of\nthe Jewish nation, rather a dress or clothing of the religion than\nforming a constituent part of it, a system of discipline of life and\nmanners rather than an essential part of doctrine.  The rites of\ncircumcision and ablution were necessary to the health and perhaps even\nto the existence of a people living on the hottest part of the shores of\nthe Mediterranean.  And in the sacrifices made of the first fruits and of\nthe chosen of the flock, we may see a design not merely connected with\nthe religious faith of the people but even with their political economy.\nTo offer their choicest and best property as a proof of their gratitude\nto the Supreme Being was a kind of test of devotedness and obedience to\nthe theocracy; and these sacrifices by obliging them to raise more\nproduce and provide more cattle than were essential to their ordinary\nsupport, preserved them from the danger of famine, as in case of a dearth\nit was easy for the priests under the divine permission to apply those\nofferings to the necessities of the people.  All the pure parts of the\nfaith which had descended from Abraham to David were preserved by Jesus\nChrist; but the ceremonial religion was fitted only for a particular\nnation and a particular country; Christianity, on the contrary, was to be\nthe religion of the world and of a civilised and improving world.  And it\nappears to me to be an additional proof of its divine nature and origin,\nthat it is exactly in conformity to the principles of the improvement and\nperfection of the human mind.  When given to a particular race fixed in a\npeculiar climate, its objects were sensible, its discipline was severe,\nand its rites and ceremonies numerous and imposing, fitted to act upon\nweak, ignorant, and consequently obstinate men.  In its gradual\ndevelopment it threw off its local character and its particular forms,\nand adopted ceremonies more fitted for mankind in general; and in its\nultimate views, it preserves only pure, spiritual, and I may say\nphilosophical doctrines, the unity of the divine nature and a future\nstate, embracing a system of rewards and punishments suited to an\naccountable and immortal being.\n\n_Phil_.--I have been attentively listening to your discussion.  The views\nwhich Ambrosio has taken of Christianity certainly throw a light over it\nperfectly new to me; and, I must say in candour, that I am disposed to\nadopt his notion of the early state of society rather than that of my\nGenius.  I have always been accustomed to consider religious feeling as\ninstinctive; but Ambrosio's arguments have given me something approaching\nto a definite faith for an obscure and indefinite notion.  I am willing\nto allow that man was created, not a savage, as he is represented in my\nvision, but perfect in his faculties and with a variety of instinctive\npowers and knowledge; that he transmitted these powers and knowledge to\nhis offspring; but that by an improper use of reason in disobedience to\nthe divine will, the instinctive faculties of most of his descendants\nbecame deteriorated and at last lost, but that these faculties were\npreserved in the race of Abraham and David, and the full power again\nbestowed upon or recovered by Christ.  I am ready to allow the importance\nof religion in cultivating and improving the world; and Ambrosio's view\nappears to me capable of being referred to a general law of our nature;\nand revelation may be regarded not as a partial interference but as a\nconstant principle belonging to the mind of man, and the belief in\nsupernatural forms and agency, the results of prophecies and the\nmiracles, as one only of the necessary consequences of it.  Man, as a\nreasoning animal, must always have doubted of his immortality and plan of\nconduct; in all the results of faith, there is immediate submission to a\ndivine will, which we are sure is good.  We may compare the destiny of\nman in this respect to that of a migratory bird; if a slow flying bird,\nas a landrail in the Orkneys in autumn, had reason and could use it as to\nthe probability of his finding his way over deserts, across seas, and of\nsecuring his food in passing to a warm climate 3,000 miles off, he would\nundoubtedly starve in Europe; under the direction of his instinct he\nsecurely arrives there in good condition.  I have allowed the force of\nyour objections to that part of my vision relating to the origin of\nsociety, but I hope you will admit that the conclusion of it is not\ninconsistent with the ideas derived from revelation respecting the future\nstate of the human being.\n\n_Amb_.--Revelation has not disclosed to us the nature of this state, but\nonly fixed its certainty.  We are sure from geological facts, as well as\nfrom sacred history, that man is a recent animal on the globe, and that\nthis globe has undergone one considerable revolution, since the creation,\nby water; and we are taught that it is to undergo another, by fire,\npreparatory to a new and glorified state of existence of man; but this is\nall we are permitted to know, and as this state is to be entirely\ndifferent from the present one of misery and probation, any knowledge\nrespecting it would be useless and indeed almost impossible.\n\n_Phil_.--My Genius has placed the more exalted spiritual natures in\ncometary worlds, and this last fiery revolution may be produced by the\nappulse of a comet.\n\n_Amb_.--Human fancy may imagine a thousand manners in which it may be\nproduced, but upon such notions it is absurd to dwell.  I will not allow\nyour Genius the slightest approach to inspiration, and I can admit no\nverisimility in a reverie which is fixed on a foundation you now allow to\nbe so weak.  But see, the twilight is beginning to appear in the orient\nsky, and there are some dark clouds on the horizon opposite to the crater\nof Vesuvius, the lower edges of which transmit a bright light, showing\nthe sun is already risen in the country beneath them.  I would say that\nthey may serve as an image of the hopes of immortality derived from\nrevelation; for we are sure from the light reflected in those clouds that\nthe lands below us are in the brightest sunshine, but we are entirely\nignorant of the surface and the scenery; so, by revelation, the light of\nan imperishable and glorious world is disclosed to us; but it is in\neternity, and its objects cannot be seen by mortal eye or imaged by\nmortal imagination.\n\n_Phil_.--I am not so well read in the Scriptures as I hope I shall be at\nno very distant time; but I believe the pleasures of heaven are mentioned\nmore distinctly than you allow in the sacred writings.  I think I\nremember that the saints are said to be crowned with palms and amaranths,\nand that they are described as perpetually hymning and praising God.\n\n_Amb_.--This is evidently only metaphorical; music is the sensual\npleasure which approaches nearest to an intellectual one, and probably\nmay represent the delight resulting from the perception of the harmony of\nthings and of truth seen in God.  The palm as an evergreen tree and the\namaranth a perdurable flower are emblems of immortality.  If I am allowed\nto give a metaphorical allusion to the future state of the blest, I\nshould image it by the orange grove in that sheltered glen, on which the\nsun is now beginning to shine, and of which the trees are at the same\ntime loaded with sweet golden fruit and balmy silver flowers.  Such\nobjects may well portray a state in which hope and fruition become one\neternal feeling.\n\n_Onu_.--This glorious sunrise seems to have made you both poetical.\nThough with the darkest and most gloomy mind of the party I cannot help\nfeeling its influence, I cannot help believing with you that the night of\ndeath will be succeeded by a bright morning; but, as in the scene below\nus, the objects are nearly the same as they were last evening, with more\nof brightness and brilliancy, with a fairer prospect in the east and more\nmist in the west, so I cannot help believing that our new state of\nexistence must bear an analogy to the present one, and that the order of\nevents will not be entirely different.\n\n_Amb_.--Your view is not an unnatural one; but I am rejoiced to find some\nsymptoms of a change in your opinions.\n\n_Onu_.--I wish with all my heart they were stronger; I begin to feel my\nreason a weight and my scepticism a very heavy load.  Your discussions\nhave made me a Philo-Christian, but I cannot understand nor embrace all\nthe views you have developed, though I really wish to do so.\n\n_Amb_.--Your wish, if sincere, I doubt not will be gratified.  Fix your\npowerful mind upon the harmony of the moral world, as you have been long\naccustomed to do upon the order of the physical universe, and you will\nsee the scheme of the eternal intelligence developing itself alike in\nboth.  Think of the goodness and mercy of omnipotence, and aid your\ncontemplation by devotional feelings and mental prayer and aspirations to\nthe source of all knowledge, and wait with humility for the light which I\ndoubt not will be so produced in your mind.\n\n_Onu_.--You again perplex me; I cannot believe that the adorations or\nofferings of so feeble a creature can influence the decrees of\nomnipotence.\n\n_Amb_.--You mistake me: as to their influencing or affecting the supreme\nmind it is out of the question, but they affect your own mind, they\nperpetuate a habit of gratitude and of obedience which may gradually end\nin perfect faith, they discipline the affections and keep the heart in a\nstate of preparation to receive and preserve all good and pious feelings.\nWhoever passes from utter darkness into bright sunshine finds that he\ncannot at first distinguish objects better in one than in the other, but\nin a feeble light he acquires gradually the power of bearing a brighter\none, and gains at last the habit not only of supporting it, but of\nreceiving delight as well as instruction from it.  In the pious\ncontemplations that I recommend to you there is the twilight or sober\ndawn of faith which will ultimately enable you to support the brightness\nof its meridian sun.\n\n_Onu_.--I understand you, but your metaphor is more poetical than just;\nyour discipline, however, I have no doubt, is better fitted to enable me\nto bear the light than to contemplate it through the smoked or coloured\nglasses of scepticism.\n\n_Amb_.--Yes, for they not only diminish its brightness but alter its\nnature.\n\n\n\n\nDIALOGUE THE THIRD.  THE UNKNOWN.\n\n\nThe same persons accompanied me in many journeys by land and water to\ndifferent parts of the Phlegraean fields, and we enjoyed in a most\ndelightful season, the beginning of May, the beauties of the glorious\ncountry which encloses the Bay of Naples, so rich, so ornamented with the\ngifts of nature, so interesting from the monuments it contains and the\nrecollections it awakens.  One excursion, the last we made in southern\nItaly, the most important both from the extraordinary personage with whom\nit made me acquainted and his influence upon my future life, merits a\nparticular detail which I shall now deliver to paper.\n\nIt was on the 16th of May, 18-- that we left Naples at three in the\nmorning for the purpose of visiting the remains of the temples of Paestum,\nand having provided relays of horses we found ourselves at about half-\npast one o'clock descending the hill of Eboli towards the plain which\ncontains these stupendous monuments of antiquity.  Were my existence to\nbe prolonged through ten centuries, I think I could never forget the\npleasure I received on that delicious spot.  We alighted from our\ncarriage to take some refreshment, and we reposed upon the herbage under\nthe shade of a magnificent pine contemplating the view around and below\nus.  On the right were the green hills covered with trees stretching\ntowards Salerno; beyond them were the marble cliffs which form the\nsouthern extremity of the Bay of Sorento; immediately below our feet was\na rich and cultivated country filled with vineyards and abounding in\nvillas, in the gardens of which were seen the olive and the cypress tree\nconnected as if to memorialise how near to each other are life and death,\njoy and sorrow; the distant mountains stretching beyond the plain of\nPaestum were in the full luxuriance of vernal vegetation; and in the\nextreme distance, as if in the midst of a desert, we saw the white\ntemples glittering in the sunshine.  The blue Tyrrhene sea filled up the\noutline of this scene, which, though so beautiful, was not calm; there\nwas a heavy breeze which blew full from the southwest; it was literally a\nzephyr, and its freshness and strength in the middle of the day were\npeculiarly balmy and delightful; it seemed a breath stolen by the spring\nfrom the summer.  I never saw a deeper, brighter azure than that of the\nwaves which rolled towards the shore, and which was rendered more\nstriking by the pure whiteness of their foam.  The agitation of nature\nseemed to be one of breathing and awakening life; the noise made by the\nwaving of the branches of the pine above our heads and by the rattling of\nits cones was overpowered by the music of a multitude of birds which sung\neverywhere in the trees that surrounded us, and the cooing of the turtle-\ndoves was heard even more distinctly than the murmuring of the waves or\nthe whistling of the winds, so that in the strife of nature the voice of\nlove was predominant.  With our hearts touched by this extraordinary\nscene we descended to the ruins, and having taken at a farmhouse a person\nwho acted as guide or cicerone, we began to examine those wonderful\nremains which have outlived even the name of the people by whom they were\nraised, and which continue almost perfect whilst a Roman and a Saracen\ncity since raised have been destroyed.  We had been walking for half an\nhour round the temples in the sunshine when our guide represented to us\nthe danger that there was of suffering from the effects of malaria, for\nwhich, as is well known, this place is notorious, and advised us to\nretire into the interior of the temple of Neptune.  We followed his\nadvice, and my companions began to employ themselves in measuring the\ncircumference of one of the Doric columns, when they suddenly called my\nattention to a stranger who was sitting on a camp-stool behind it.  The\nappearance of any person in this place at this time was sufficiently\nremarkable, but the man who was before us from his dress and appearance\nwould have been remarkable anywhere.  He was employed in writing in a\nmemorandum book when we first saw him, but he immediately rose and\nsaluted us by bending the head slightly though gracefully; and this\nenabled me to see distinctly his person and dress.  He was rather above\nthe middle stature, slender, but with well-turned limbs; his countenance\nwas remarkably intelligent, his eye hazel but full and strong, his front\nwas smooth and unwrinkled, and but for some grey hairs, which appeared\nsilvering his brown and curly locks, he might have been supposed to have\nhardly reached the middle age; his nose was aquiline, the expression of\nthe lower part of his countenance remarkably sweet, and when he spoke to\nour guide, which he did with uncommon fluency in the Neapolitan dialect,\nI thought I had never heard a more agreeable voice, sonorous yet gentle\nand silver-sounded.  His dress was very peculiar, almost like that of an\necclesiastic, but coarse and light; and there was a large soiled white\nhat on the ground beside him, on which was fastened a pilgrim's cockle\nshell, and there was suspended round his neck a long antique blue\nenamelled phial, like those found in the Greek tombs, and it was attached\nto a rosary of coarse beads.  He took up his hat, and appeared to be\nretiring to another part of the building, when I apologised for the\ninterruption we had given to his studies, begged him to resume them, and\nassured him that our stay in the building would be only momentary, for I\nsaw that there was a cloud over the sun, the brightness of which was the\ncause of our retiring.  I spoke in Italian; he replied in English,\nobserving that he supposed the fear of contracting the malaria fever had\ninduced us to seek the shelter of the shade: but it is too early in the\nseason to have much reasonable fear of this insidious enemy; yet, he\nadded, this bottle which you may have observed here at my breast, I carry\nabout with me, as a supposed preventive of the effects of malaria, and as\nfar as my experience, a very limited one, however, has gone, it is\neffectual.  I ventured to ask him what the bottle might contain, as such\na benefit ought to be made known to the world.  He replied, \"It is a\nmixture which slowly produces the substance called by chemists chlorine,\nwhich is well known to be generally destructive to contagious matters;\nand a friend of mine who has lived for many years in Italy, and who has\nmade a number of experiments with it, by exposing himself to the danger\nof fever in the worst seasons and in the worst places, believes that it\nis a secure preventive.  I am not convinced of this; but it can do no\nharm; and in waiting for more evidence of its utility, I employ it\nwithout putting the least confidence in its power; nor do I expose myself\nto the same danger as my friend has done for the sake of an experiment.\"\nI said, \"I believe several scientific persons--Brocchi amongst\nothers--have doubted the existence of any specific matter in the\natmosphere producing intermittent fevers in marshy countries and hot\nclimates; and have been more disposed to attribute the disease to\nphysical causes, dependent upon the great differences of temperature\nbetween day and night and to the refrigerating effects of the dense fogs\ncommon in such situations in the evening and morning; and, on this\nhypothesis, they have recommended warm woollen clothing and fires at\nnight as the best preventives against these destructive diseases, so\nfatal to the peasants who remain in the summer and autumn in the\nneighbourhood of the maremme of Rome, Tuscany, or Naples.\"  The stranger\nsaid, \"I am acquainted with the opinions of the gentlemen, and they\nundoubtedly have weight; but that a specific matter of contagion has not\nbeen detected by chemical means in the atmosphere of marshes does not\nprove its non-existence.  We know so little of those agents that affect\nthe human constitution, that it is of no use to reason on this subject.\nThere can be no doubt that the line of malaria above the Pontine marshes\nis marked by a dense fog morning and evening, and most of the old Roman\ntowns were placed upon eminences out of the reach of this fog.  I have\nmyself experienced a peculiar effect upon the organs of smell in the\nneighbourhood of marshes in the evening after a very hot day; and the\ninstances in which people have been seized with intermittents by a single\nexposure in a place infested by malaria in the season of fevers gives, I\nthink, a strong support to something like a poisonous material existing\nin the atmosphere in such spots; but I merely offer doubts.  I hope the\nprogress of physiology and of chemistry will at no very distant time\nsolve this important problem.\"  Ambrosio now came forward, and bowing to\nthe stranger, said he took the liberty, as he saw from his familiarity\nwith the cicerone that he was well acquainted with Paestum, of asking him\nwhether the masses of travertine, of which the Cyclopean walls and the\ntemples were formed, were really produced by aqueous deposition from the\nRiver Silaro, as he had often heard reported.  The stranger replied,\n\"that they were certainly produced by deposition from water; and such\ndeposits are made by the Silaro.  But I rather believe,\" he said, \"that a\nlake in the immediate neighbourhood of the city furnished the quarry from\nwhich these stones were excavated; and, in half an hour, if you like,\nafter you have finished your examinations of the temples with your guide,\nI will accompany you to the spot from which it is evident that large\nmasses of the travertine, marmor tiburtinum, or calcareous tufa, have\nbeen raised.\"  We thanked him for his attention, accepted his invitation,\ntook the usual walk round the temples, and returned to our new\nacquaintance, who led the way through the gate of the city to the banks\nof a pool or lake a short distance off.  We walked to the borders on a\nmass of calcareous tufa, and we saw that this substance had even\nencrusted the reeds on the shore.  There was something peculiarly\nmelancholy in the character of this water; all the herbs around it were\ngrey, as if encrusted with marble; a few buffaloes were slaking their\nthirst in it, which ran wildly away on our approach, and appeared to\nretire into a rocky excavation or quarry at the end of the lake; there\nwere a number of birds, which, on examination, I found were sea swallows,\nflitting on the surface and busily employed with the libella or dragon-\nfly in destroying the myriads of gnats which rose from the bottom and\nwere beginning to be very troublesome by their bites to us.  \"There,\"\nsaid the stranger, \"is what I believe to be the source of those large and\ndurable stones which you see in the plain before you.  This water rapidly\ndeposits calcareous matter, and even if you throw a stick into it, a few\nhours is sufficient to give it a coating of this substance.  Whichever\nway you turn your eyes you see masses of this recently-produced marble,\nthe consequence of the overflowing of the lake during the winter floods,\nand in that large excavation where you saw the buffaloes disappear you\nmay observe that immense masses have been removed, as if by the hand of\nart and in remote times.  The marble that remains in the quarry is of the\nsame texture and character as that which you see in the ruins of Paestum,\nand I think it is scarcely possible to doubt that the builders of those\nextraordinary structures derived a part of their materials from this\nspot.\"  Ambrosio gave his assent to this opinion of the stranger; and I\ntook the liberty of asking him as to the quantity of calcareous matter\ncontained in solution in the lake, saying that it appeared to me, for so\nrapid and considerable an effect of deposition, there must be an unusual\nquantity of solid matter dissolved by the water or some peculiar\ncircumstance of solution.  The stranger replied, \"This water is like\nmany, I may say most of the sources which rise at the foot of the\nApennines: it holds carbonic acid in solution which has dissolved a\nportion of the calcareous matter of the rock through which it has passed.\nThis carbonic acid is dissipated in the atmosphere, and the marble,\nslowly thrown down, assumes a crystalline form and produces coherent\nstones.  The lake before us is not particularly rich in the quantity of\ncalcareous matter that it contains, for, as I have found by experience, a\npint of it does not afford more than five or six grains; but the quantity\nof fluid and the length of time are sufficient to account for the immense\nquantities of tufa and rock which in the course of ages have accumulated\nin this situation.\"  Onuphrio's curiosity was excited by this statement\nof the stranger, and he said, \"May I take the liberty of asking if you\nhave any idea as to the cause of the large quantity of carbonic acid\nwhich you have been so good as to inform us exists in most of the waters\nin this country?\"  The stranger replied, \"I certainly have formed an\nopinion on this subject, which I willingly state to you.  It can, I\nthink, be scarcely doubted that there is a source of volcanic fire at no\ngreat distance from the surface in the whole of southern Italy; and, this\nfire acting upon the calcareous rocks of which the Apennines are\ncomposed, must constantly detach from them carbonic acid, which rising to\nthe sources of the springs, deposited from the waters of the atmosphere,\nmust give them their impregnation and enable them to dissolve calcareous\nmatter.  I need not dwell upon Etna, Vesuvius, or the Lipari Islands to\nprove that volcanic fires are still in existence; and there can be no\ndoubt that in earlier periods almost the whole of Italy was ravaged by\nthem; oven Rome itself, the eternal city, rests upon the craters of\nextinct volcanoes; and I imagine that the traditional and fabulous record\nof the destruction made by the conflagration of Phaeton in the chariot of\nthe sun and his falling into the Po had reference to a great and\ntremendous igneous volcanic eruption, which extended over Italy and\nceased only near the Po at the foot of the Alps.  Be this as it may, the\nsources of carbonic acid are numerous, not merely in the Neapolitan, but\nlikewise in the Roman and Tuscan states.  The most magnificent waterfall\nin Europe, that of the Velino, near Terni, is partly fed by a stream\ncontaining calcareous matter dissolved by carbonic acid, and it deposits\nmarble, which crystallises even in the midst of its thundering descent\nand foam in the bed in which it falls.  The Anio or Teverone, which\nalmost approaches in beauty to the Velino in the number and variety of\nits falls and cascatelle, is likewise a calcareous water; and there is\nstill a more remarkable one which empties itself into this river below\nTivoli, and which you have probably seen in your excursions in the\ncampagna of Rome, called the lacus Albula or the lake of the Solfatara.\"\nAmbrosio said, \"We remember it well, we saw it this very spring; we were\ncarried there to examine some ancient Roman baths, and we were struck by\nthe blue milkiness of the water, by the magnitude of the source, and by\nthe disagreeable smell of sulphuretted hydrogen which everywhere\nsurrounded the lake.\"  The stranger said, \"When you return to Latium I\nadvise you to pay another visit to a spot which is interesting from a\nnumber of causes, some of which I will take the liberty of mentioning to\nyou.  You have only seen one lake, that where the ancient Romans erected\ntheir baths, but there is another a few yards above it, surrounded by\nvery high rushes, and almost hidden by them from the sight.  This lake\nsends down a considerable stream of tepid water to the larger lake, but\nthis water is less strongly impregnated with carbonic acid; the largest\nlake is actually a saturated solution of this gas, which escapes from it\nin such quantities in some parts of its surface that it has the\nappearance of being actually in ebullition.  I have found by experiment\nthat the water taken from the most tranquil part of the lake, even after\nbeing agitated and exposed to the air, contained in solution more than\nits own volume of carbonic acid gas with a very small quantity of\nsulphuretted hydrogen, to the presence of which, I conclude, its ancient\nuse in curing cutaneous disorders may be referred.  Its temperature, I\nascertained, was in the winter in the warmest parts above 80 degrees of\nFahrenheit, and it appears to be pretty constant, for I have found it\ndiffer a few degrees only, in the ascending source, in January, March,\nMay, and the beginning of June; it is therefore supplied with heat from a\nsubterraneous source, being nearly twenty degrees above the mean\ntemperature of the atmosphere.  Kircher has detailed in his \"Mundus\nSubterraneus\" various wonders respecting this lake, most of which are\nunfounded, such as that it is unfathomable, that it has at the bottom the\nheat of boiling water, and that floating islands rise from the gulf which\nemits it.  It must certainly be very difficult, or even impossible, to\nfathom a source which rises with so much violence from a subterraneous\nexcavation, and, at a time when chemistry had made small progress, it was\neasy to mistake the disengagement of carbonic acid for an actual\nebullition.  The floating islands are real, but neither the Jesuit nor\nany of the writers who have since described this lake had a correct idea\nof their origin, which is exceedingly curious.  The high temperature of\nthis water, and the quantity of carbonic acid that it contains, render it\npeculiarly fitted to afford a pabulum or nourishment to vegetable life.\nThe banks of travertine are everywhere covered with reeds, lichens,\nconfervae, and various kinds of aquatic vegetables, and, at the same time\nthat the process of vegetable life is going on, the crystallisations of\nthe calcareous matter, which is everywhere deposited in consequence of\nthe escape of carbonic acid, likewise proceed, giving a constant\nmilkiness to what, from its tint, would otherwise be a blue fluid.  So\nrapid is the vegetation, owing to the decomposition of the carbonic acid,\nthat, even in winter, masses of confervae and lichens, mixed with\ndeposited travertine, are constantly detached by the currents of water\nfrom the bank and float down the stream, which being a considerable river\nis never without many of these small islands on its surface; they are\nsometimes only a few inches in size, and composed merely of dark-green\nconfervae or purple or yellow lichens, but they are sometimes even of\nsome feet in diameter, and contain seeds and various species of common\nwater-plants, which are usually more or less encrusted with marble.  There\nis, I believe, no place in the world where there is a more striking\nexample of the opposition or contrast of the laws of animate and\ninanimate Nature, of the forces of inorganic chemical affinity and those\nof the powers of life.  Vegetables in such a temperature, and everywhere\nsurrounded by food, are produced with a wonderful rapidity, but the\ncrystallisations are formed with equal quickness, and they are no sooner\nproduced than they are destroyed together.  Notwithstanding the\nsulphureous exhalations from the lake, the quantity of vegetable matter\ngenerated there and its heat make it the resort of an infinite variety of\ninsect tribes, and even in the coldest days in winter numbers of flies\nmay be observed on the vegetables surrounding its banks or on its\nfloating island's, and a quantity of their larvae may be seen there\nsometimes encrusted and entirely destroyed by calcareous matter, which is\nlikewise often the fate of the insects themselves, as well as of various\nspecies of shell-fish that are found amongst the vegetables, which grow\nand are destroyed in the travertine on its banks.  Snipes, ducks, and\nvarious water-birds, often visit those lakes, probably attracted by the\ntemperature and the quantity of food in which they abound; but they\nusually confine themselves to the banks, as the carbonic acid disengaged\nfrom the surface would be fatal to them if they ventured to swim upon it\nwhen tranquil.  In May, 18--, I fixed a stick on a mass of travertine\ncovered by the water, and I examined it in the beginning of the April\nfollowing for the purpose of determining the nature of the depositions.\nThe water was lower at this time, yet I had some difficulty, by means of\na sharp-pointed hammer, in breaking the mass which adhered to the bottom\nof the stick; it was several inches in thickness.  The upper part was a\nmixture of light tufa and the leaves of confervae; below this was a\ndarker and more solid travertine, containing black and decomposed masses\nof confervae; in the inferior part the travertine was more solid and of a\ngrey colour, but with cavities which I have no doubt were produced by the\ndecomposition of vegetable matter.  I have passed many hours, I may say\nmany days, in studying the phenomena of this wonderful lake; it has\nbrought many trains of thought into my mind connected with the early\nchanges of our globe, and I have sometimes reasoned from the forms of\nplants and animals preserved in marble in this warm source to the grander\ndepositions in the secondary rocks, where the zoophytes or coral insects\nhave worked upon a grand scale, and where palms, and vegetables now\nunknown are preserved with the remains of crocodiles, turtles, and\ngigantic extinct animals of the _sauri genus_, and which appear to have\nbelonged to a period when the whole globe possessed a much higher\ntemperature.  I have, likewise, often been led, from the remarkable\nphenomena surrounding me in that spot, to compare the works of man with\nthose of Nature.  The baths, erected there nearly twenty centuries ago,\npresent only heaps of ruins, and even the bricks of which they were\nbuilt, though hardened by fire, are crumbled into dust, whilst the masses\nof travertine around it, though formed by a variable source from the most\nperishable materials, have hardened by time, and the most perfect remains\nof the greatest ruins in the eternal city, such as the triumphal arches\nand the Colosaeum, owe their duration to this source.  Then, from all we\nknow, this lake, except in some change in its dimensions, continues\nnearly in the same state in which it was described 1,700 years ago by\nPliny, and I have no doubt contains the same kinds of floating islands,\nthe same plants, and the same insects.  During the fifteen years that I\nhave known it it has appeared precisely identical in these respects, and\nyet it has the character of an accidental phenomenon depending upon\nsubterraneous fire.  How marvellous then are those laws by which even the\nhumblest types of organic existence are preserved though born amidst the\nsources of their destruction, and by which a species of immortality is\ngiven to generations floating, as it were, like evanescent bubbles, on a\nstream raised from the deepest caverns of the earth, and instantly losing\nwhat may be called its spirit in the atmosphere.\"  These last\nobservations of the stranger recalled to my recollection some phenomena\nwhich I had observed many years ago, and of which I could then give no\nsatisfactory explanation.  I was shooting in the marshes which surround\nthe ruins of Gabia, and where there are still remains supposed to be of\nthe Alexandrine aqueduct; I observed a small insulated hill, apparently\nentirely composed of travertine, and from its summit there were\nformations of tufa which had evidently been produced by running water,\nbut the whole mass was now perfectly dry and encrusted by vegetables.  At\nfirst I suspected that this little mountain had been formed by a jet of\ncalcareous water, a kind of small fountain analogous to the Geiser, which\nhad deposited travertine and continued to rise through the basin flowing\nfrom a higher level; but the irregular form of the eminence did not\ncorrespond to this idea, and I remained perplexed with the fact and\nunable to satisfy myself as to its cause.  The views of the stranger\nappeared to me now to make it probable that the calcareous water had\nissued from ancient leaks in the aqueduct and formed a hillock that had\nencased the bricks of the erection, which in other parts, where not\nencrusted by travertine, had become entirely decayed, degraded, and\nremoved from the soil.  I mentioned the circumstance and my suspicion of\nits nature.  The stranger said: \"You are perfectly correct in your idea.\nI know the spot well, and if you had not mentioned it I should probably\nhave quoted it as an instance in which the works of art are preserved, as\nit were, by the accidents of Nature.  I was so struck by this appearance\nlast year that I had the travertine partially removed by some workmen,\nand I found beneath it the canal of the aqueduct in a perfect state, and\nthe bricks of the arches as uninjured as if freshly laid.\"  The stranger\nhad hardly concluded this sentence when he was interrupted by Onuphrio,\nwho said, \"I have always supposed that in every geological system water\nis considered as the cause of the destruction or degradation of the\nsurface, but in all the instances that you have mentioned it appears\nrather as a conservative power, not destroying but rather producing.\"  \"It\nis the general vice of philosophical systems,\" replied the stranger,\n\"that they are usually founded upon a few facts, which they well explain,\nand are extended by the human fancy to all the phenomena of Nature, to\nmany of which they must be contradictory.  The human intellectual powers\nare so feeble that they can with difficulty embrace a single series of\nphenomena, and they consequently must fail when extended to the whole of\nNature.  Water by its common operation, as poured down from the\natmosphere in rain and torrents, tends to level and degrade the surface,\nand carries the material of the land into the bosom of the ocean.  Fire,\non the contrary, in volcanic eruptions usually raises mountains, exalts\nthe surface, and creates islands even in the midst of the sea.  But these\nlaws are not invariable, as the instances to which we have just referred\nprove, and parts of the surface of the globe are sometimes destroyed even\nby fire, of which examples may be seen in the Phlegraean fields, and\nislands raised by one volcanic eruption have been immerged in the sea by\nanother.  There are, in fact, no accidents in Nature; what we call\naccidents are the results of general laws in particular operation, but we\ncannot deduce these laws from the particular operation or the general\norder from the partial result.\"  Ambrosio said to the stranger: \"You\nappear, sir, to have paid so much attention to physical phenomena that\nfew things would give us more pleasure than to know your opinion\nrespecting the early changes and physical history of the globe, for I\nperceive you do not belong to the modern geological schools.\"  The\nstranger said, \"I have certainly formed opinions or rather speculations\non these subjects, but I fear they are hardly worth communicating; they\nhave sometimes amused me in hours of idleness, but I doubt if they will\namuse others.\"  I said, \"The observations which you have already been so\nkind as to communicate to us, on the formation of the travertine, lead us\nnot only to expect amusement but likewise instruction.\"\n\n_The Stranger_.--On these matters I had facts to communicate; on the\ngeological scheme of the early history of the globe there are only\nanalogies to guide us, which different minds may apply and interpret in\ndifferent ways; but I will not trifle with a long preliminary discourse.\nAstronomical deductions and actual measures by triangulation prove that\nthe globe is an oblate spheroid flattened at the poles, and this form we\nknow, by strict mathematical demonstrations, is precisely the one which a\nfluid body revolving round its axis, and become solid at its surface by\nthe slow dissipation of its heat or other causes, would assume.  I\nsuppose, therefore, that the globe, in the first state in which the\nimagination can venture to consider it, was a fluid mass with an immense\natmosphere revolving in space round the sun, and that by its cooling a\nportion of its atmosphere was condensed in water which occupied a part of\nthe surface.  In this state no forms of life such as now belong to our\nsystem could have inhabited it; and, I suppose, the crystalline rocks\n(or, as they are called by geologists, the primary rocks), which contain\nno vestiges of a former order of things, were the results of the first\nconsolidation on its surface.  Upon the further cooling the water which\nmore or less had covered it contracted, depositions took place, shell-\nfish and coral insects of the first creation began their labours, and\nislands appeared in the midst of the ocean raised from the deep by the\nproductive energies of millions of zoophytes.  Those islands became\ncovered with vegetables fitted to bear a high temperature, such as palms\nand various species of plants similar to those which now exist in the\nhottest parts of the world; and the submarine rocks or shores of these\nnew formations of land became covered with aquatic vegetables, on which\nvarious species of shell-fish and common fishes found their nourishment.\nThe fluids of the globe in cooling deposited a large quantity of the\nmaterials they held in solution, and these deposits agglutinating\ntogether the sand, the immense masses of coral rocks, and some of the\nremains of the shells and fishes found round the shores of the primitive\nlands, produced the first order of secondary rocks.  As the temperature\nof the globe became lower, species of the oviparous reptiles were created\nto inhabit it; and the turtle, crocodile, and various gigantic animals of\nthe sauri kind, seem to have haunted the bays and waters of the primitive\nlands.  But in this state of things there was no order of events similar\nto the present; the crust of the globe was exceedingly slender, and the\nsource of fire a small distance from the surface.  In consequence of\ncontraction in one part of the mass, cavities were opened, which caused\nthe entrance of water, and immense volcanic explosions took place,\nraising one part of the surface, depressing another, producing mountains,\nand causing new and extensive depositions from the primitive ocean.\nChanges of this kind must have been extremely frequent in the early\nepochas of nature, and the only living forms of which the remains are\nfound in the strata that are the monuments of these changes, are those of\nplants, fishes, birds, and oviparous reptiles, which seem most fitted to\nexist in such a war of the elements.  When these revolutions became less\nfrequent, and the globe became still more cooled, and the inequalities of\nits temperature preserved by the mountain chains, more perfect animals\nbecame its inhabitants, many of which, such as the mammoth, megalonix,\nmegatherium, and gigantic hyena, are now extinct.  At this period the\ntemperature of the ocean seems to have been not much higher than it is at\npresent, and the changes produced by occasional eruptions of it have left\nno consolidated rocks.  Yet one of these eruptions appears to have been\nof great extent and some duration, and seems to have been the cause of\nthose immense quantities of water-worn stones, gravel and sand, which are\nusually called diluvian remains; and it is probable that this effect was\nconnected with the elevation of a new continent in the southern\nhemisphere by volcanic fire.  When the system of things became so\npermanent that the tremendous revolutions depending upon the destruction\nof the equilibrium between the heating and cooling agencies were no\nlonger to be dreaded, the creation of man took place; and since that\nperiod there has been little alteration in the physical circumstances of\nour globe.  Volcanoes sometimes occasion the rise of new islands,\nportions of the old continent are constantly washed by rivers into the\nsea; but these changes are too insignificant to affect the destinies of\nman, or the nature of the physical circumstances of things.  On the\nhypothesis that I have adopted, however, it must be remembered that the\npresent surface of the globe is merely a thin crust surrounding a nucleus\nof fluid ignited matter, and consequently we can hardly be considered as\nactually safe from the danger of a catastrophe by fire.\n\nOnuphrio said: \"From the view you have taken, I conclude that you\nconsider volcanic eruptions as owing to the central fire; indeed, their\nexistence offers, I think, an argument for believing that the interior of\nthe globe is fluid.\"  The stranger answered: \"I beg you to consider the\nviews I have been developing as merely hypothetical, one of the many\nresting places that may be taken by the imagination in considering this\nsubject.  There are, however, distinct facts in favour of the idea that\nthe interior of the globe has a higher temperature than the surface; the\nheat increasing in mines the deeper we penetrate, and the number of warm\nsources which rise from great depths in almost all countries, are\ncertainly favourable to the idea.  The opinion that volcanoes are owing\nto this general and simple cause is, I think, likewise more agreeable to\nthe analogies of things than to suppose them dependent upon partial\nchemical changes, such as the action of air and water upon the\ncombustible bases of the earths and alkalies, though it is extremely\nprobable that these substances may exist beneath the surface, and may\noccasion some results of volcanic fire; and on this subject my notion\nmay, perhaps, be more trusted, as for a long while I thought volcanic\neruptions were owing to chemical agencies of the newly discovered metals\nof the earths and alkalies, and I made many, and some dangerous,\nexperiments in the hope of confirming this notion, but in vain.\"\n\n_Amb_.--We are very much obliged to you for your geological\nillustrations; but they remind me a little of some of the ideas of our\nfriend Philalethes in his remarkable vision, and with which we may at\nsome time amuse you in return for your geology should we be honoured with\nmore of your company.  You are obliged to have recourse to creations for\nall the living beings in your philosophical romance.  I do not see why\nyou should not suppose creations or arrangements of dead matter by the\nsame laws of infinite wisdom, and why our globe should not rise at once a\ndivine work fitted for all the objects of living and intelligent natures.\n\nThe stranger replied: \"I have merely attempted a philosophical history\nfounded upon the facts known respecting rocks and strata and the remains\nthey contain.  I begin with what may be considered a creation, a fluid\nglobe supplied with an immense atmosphere, and the series of phenomena\nwhich I imagine consequent to the creation, I supposed produced by powers\nimpressed upon matter by Omnipotence.\"\n\nAmbrosio said: \"There is this verisimility in your history, that it is\nnot contradictory to the little we are informed by Revelation as to the\norigin of the globe, the order produced in the chaotic state, and the\nsuccession of living forms generated in the days of creation, which may\nbe what philosophers call the 'epochas of nature,' for a day with\nOmnipotence is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day.\"\n\n\"I must object,\" Onuphrio said, \"to your interpretation of the scientific\nview of our new acquaintance, and to your disposition to blend them with\nthe cosmogony of Moses.  Allowing the divine origin of the Book of\nGenesis, you must admit that it was not intended to teach the Jews\nsystems of philosophy, but the laws of life and morals; and a great man\nand an exalted Christian raised his voice two centuries ago against this\nmode of applying and of often wresting the sense of the Scriptures to\nmake them conformable to human fancies; 'from which,' says Lord Bacon,\n'arise not only false and fantastical philosophies, but likewise\nheretical religions.'  If the Scriptures are to be literally interpreted\nand systems of science found in them, Gallileo Gallilei merited his\npersecution, and we ought still to believe that the sun turns round the\nearth.\"\n\n_Amb_.--You mistake my view, Onuphrio, if you imagine I am desirous of\nraising a system of geology on the Book of Genesis.  It cannot be doubted\nthat the first man was created with a great variety of instinctive or\ninspired knowledge, which must have been likewise enjoyed by his\ndescendants; and some of this knowledge could hardly fail to have related\nto the globe which he inhabited, and to the objects which surrounded him.\nIt would have been impossible for the human mind to have embraced the\nmysteries of creation, or to have followed the history of the moving\natoms from their chaotic disorder into their arrangement in the visible\nuniverse, to have seen dead matter assuming the forms of life and\nanimation, and light and power arising out of death and sleep.  The ideas\ntherefore transmitted to or presented by Moses respecting the origin of\nthe world and of man were of the most simple kind, and such as suited the\nearly state of society; but, though general and simple truths, they were\ndivine truths, yet clothed in a language and suited to the ideas of a\nrude and uninstructed people.  And, when I state my satisfaction in\nfinding that they are not contradicted by the refined researches of\nmodern geologists, I do not mean to deduce from them a system of science.\nI believe that light was the creation of an act of the Divine will; but I\ndo not mean to say that the words, \"Let there be light, and there was\nlight,\" were orally spoken by the Deity, nor do I mean to imply that the\nmodern discoveries respecting light are at all connected with this\nsublime and magnificent passage.\n\n_Onu_.--Having resided for a long time in Edinburgh, and having heard a\nnumber of discussions on the theory of Dr. Hutton, or the plutonic theory\nof geology, and having been exceedingly struck both by its simplicity and\nbeauty, its harmony with existing facts, and the proofs afforded to it by\nsome beautiful chemical experiments, I do not feel disposed immediately\nto renounce it for the views which I have just heard explained; for the\nprincipal facts which our new acquaintance has stated are, I think, not\ninconsistent with the refined philosophical systems of Professor Playfair\nand Sir James Hall.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I have no objection to the refined plutonic view, as\ncapable of explaining many existing phenomena; indeed, you must be aware\nthat I have myself had recourse to it.  What I contend against is, its\napplication to explain the formations of the secondary rocks, which I\nthink clearly belong to an order of facts not at all embraced by it.  In\nthe plutonic system there is one simple and constant order assumed, which\nmay be supposed eternal.  The surface is constantly imagined to be\ndisintegrated, destroyed, degraded, and washed into the bosom of the\nocean by water, and as constantly consolidated, elevated, and regenerated\nby fire, and the ruins of the old form the foundations of the new world.\nIt is supposed that there are always the same types, both of dead and\nliving matter; that the remains of rocks, of vegetables, and animals of\none age are found embedded in rocks raised from the bottom of the ocean\nin another.  Now, to support this view, not only the remains of living\nbeings which at present people the globe might be expected to be found in\nthe oldest secondary strata, but even those of the arts of man, the most\npowerful and populous of its inhabitants, which is well known not to be\nthe case.  On the contrary, each stratum of the secondary rocks contains\nremains of peculiar and mostly now unknown species of vegetables and\nanimals.  In those strata which are deepest, and which must consequently\nbe supposed to be the earliest deposited, forms even of vegetable life\nare rare; shells and vegetable remains are found in the next order; the\nbones of fishes and oviparous reptiles exist in the following class; the\nremains of birds, with those of the same genera mentioned before, in the\nnext order; those of quadrupeds of extinct species, in a still more\nrecent class; and it is only in the loose and slightly consolidated\nstrata of gravel and sand, and which are usually called diluvian\nformations, that the remains of animals such as now people the globe are\nfound, with others belonging to extinct species.  But in none of these\nformations, whether called secondary, tertiary, or diluvial, have the\nremains of man or any of his works been discovered.  It is, I think,\nimpossible to consider the organic remains found in any of the earlier\nsecondary strata, the lias-limestone and its congenerous formations for\ninstance, without being convinced that the beings, whose organs they\nformed, belonged to an order of things entirely different from the\npresent.  Gigantic vegetables, more nearly allied to the palms of the\nequatorial countries than to any other plants, can only be imagined to\nhave lived in a very high temperature; and the immense reptiles, the\nmegalosauri with paddles instead of legs and clothed in mail, in size\nequal or even superior to the whale; and the great amphibia,\nplethiosauri, with bodies like turtles, but furnished with necks longer\nthan their bodies, probably to enable them to feed on vegetables growing\nin the shallows of the primitive ocean, seem to show a state in which low\nlands or extensive shores rose above an immense calm sea, and when there\nwere no great mountain, chains to produce inequalities of temperature,\ntempests, or storms.  Were the surface of the earth now to be carried\ndown into the depths of the ocean, or were some great revolution of the\nwaters to cover the existing land, and it was again to be elevated by\nfire, covered with consolidated depositions of sand or mud, how entirely\ndifferent would it be in its characters from any of the secondary strata.\nIts great features would undoubtedly be the works of man--hewn stones,\nand statues of bronze and marble, and tools of iron--and human remains\nwould be more common than those of animals on the greatest part of the\nsurface; the columns of Paestum or of Agrigentum, or the immense iron and\ngranite bridges of the Thames, would offer a striking contrast to the\nbones of the crocodiles or sauri in the older rocks, or even to those of\nthe mammoth or elephas primogenius in the diluvial strata.  And whoever\ndwells upon this subject must be convinced that the present order of\nthings, and the comparatively recent existence of man as the master of\nthe globe, is as certain as the destruction of a former and a different\norder and the extinction of a number of living forms which have now no\ntypes in being, and which have left their remains wonderful monuments of\nthe revolutions of Nature.\n\n_Onu_.--I am not quite convinced by your arguments.  Supposing the lands\nof New Holland were to be washed into the depths of the ocean, and to be\nraised according to the Huttonian view, as a secondary stratum, by\nsubterraneous fire, they would contain the remains of both vegetables and\nanimals entirely different from any found in the strata of the old\ncontinents; and may not those peculiar formations to which you have\nreferred be, as it were, accidents of Nature belonging to peculiar parts\nof the globe?  And you speak of a diluvian formation, which I conclude\nyou would identify with that belonging to the catastrophe described in\nthe sacred writings, in which no human remains are found.  Now, you\nsurely will not deny that man existed at the time of this catastrophe,\nand he consequently may have existed at the period of the other\nrevolutions, which are supposed to be produced in the Huttonian views by\nsubterraneous fire.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I have made use of the term \"diluvian,\" because it has\nbeen adopted by geologists, but without meaning to identify the cause of\nthe formations with the deluge described in the sacred writings.  I apply\nthe term merely to signify loose and water-worn strata not at all\nconsolidated, and deposited by an inundation of water, and in these\ncountries which they have covered man certainly did not exist.  With\nrespect to your argument derived from New Holland, it appears to me to be\nwithout weight.  In a variety of climates, and in very distant parts of\nthe globe, secondary strata of the same order are found, and they contain\nalways the same kind of organic remains, which are entirely different\nfrom any of those now afforded by beings belonging to the existing order\nof things.  The catastrophes which produced the secondary strata and\ndiluvian depositions could not have been local and partial phenomena, but\nmust have extended over the whole, or a great part of the surface, of the\nglobe.  The remains of similar shell-fishes are found in the limestones\nof the old and new continents; the teeth of the mammoth are not uncommon\nin various parts of Europe; entire skeletons have been found in America,\nand even the skin covered with hair and the entire body of one of these\nenormous extinct animals has been discovered in Siberia preserved in a\nmass of ice.  In the oldest secondary strata there are no remains of such\nanimals as now belong to the surface; and in the rocks which may be\nregarded as more recently deposited, these remains occur but rarely, and\nwith abundance of extinct species.  There seems, as it were, a gradual\napproach to the present system of things, and a succession of\ndestructions and creations preparatory to the existence of man.  It will\nbe useless to push these arguments farther.  You must allow that it is\nimpossible to defend the proposition, that the present order of things is\nthe ancient and constant order of Nature, only modified by existing laws,\nand, consequently, the view which you have supported must be abandoned.\nThe monuments of extinct generations of animals are as perfect as those\nof extinct nations; and it would be more reasonable to suppose that the\npillars and temples of Palmyra were raised by the wandering Arabs of the\ndesert, than to imagine that the vestiges of peculiar animated forms in\nthe strata beneath the surface belonged to the early and infant families\nof the beings that at present inhabit it.\n\n_Onu_.--I am convinced.  I shall push my arguments no further, for I will\nnot support the sophisms of that school which supposes that living nature\nhas undergone gradual changes by the effects of its irritabilities and\nappetencies; that the fish has in millions of generations ripened into\nthe quadruped, and the quadruped into the man; and that the system of\nlife by its own inherent powers has fitted itself to the physical changes\nin the system of the universe.  To this absurd, vague, atheistical\ndoctrine, I prefer even the dream of plastic powers, or that other more\nmodern dream, that the secondary strata were created, filled with\nremains, as it were, of animal life, to confound the speculations of our\ngeological reasoners.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I am glad you have not retreated into the desert and\ndefenceless wilderness of scepticism, or of false and feeble philosophy.\nI should not have thought it worth my while to have followed you there; I\nshould as soon think of arguing with the peasant who informs me that the\nbasaltic columns of Antrim or of Staffa were the works of human art and\nraised by the giant Finmacoul.\n\nAt this moment, one of our servants came to inform me that a dinner which\nhad been preparing for us at the farmhouse was ready; we asked the\nstranger to do us the honour to partake of our repast; he assented, and\nthe following conversation took place at table.\n\n_Phil_.--In reflecting upon our discussions this morning, I cannot help\nbeing a little surprised at their nature; we have been talking only of\ngeological systems, when a more natural subject for our conversation\nwould have been these magnificent temples, and an inquiry into the race\nby whom they were raised and the gods to whom they wore dedicated.  We\nare now treading on a spot which contains the bones of a highly civilised\nand powerful people; yet we are almost ignorant of the names they bore,\nand the period of their greatness is lost in the obscurity of time.\n\n_Amb_.--There can be no doubt that the early inhabitants of this city\nwere Grecians and a maritime and commercial people; they have been\nsupposed to belong to the Sybarite race, and the roses producing flowers\ntwice a year in the spring and autumn in ancient times here, might\nsanction the idea that this balmy spot was chosen by a colony who carried\nluxury and refinement to the highest pitch.\n\n_Onu_.--To attempt to form any opinion with respect to the people that\nanciently inhabited these now deserted plains is useless and a vain\nlabour.  In the geological conversation which took place before dinner,\nsome series of interesting facts were presented to us; and the monuments\nof Nature, though they do not speak a distinct language, yet speak an\nintelligible one; but with respect to Paestum, there is neither history\nnor tradition to guide us; and we shall do wisely to resume our\nphilosophical inquiries, if we have not already exhausted the patience of\nour new guest by doubts or objections to his views.\n\n_The Stranger_.--One of you referred in our conversation this morning to\na vision, which had some relation to the subject of our discussion, and I\nwas promised some information on this matter.\n\nI immediately gave a sketch of my vision, and of the opinions which had\nbeen expressed by Ambrosio on the early history of man, and the\ntermination of our discussions on religion.\n\n_The Stranger_.--I agree with Ambrosio in opinion on the subjects you\nhave just mentioned.  In my youth, I was a sceptic; and this I believe is\nusually the case with young persons given to general and discursive\nreading, and accustomed to adopt something like a mathematical form in\ntheir reasonings; and it was in considering the nature of the\nintellectual faculties of brutes, as compared with those of man, and in\nexamining the nature of instinctive powers, that I became a believer.\nAfter I had formed the idea that Revelation was to man in the place of an\ninstinct, my faith constantly became stronger; and it was exalted by many\ncircumstances I had occasion to witness in a journey that I made through\nEgypt and a part of Asia Minor, and by no one more than by a very\nremarkable dream which occurred to me in Palestine, and which, as we are\nnow almost at the hour of the siesta, I will relate to you, though\nperhaps you will be asleep before I have finished it.  I was walking\nalong that deserted shore which contains the ruins of Ptolemais, one of\nthe most ancient ports of Judaea.  It was evening; the sun was sinking in\nthe sea; I seated myself on a rock, lost in melancholy contemplations on\nthe destinies of a spot once so famous in the history of man.  The calm\nMediterranean, bright in the glowing light of the west, was the only\nobject before me.  \"These waves,\" I said to myself, \"once bore the ships\nof the monarch of Jerusalem which were freighted with the riches of the\nEast to adorn and honour the sanctuary of Jehovah; here are now no\nremains of greatness or of commerce; a few red stones and broken bricks\nonly mark what might have been once a flourishing port, and the citadel\nabove, raised by the Saracens, is filled with Turkish soldiers.\"  The\njanissary, who was my guide, and my servant, were preparing some food for\nme in a tent which had been raised for the purpose, and whilst waiting\nfor their summons to my repast, I continued my reveries, which must\ngradually have ended in slumber.  I saw a man approaching towards me,\nwhom, at first, I took for my janissary, but as he came nearer I found a\nvery different figure.  He was a very old man with a beard as white as\nsnow; his countenance was dark but paler than that of an Arab, and his\nfeatures stern, wild, and with a peculiar savage expression; his form was\ngigantic, but his arms were withered and there was a large scar on the\nleft side of his face which seemed to have deprived him of an eye.  He\nwore a black turban and black flowing robes, and there was a large chain\nround his waist which clanked as he moved.  It occurred to me that he was\none of the santons or sacred madmen so common in the East, and I retired\nas he approached towards me.  He called out: \"Fly not, stranger; fear me\nnot, I will not harm you.  You shall hear my story, it may be useful to\nyou.\"  He spoke in Arabic but in a peculiar dialect and to me new, yet I\nunderstood every word.  \"You see before you,\" he said, \"a man who was\neducated a Christian, but who renounced the worship of the one supreme\nGod for the superstitions of the pagans.  I became an apostate in the\nreign of the Emperor Julian, and I was employed by that Sovereign to\nsuperintend the re-erection of the temple of Jerusalem, by which it was\nintended to belie the prophecies and give the deathblow to the holy\nreligion.  History has informed you of the result: my assistants were\nmost of them destroyed in a tremendous storm, I was blasted by lightning\nfrom heaven (he raised his withered hand to his face and eye), but\nsuffered to live and expiate my crime in the flesh.  My life has been\nspent in constant and severe penance, and in that suffering of the spirit\nproduced by guilt, and is to be continued as long as any part of the\ntemple of Jupiter, in which I renounced my faith, remains in this place.\nI have lived through fifteen tedious centuries, but I trust in the\nmercies of Omnipotence, and I hope my atonement is completed.  I now\nstand in the dust of the pagan temple.  You have just thrown the last\nfragment of it over the rock.  My time is arrived, I come!\"  As he spake\nthe last words, he rushed towards the sea, threw himself from the rock\nand disappeared.  I heard no struggling, and saw nothing but a gleam of\nlight from the wave that closed above him.  I was now roused by the cries\nof my servant and of the janissary, who were shaking my arm, and who\ninformed me that my sleep was so sound that they were alarmed for me.\nWhen I looked on the sea, there was the same light, and I seemed to see\nthe very spot in the wave where the old man had sunk.  I was so struck by\nthe vision, that I asked if they had not seen something dash into the\nwave, and if they had not heard somebody speaking to me as they arrived.\nOf course their answers were negative.  In passing through Jerusalem and\nin coasting the Dead Sea I had been exceedingly struck by the present\nstate of Judaea and the conformity of the fate of the Jewish nation to\nthe predictions of our Saviour; I had likewise been reading Gibbon's\neulogy of Julian, and his account of the attempts made by that Emperor to\nrebuild the temple: so that the dream at such a time and in such a place\nwas not an unnatural occurrence.  Yet it was so vivid, and the image of\nthe subject of it so peculiar, that it long affected my imagination, and\nwhenever I recurred to it, strengthened my faith.\n\n_Onu_.--I believe all the narratives of apparitions and ghost stories are\nfounded upon dreams of the same kind as that which occurred to you: an\nideal representation of events in the local situation, in which the\nperson is at the moment, and when the imaginary picture of the place in\nsleep exactly coincides with its reality in waking.\n\n_The Stranger_.--I agree with you in your opinion.  If my servant had not\nbeen with me, and my dream had been a little less improbable, it would\nhave been difficult to have persuaded me that I had not been visited by\nan apparition.\n\nI mentioned the dream of Brutus, and said, \"His supposed evil genius\nappeared in his tent; had the philosophical hero dreamt that his genius\nhad appeared to him in Rome, there could have been no delusion.\"  I cited\nthe similar vision, recorded of Dion before his death, by Plutarch, of a\ngigantic female, one of the fates or furies, who was supposed to have\nbeen seen by him when reposing in the portico of his palace.  I referred\nlikewise to my own vision of the beautiful female, the guardian angel of\nmy recovery, who always seemed to me to be present at my bedside.\n\n_Amb_.--In confirmation of this opinion of Onuphrio, I can mention many\ninstances.  I once dreamt that my door had been forced, that there were\nrobbers in my room, and that one of them was actually putting his hand\nbefore my mouth to ascertain if I was sleeping naturally.  I awoke at\nthis moment, and was some minutes before I could be sure whether it was a\ndream or a reality.  I felt the pressure of the bedclothes on my lips,\nand still in the fear of being murdered continued to keep my eyes closed\nand to breathe slowly, till, hearing nothing and finding no motion, I\nventured to open my eyes; but even then, when I saw nothing, I was not\nsure that my impression was a dream till I had risen from my bed and\nascertained that the door was still locked.\n\n_Onu_.--I am the only one of the party unable to record any dreams of the\nvivid and peculiar nature you mention from my own experience; I conclude\nit is owing to the dulness of my imagination.  I suppose the more intense\npower of reverie is a symptom of the poetical temperament; and perhaps,\nif I possessed more enthusiasm, I should always have possessed more of\nthe religious instinct.  To adopt the idea of Philalethes of hereditary\ncharacter, I fear my forefathers have not been correct in their faith.\n\n_Amb_.--Your glory will be greater in establishing a new character, and I\ntrust even the conversation of this day has given you an additional\nreason to adopt _our_ faith.\n\nAmbrosio spoke these words with an earnestness unusual in him, and with\nsomething of a tone which marked a zeal for proselytism, and at the same\ntime he cast his eyes on the rosary which was suspended round the neck of\nthe stranger, and said, \"I hope I am not indiscreet in saying _our_\nfaith.\"\n\n_The Stranger_.--I was educated in the ritual of the church of England; I\nbelong to the Church of Christ; the rosary which you see suspended round\nmy neck is a memorial of sympathy and respect for an illustrious man.  I\nwill, if you will allow me, give you the history of it, which, I think\nfrom the circumstances with which it is connected, you will not find\ndevoid of interest.  I was passing through France in the reign of\nNapoleon, by the peculiar privilege granted to a scavan, on my road into\nItaly.  I had just returned from the Holy Land, and had in my possession\ntwo or three of the rosaries which are sold to pilgrims at Jerusalem as\nhaving been suspended in the Holy Sepulchre.  Pius VII. was then in\nimprisonment at Fontainebleau.  By a special favour, on the plea of my\nreturn from the Holy Land, I obtained permission to see this venerable\nand illustrious Pontiff.  I carried with me one of my rosaries.  He\nreceived me with great kindness.  I tendered my services to execute any\ncommissions, not political ones, he might think fit to entrust me with in\nItaly, informing him that I was an Englishman.  He expressed his thanks,\nbut declined troubling me.  I told him I was just returned from the Holy\nLand, and bowing with great humility, offered to him my rosary from the\nHoly Sepulchre.  He received it with a smile, touched it with his lips,\ngave his benediction over it, and returned it into my hands, supposing,\nof course, that I was a Roman Catholic.  I had meant to present it to his\nHoliness, but the blessing he had bestowed upon it and the touch of his\nlips, made it a precious relic to me and I restored it to my neck, round\nwhich it has ever since been suspended.  He asked me some unimportant\nquestions respecting the state of the Christians at Jerusalem; and on a\nsudden, turned the subject, much to my surprise, to the destruction of\nthe French in Russia, and in an exceedingly low tone of voice, as if\nafraid of being overheard, he said, \"The _nefas_ has long been triumphant\nover the _fas_, but I do not doubt that the balance of things is even now\nrestoring; that God will vindicate his Church, clear his polluted altars,\nand establish society upon its permanent basis of justice and faith.  We\nshall meet again.  Adieu!\" and he gave me his paternal blessing.  It was\neighteen months after this interview, that I went out with almost the\nwhole population of Rome, to receive and welcome the triumphal entry of\nthis illustrious father of the Church into his capital.  He was borne on\nthe shoulders of the most distinguished artists, headed by Canova; and\nnever shall I forget the enthusiasm with which he was received--it is\nimpossible to describe the shouts of triumph and of rapture sent up to\nheaven by every voice.  And when he gave his benediction to the people,\nthere was an universal prostration, a sobbing and marks of emotions of\njoy almost like the bursting of the heart.  I heard, everywhere around\nme, cries of \"The holy Father!  The most holy Father!  His restoration is\nthe work of God!\"  I saw tears streaming from the eyes of almost all the\nwomen about me, many of them were sobbing hysterically, and old men were\nweeping as if they had been children.  I pressed my rosary to my breast\non this occasion, and repeatedly touched with my lips that part of it\nwhich had received the kiss of the most venerable Pontiff.  I preserve it\nwith a kind of hallowed feeling, as the memorial of a man whose sanctity,\nfirmness, meekness and benevolence are an honour to his Church and to\nhuman nature; and it has not only been useful to me, by its influence\nupon my own mind, but it has enabled me to give pleasure to others, and\nhas, I believe, been sometimes beneficial in insuring my personal safety.\nI have often gratified the peasants of Apulia and Calabria by presenting\nthem to kiss a rosary from the Holy Sepulchre which had been hallowed by\nthe touch of the lips and benediction of the Pope; and it has been even\nrespected by and procured me a safe passage through a party of brigands\nwho once stopped me in the passes of the Apennines.\n\n_Onu_.--The use you have made of this relic puts me in mind of a device\nof a very ingenious geological philosopher now living.  He was on Etna\nand busily employed in making a collection of the lavas formed from the\nigneous currents of that mountain; the peasants were often troublesome to\nhim, suspecting that he was searching for treasures.  It occurred to him\nto make the following speech to them: \"I have been a great sinner in my\nyouth and, as a penance, I have made a vow to carry away with me pieces\nof every kind of stone found upon the mountain; permit me quietly to\nperform my pious duty, that I may receive absolution for my sins.\"  The\nspeech produced the desired effect; the peasants shouted, \"The holy man!\nThe saint!\" and gave him every assistance in their power to enable him to\ncarry off his burthen, and he made his ample collections with the utmost\nsecurity and in the most agreeable manner.\n\n_The Stranger_.--I do not approve of pious frauds even for philosophical\npurposes; my rosary excited in others the same kind of feeling which it\nexcited in my own bosom, and which I hold to be perfectly justifiable,\nand of which I shall never be ashamed.\n\n_Amb_.--You must have travelled in Italy in very dangerous times; have\nyou always been secure?\n\n_The Stranger_.--Always; I have owed my security, partly, as I have said,\nto my rosary, but more to my dress and my acquaintance with the dialect\nof the natives.  I have always carried with me a peasant as a guide, who\nhas been intrusted with the small sums of money I wanted for my immediate\npurposes, and my baggage has been little more than a Cynic philosopher\nwould have carried with him; and when I have been unable to walk, I have\ntrusted myself to the conduct of a vetturino, a native of the province,\nwith his single mule and caratella.\n\nThe sun was now setting and the temple of Neptune was glowing with its\nlast purple rays.  We were informed that our horses were waiting, and\nthat it was time for us to depart to our lodgings at Eboli.  I asked the\nstranger to be our companion and to do us the honour to accept of a seat\nin our carriage.  He declined the invitation, and said: \"My bed is\nprepared in the casina here for this night, and to-morrow I proceed on a\njourney connected with scientific objects in the parts of Calabria the\nscene of the terrible earthquakes of 1783.\"  I held out my hand to him in\nparting; he gave it a strong and warm pressure, and said, \"Adieu! we\nshall meet again.\"\n\n\n\n\nDIALOGUE THE FOURTH.  THE PROTEUS, OR IMMORTALITY.\n\n\nThe impression made upon my mind by the stranger with whom we became\nacquainted at Paestum was of the strongest and most extraordinary kind.\nThe memory of his person, his dress, his manners, the accents of his\nvoice, and the tone of his philosophy, for a long while haunted my\nimagination in a most unaccountable manner, and even formed a part of my\ndreams.  It often occurred to me that this was not the first time that I\nhad seen him; and I endeavoured, but in vain, to find some type or image\nof him in former scenes of my life.  I continually made inquiries\nrespecting him amongst my acquaintance, but I could never be sure that\nany of them knew him, or even had seen him.  So great were his\npeculiarities, that he must have escaped observation altogether; for, had\nhe entered the world at all, he must have made some noise in it.  I\nexpressed so much interest on this subject, that at last it became a\nsource of ridicule amongst my acquaintance, who often asked me if I had\nnot yet obtained news of my spirit-friend or ghost-seer.\n\nAfter my return from Naples to Rome, I was almost immediately recalled to\nEngland by a melancholy event--the death of a very near and dear\nrelation--and I left my two friends, Ambrosio and Onuphrio, to pursue\ntheir travels, which were intended to be of some extent and duration.\n\nIn my youth, and through the prime of manhood, I never entered London\nwithout feelings of pleasure and hope.  It was to me as the grand theatre\nof intellectual activity, the field of every species of enterprise and\nexertion, the metropolis of the world of business, thought, and action.\nThere I was sure to find the friends and companions of my youth, to hear\nthe voice of encouragement and praise.  There, society of the most\nrefined kind offered daily its banquets to the mind with such variety\nthat satiety had no place in them, and new objects of interest and\nambition were constantly exciting attention either in politics,\nliterature, or science.\n\nI now entered this great city in a very different tone of mind--one of\nsettled melancholy; not merely produced by the mournful event which\nrecalled me to my country, but owing, likewise, to an entire change in\nthe condition of my physical, moral, and intellectual being.  My health\nwas gone, my ambition was satisfied, I was no longer excited by the\ndesire of distinction; what I regarded most tenderly was in the grave,\nand, to take a metaphor derived from the change produced by time in the\njuice of the grape, my cup of life was no longer sparkling, sweet, and\neffervescent;--it had lost its sweetness without losing its power, and it\nhad become bitter.\n\nAfter passing a few months in England and enjoying (as much as I could\nenjoy anything) the society of the few friends who still remained alive,\nthe desire of travel again seized me.  I had preserved amidst the wreck\nof time one feeling strong and unbroken: the love of natural scenery; and\nthis, in advanced life, formed a principal motive for my plans of conduct\nand action.  Of all the climates of Europe, England seems to me most\nfitted for the activity of the mind, and the least suited to repose.  The\nalterations of a climate so various and rapid continually awake new\nsensations; and the changes in the sky from dryness to moisture, from the\nblue ethereal to cloudiness and fogs, seem to keep the nervous system in\na constant state of disturbance.  In the mild climate of Nice, Naples, or\nSicily, where even in winter it is possible to enjoy the warmth of the\nsunshine in the open air, beneath palm trees or amidst evergreen groves\nof orange trees covered with odorous fruit and sweet-scented leaves, mere\nexistence is a pleasure, and even the pains of disease are sometimes\nforgotten amidst the balmy influence of nature, and a series of agreeable\nand uninterrupted sensations invite to repose and oblivion.  But in the\nchangeful and tumultuous atmosphere of England, to be tranquil is a\nlabour, and employment is necessary to ward off the attacks of ennui.  The\nEnglish as a nation is pre-eminently active, and the natives of no other\ncountry follow their objects with so much force, fire, and constancy.\nAnd, as human powers are limited, there are few examples of very\ndistinguished men living in this country to old age: they usually fail,\ndroop, and die before they have attained the period naturally marked for\nthe end of human existence.  The lives of our statesmen, warriors, poets,\nand even philosophers offer abundant proofs of the truth of this opinion;\nwhatever burns, consumes--ashes remain.  Before the period of youth is\npassed, grey hairs usually cover those brows which are adorned with the\ncivic oak or the laurel; and in the luxurious and exciting life of the\nman of pleasure, their tints are not even preserved by the myrtle wreath\nor the garland of roses from the premature winter of time.\n\nIn selecting the scenes for my new journey I was guided by my former\nexperience.  I know no country more beautiful than that which may be\ncalled the Alpine country of Austria, including the Alps of the southern\nTyrol, those of Illyria, the Noric and the Julian Alps, and the Alps of\nStyria and Salzburg.  The variety of the scenery, the verdure of the\nmeadows and trees, the depths of the valleys, the altitude of the\nmountains, the clearness and grandeur of the rivers and lakes give it, I\nthink, a decided superiority over Switzerland; and the people are far\nmore agreeable.  Various in their costumes and manners, Illyrians,\nItalians, or Germans, they have all the same simplicity of character, and\nare all distinguished by their love of their country, their devotion to\ntheir sovereign, the warmth and purity of their faith, their honesty, and\n(with very few exceptions) I may say their great civility and courtesy to\nstrangers.\n\nIn the prime of life I had visited this region in a society which\nafforded me the pleasures of intellectual friendship and the delights of\nrefined affection; later I had left the burning summer of Italy and the\nviolence of an unhealthy passion, and had found coolness, shade, repose,\nand tranquillity there; in a still more advanced period I had sought for\nand found consolation, and partly recovered my health after a dangerous\nillness, the consequence of labour and mental agitation; there I had\nfound the spirit of my early vision.  I was desirous, therefore, of again\npassing some time in these scenes in the hope of re-establishing a broken\nconstitution; and though this hope was a feeble one, yet at least I\nexpected to spend a few of the last days of life more tranquilly and more\nagreeably than in the metropolis of my own country.  Nature never\ndeceives us.  The rocks, the mountains, the streams always speak the same\nlanguage.  A shower of snow may hide the verdant woods in spring, a\nthunderstorm may render the blue limpid streams foul and turbulent; but\nthese effects are rare and transient: in a few hours or at least days all\nthe sources of beauty are renovated.  And Nature affords no continued\ntrains of misfortunes and miseries, such as depend upon the constitution\nof humanity; no hopes for ever blighted in the bud; no beings full of\nlife, beauty, and promise taken from us in the prime of youth.  Her\nfruits are all balmy, bright, and sweet; she affords none of those\nblighted ones so common in the life of man and so like the fabled apples\nof the Dead Sea--fresh and beautiful to the sight, but when tasted full\nof bitterness and ashes.  I have already mentioned the strong effect\nproduced on my mind by the stranger whom I had met so accidentally at\nPaestum; the hope of seeing him again was another of my motives for\nwishing to leave England, and (why, I know not) I had a decided\npresentiment that I was more likely to meet him in the Austrian states\nthan in England, his own country.\n\nFor this journey I had one companion, an early friend and medical\nadviser.  He had lived much in the world, had acquired a considerable\nfortune, had given up his profession, was now retired, and sought, like\nmyself, in this journey repose of mind and the pleasures derived from\nnatural scenery.  He was a man of a very powerful and acute\nunderstanding, but had less of the poetical temperament than any person\nwhom I had ever known with similar vivacity of mind.  He was a severe\nthinker, with great variety of information, an excellent physiologist,\nand an accomplished naturalist.  In his reasonings he adopted the\nprecision of a geometer, and was always upon his guard against the\ninfluence of imagination.  He had passed the meridian of life, and his\nhealth was weak, like my own, so that we were well suited as travelling\ncompanions, moving always slowly from place to place without hurry or\nfatigue.  I shall call this friend Eubathes.  I will say nothing of the\nprogress of our journey through France and Germany; I shall dwell only\nupon that part of it which has still a strong interest for me, and where\nevents occurred that I shall never forget.  We passed into the Alpine\ncountry of Austria by Lintz, on the Danube, and followed the course of\nthe Traun to Gmunden, on the Traun See or lake of the Traun, where we\nhalted for some days.  If I were disposed to indulge in minute\npicturesque descriptions I might occupy hours with details of the various\ncharacters of the enchanting scenery in this neighbourhood.  The vales\nhave that pastoral beauty and constant verdure which is so familiar to us\nin England, with similar enclosures and hedge-rows and fruit and forest\ntrees.  Above are noble hills planted with beeches and oaks.  Mountains\nbound the view, here covered with pines and larches, there raising their\nmarble crests capped with eternal snows above the clouds.  The lower part\nof the Traun See is always, even in the most rainy season, perfectly\npellucid; and the Traun pours out of it over ledges of rocks a large and\nmagnificent river, beautifully clear and of the purest tint of the beryl.\nThe fall of the Traun, about ten miles below Gmunden, was one of our\nfavourite haunts.  It is a cataract which, when the river is full, may be\nalmost compared to that of Schaffhausen for magnitude, and possesses the\nsame peculiar characters of grandeur in the precipitous rush of its awful\nand overpowering waters, and of beauty in the tints of its streams and\nfoam, and in the forms of the rocks over which it falls, and the cliffs\nand woods by which it is overhung.  In this spot an accident, which had\nnearly been fatal to me, occasioned the renewal of my acquaintance in an\nextraordinary manner with the mysterious unknown stranger.  Eubathes, who\nwas very fond of fly-fishing, was amusing himself by catching graylings\nfor our dinner in the stream above the fall.  I took one of the boats\nwhich are used for descending the canal or lock artificially cut in the\nrock by the side of the fall, on which salt and wood are usually\ntransported from Upper Austria to the Danube; and I desired two of the\npeasants to assist my servant in permitting the boat to descend by a rope\nto the level of the river below.  My intention was to amuse myself by\nthis rapid species of locomotion along the descending sluice.  For some\nmoments the boat glided gently along the smooth current, and I enjoyed\nthe beauty of the moving scene around me, and had my eye fixed upon the\nbright rainbow seen upon the spray of the cataract above my head; when I\nwas suddenly roused by a shout of alarm from my servant, and, looking\nround, I saw that the piece of wood to which the rope had been attached\nhad given way, and the boat was floating down the river at the mercy of\nthe stream.  I was not at first alarmed, for I saw that my assistants\nwere procuring long poles with which it appeared easy to arrest the boat\nbefore it entered the rapidly descending water of the sluice, and I\ncalled out to them to use their united force to reach the longest pole\nacross the water that I might be able to catch the end of it in my hand.\nAnd at this moment I felt perfect security; but a breeze of wind suddenly\ncame down the valley and blew from the nearest bank, the boat was turned\nby it out of the side current and thrown nearer to the middle of the\nriver, and I soon saw that I was likely to be precipitated over the\ncataract.  My servant and the boatmen rushed into the water, but it was\ntoo deep to enable them to reach the boat; I was soon in the white water\nof the descending stream, and my danger was inevitable.  I had presence\nof mind enough to consider whether my chance of safety would be greater\nby throwing myself out of the boat or by remaining in it, and I preferred\nthe latter expedient.  I looked from the rainbow upon the bright sun\nabove my head, as if taking leave for ever of that glorious luminary; I\nraised one pious aspiration to the divine source of light and life; I was\nimmediately stunned by the thunder of the fall, and my eyes were closed\nin darkness.  How long I remained insensible I know not.  My first\nrecollections after this accident were of a bright light shining above\nme, of warmth and pressure in different parts of my body, and of the\nnoise of the rushing cataract sounding in my ears.  I seemed awakened by\nthe light from a sound sleep, and endeavoured to recall my scattered\nthoughts, but in vain; I soon fell again into slumber.  From this second\nsleep I was awakened by a voice which seemed not altogether unknown to\nme, and looking upwards I saw the bright eye and noble countenance of the\nUnknown Stranger whom I had met at Paestum.  I faintly articulated: \"I am\nin another world.\"  \"No,\" said the stranger, \"you are safe in this; you\nare a little bruised by your fall, but you will soon be well; be tranquil\nand compose yourself.  Your friend is here, and you will want no other\nassistance than he can easily give you.\"  He then took one of my hands,\nand I recognised the same strong and warm pressure which I had felt from\nhis parting salute at Paestum.  Eubathes, whom I now saw with an\nexpression of joy and of warmth unusual to him, gave a hearty shake to\nthe other hand, and they both said, \"You must repose a few hours longer.\"\nAfter a sound sleep till the evening, I was able to take some\nrefreshment, and found little inconvenience from the accident except some\nbruises on the lower part of the body and a slight swimming in the head.\nThe next day I was able to return to Gmunden, where I learnt from the\nUnknown the history of my escape, which seemed almost miraculous to me.\nHe said that he was often in the habit of combining pursuits of natural\nhistory with the amusements derived from rural sports and was fishing the\nday that my accident happened below the fall of the Traun for that\npeculiar species of the large _salmo_ of the Danube which, fortunately\nfor me, is only to be caught by very strong tackle.  He saw, to his very\ngreat astonishment and alarm, the boat and my body precipitated by the\nfall, and was so fortunate as to entangle his hooks in a part of my dress\nwhen I had been scarcely more than a minute under water, and by the\nassistance of his servant, who was armed with the gaff or curved hook for\nlanding large fish, I was safely conveyed to the shore, undressed, put\ninto a warm bed, and by the modes of restoring suspended animation, which\nwere familiar to him, I soon recovered my sensibility and consciousness.\nI was desirous of reasoning with him and Eubathes upon the state of\nannihilation of power and transient death which I had suffered when in\nthe water; but they both requested me to defer those inquiries, which\nrequired too profound an exertion of thought, till the effects of the\nshock on my weak constitution were over and my strength was somewhat re-\nestablished: and I was the more contented to comply with their request as\nthe Unknown said it was his intention to be our companion for at least\nsome days longer, and that his objects of pursuit lay in the very country\nin which we were making our summer tour.  It was some weeks before I was\nsufficiently strong to proceed on our journey, for my frame was little\nfitted to bear such a trial as that which it had experienced; and,\nconsidering the weak state of my body when I was immerged in the water, I\ncould hardly avoid regarding my recovery as providential, and the\npresence and assistance of the Stranger as in some way connected with the\nfuture destiny and utility of my life.  In the middle of August we\npursued our plans of travel.  We first visited those romantic lakes,\nHallsstadt, Aussee, and Toplitz See, which collect the melted snows of\nthe higher mountains of Styria to supply the unfailing sources of the\nTraun.  We visited that elevated region of the Tyrol which forms the\ncrest of the Pusterthal, and where the same chains of glaciers send down\nstreams to the Drave and the Adige, to the Black Sea and to the Adriatic.\nWe remained for many days in those two magnificent valleys which afford\nthe sources of the Save, where that glorious and abundant river rises, as\nit were, in the very bosom of beauty, leaping from its subterraneous\nreservoirs in the snowy mountains of Terglou and Manhardt in thundering\ncataracts amongst cliffs and woods into the pure and deep cerulean lakes\nof Wochain and Wurzen, and pursuing its course amidst pastoral meadows so\nornamented with plants and trees as to look the garden of Nature.  The\nsubsoil or strata of this part of Illyria are entirely calcareous and\nfull of subterranean caverns, so that in every declivity large funnel-\nshaped cavities, like the craters of volcanoes, may be seen, in which the\nwaters that fall from the atmosphere are lost: and almost every lake or\nrives has a subterraneous source, and often a subterraneous exit.  The\nLaibach river rises twice from the limestone rock, and is twice again\nswallowed up by the earth before it makes its final appearance and is\nlost in the Save.  The Zirknitz See or Lake is a mass of water entirely\nfilled and emptied by subterraneous sources, and its natural history,\nthough singular, has in it nothing of either prodigy, mystery, or wonder.\nThe Grotto of the Maddalena at Adelsberg occupied more of our attention\nthan the Zirknitz See.  I shall give the conversation that took place in\nthat extraordinary cavern entire, as well as I can remember it, in the\nwords used by my companions.\n\n_Eub_.--We must be many hundred feet below the surface, yet the\ntemperature of this cavern is fresh and agreeable.\n\n_The Unknown_.--This cavern has the mean temperature of the atmosphere,\nwhich is the case with all subterraneous cavities removed from the\ninfluence of the solar light and heat; and, in so hot a day in August as\nthis, I know no more agreeable or salutary manner of taking a cold bath\nthan in descending to a part of the atmosphere out of the influence of\nthose causes which occasion its elevated temperature.\n\n_Eub_.--Have you, sir, been in this country before?\n\n_The Unknown_.--This is the third summer that I have made it the scene of\nan annual visit.  Independently of the natural beauties found in Illyria,\nand the various sources of amusement which a traveller fond of natural\nhistory may find in this region, it has had a peculiar object of interest\nfor me in the extraordinary animals which are found in the bottom of its\nsubterraneous cavities: I allude to the Proteus anguinus, a far greater\nwonder of nature than any of those which the Baron Valvasa detailed to\nthe Royal Society a century and half ago as belonging to Carniola, with\nfar too romantic an air for a philosopher.\n\n_Phil_.--I have seen these animals in passing through this country\nbefore; but I should be very glad to be better acquainted with their\nnatural history.\n\n_The Unknown_.--We shall soon be in that part of the grotto where they\nare found, and I shall willingly communicate the little that I have been\nable to learn respecting their natural characters and habits.\n\n_Eub_.--The grotto now becomes really magnificent; I have seen no\nsubterraneous cavity with so many traits of beauty and of grandeur.  The\nirregularity of its surface, the magnitude of the masses broken in pieces\nwhich compose its sides, and which seem torn from the bosom of the\nmountain by some great convulsion of nature, their dark colours and deep\nshades form a singular contrast with the beauty, uniformity, I may say,\norder and grace of the white stalactical concretions which hang from the\ncanopy above, and where the light of our torches reflected from the\nbrilliant or transparent calcareous gems create a scene which almost\nlooks like one produced by enchantment.\n\n_Phil_.--If the awful chasms of dark masses of rock surrounding us appear\nlike the work of demons who might be imagined to have risen from the\ncentre of the earth, the beautiful works of Nature above our heads may be\ncompared to a scenic representation of a temple or banquet hall for\nfairies or genii, such as those fabled in the Arabian romances.\n\n_The Unknown_.--A poet might certainly place here the palace of the King\nof the Gnomes, and might find marks of his creative power in the small\nlake close by on which the flame of the torch is now falling, for there\nit is that I expect to find the extraordinary animals which have been so\nlong the objects of my attention.\n\n_Eub_.--I see three or four creatures, like slender fish, moving on the\nmud below the water.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I see them; they are the Protei.  Now I have them in my\nfishing-net, and now they are safe in the pitcher of water.  At first\nview you might suppose this animal to be a lizard, but it has the motions\nof a fish.  Its head and the lower part of its body and its tail bear a\nstrong resemblance to those of the eel; but it has no fins, and its\ncurious bronchial organs are not like the gills of fishes: they form a\nsingular vascular structure, as you see, almost like a crest, round the\nthroat, which may be removed without occasioning the death of the animal,\nwhich is likewise furnished with lungs.  With this double apparatus for\nsupplying air to the blood, it can live either below or above the surface\nof the water.  Its fore-feet resemble hands, but they have only three\nclaws or fingers, and are too feeble to be of use in grasping or\nsupporting the weight of the animal; the hinder feet have only two claws\nor toes, and in the larger specimens are found so imperfect as to be\nalmost obliterated.  It has small points in place of eyes, as if to\npreserve the analogy of Nature.  It is of a fleshy whiteness and\ntransparency in its natural state; but when exposed to light, its skin\ngradually becomes darker, and at last gains an olive tint.  Its nasal\norgans appear large, and it is abundantly furnished with teeth: from\nwhich it may be concluded that it is an animal of prey; yet in its\nconfined state it has never been known to eat, and it has been kept alive\nfor many years by occasionally changing the water in which it was placed.\n\n_Eub_.--Is this the only place in Carniola where these animals are found?\n\n_The Unknown_.--They were first discovered here by the late Baron Zois;\nbut they have since been found, though rarely, at Sittich, about thirty\nmiles distant, thrown up by water from a subterraneous cavity; and I have\nlately heard it reported that some individuals of the same species have\nbeen recognised in the calcareous strata in Sicily.\n\n_Eub_.--This lake in which we have seen these animals is a very small\none.  Do you suppose they are bred here?\n\n_The Unknown_.--Certainly not.  In dry seasons they are seldom found\nhere, but after great rains they are often abundant.  I think it cannot\nbe doubted that their natural residence is in an extensile deep\nsubterranean lake, from which in great floods they sometimes are forced\nthrough the crevices of the rocks into this place where they are found;\nand it does not appear to me impossible, when the peculiar nature of the\ncountry in which we are is considered, that the same great cavity may\nfurnish the individuals which have been found at Adelsberg and at\nSittich.\n\n_Eub_.--This is a very extraordinary view of the subject.  Is it not\npossible that it may be the larva of some large unknown animal inhabiting\nthese limestone cavities?  Its feet are not in harmony with the rest of\nits organisation; and were they removed, it would have all the characters\nof a fish.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I cannot suppose that they are larvae.  There is, I\nbelieve, in Nature no instance of a transition by this species of\nmetamorphosis from a more perfect to a less perfect animal.  The tadpole\nhas a resemblance to a fish before it becomes a frog; the caterpillar and\nthe maggot gain not only more perfect powers of motion on the earth in\ntheir new state, but acquire organs by which they inhabit a new element.\nThis animal, I dare say, is much larger than we now see it when mature in\nits native place; but its comparative anatomy is exceedingly hostile to\nthe idea that it is an animal in a state of transition.  It has been\nfound of various sizes, from that of the thickness of a quill to that of\nthe thumb, but its form of organs has been always the same.  It is surely\na perfect animal of a peculiar species.  And it adds one instance more to\nthe number already known of the wonderful manner in which life is\nproduced and perpetuated in every part of our globe, even in places which\nseem the least suited to organised existences.  And the same infinite\npower and wisdom which has fitted the camel and the ostrich for the\ndeserts of Africa, the swallow that secretes its own nest for the caves\nof Java, the whale for the Polar seas, and the morse and white bear for\nthe Arctic ice, has given the proteus to the deep and dark subterraneous\nlakes of Illyria--an animal to whom the presence of light is not\nessential, and who can live indifferently in air and in water, on the\nsurface of the rock, or in the depths of the mud.\n\n_Phil_.--It is now ten years since I first visited this spot.  I was\nexceedingly anxious to see the proteus, and came here with the guide in\nthe evening of the day I arrived at Adelsberg; but though we examined the\nbottom of the cave with the greatest care, we could find no specimens.  We\nreturned the next morning and were more fortunate, for we discovered five\nclose to the bank on the mud covering the bottom of the lake; the mud was\nsmooth and perfectly undisturbed, and the water quite clear.  This fact\nof their appearance during the night seemed to me so extraordinary, that\nI could hardly avoid the fancy that they were new creations.  I saw no\ncavities through which they could have entered, and the undisturbed state\nof the lake seemed to give weight to my notion.  My reveries became\ndiscursive; I was carried in imagination back to the primitive state of\nthe globe, when the great animals of the sauri kind were created under\nthe pressure of a heavy atmosphere; and my notion on this subject was not\ndestroyed when I heard from a celebrated anatomist, to whom I sent the\nspecimens I had collected, that the organisation of the spine of the\nproteus was analogous to that of one of the sauri, the remains of which\nare found in the older secondary strata.  It was said at this time that\nno organs of reproduction had been discovered in any of the specimens\nexamined by physiologists, and this lent a weight to my opinion of the\npossibility of their being actually new creations, which I suppose you\nwill condemn as wholly visionary and unphilosophical.\n\n_Eub_.--From the tone in which you make your statements, I think you\nyourself consider them as unworthy of discussion.  On such ground eels\nmight be considered new creations, for their mature ovaria have not yet\nbeen discovered, and they come from the sea into rivers under\ncircumstances when it is difficult to trace their course.\n\n_The Unknown_.--The problem of the reproduction of the proteus, like that\nof the common eel, is not yet solved; but ovaria have been discovered in\nanimals of both species, and in this instance, as in all others belonging\nto the existing order of things, Harvey's maxim of \"omne vivum ab ovo\"\nwill apply.\n\n_Eub_.--You just now said that this animal has been long an object of\nattention to you; have you studied it as a comparative anatomist, in\nsearch of the solution of the problem of its reproduction?\n\n_The Unknown_.--No; this inquiry has been pursued by much abler\ninvestigators: by Schreiber and Configliachi; my researches were made\nupon its respiration and the changes occasioned in water by its bronchia.\n\n_Eub_.--I hope they have been satisfactory.\n\n_The Unknown_.--They proved to me, at least, that not merely the oxygen\ndissolved in water, but likewise a part of the azote, was absorbed in the\nrespiration of this animal.\n\n_Eub_.--So that your researches confirm those of the French savants and\nAlexander von Humboldt, that in the respiration of animals which separate\nair from water, both principles of the atmosphere are absorbed.\n\n_Phil_.--I have heard so many and such various opinions on the nature of\nthe function of respiration during my education and since, that I should\nlike to know what is the modern doctrine on this subject.  I can hardly\nrefer to better authority than yourself, and I have an additional reason\nfor wishing for some accurate knowledge on this matter, having, as you\nwell know, been the subject of an experiment in relation to it which, but\nfor your kind and active assistance, must have terminated fatally.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I shall gladly state what I know, which is very little.\nIn physics and in chemistry, the science of dead matter, we possess many\nfacts and a few principles or laws; but whenever the functions of life\nare considered, though the facts are numerous, yet there is, as yet,\nscarcely any approach to general laws, and we must usually end where we\nbegin by confessing our entire ignorance.\n\n_Eub_.--I will not allow this ignorance to be entire.  Something,\nundoubtedly, has been gained by the knowledge of the circulation of the\nblood and its aeration in the lungs--these, if not laws, are at least\nfundamental principles.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I speak only of the functions in their connection with\nlife.  We are still ignorant of the source of animal heat, though half a\ncentury ago the chemists thought they had proved it was owing to a sort\nof combustion of the carbon of the blood.\n\n_Phil_.--As we return to our inn I hope you will both be so good as give\nme your views of the nature of this function, so important to all living\nthings; tell me what you _know_, or what you _believe_, or what others\n_imagine they know_.\n\n_The Unknown_.--The powers of the organic system depend upon a continued\nstate of change.  The waste of the body produced in muscular action,\nperspiration, and various secretions, is made up for by the constant\nsupply of nutritive matter to the blood by the absorbents, and by the\naction of the heart the blood is preserved in perpetual motion through\nevery part of the body.  In the lungs, or bronchia, the venous blood is\nexposed to the influence of air and undergoes a remarkable change, being\nconverted into arterial blood.  The obvious chemical alteration of the\nair is sufficiently simple in this process: a certain quantity of carbon\nonly is added to it, and it receives an addition of heat or vapour; the\nvolumes of elastic fluid inspired and expired (making allowance for\nchange of temperature) are the same, and if ponderable agents only were\nto be regarded it would appear as if the only use of respiration were to\nfree the blood from a certain quantity of carbonaceous matter.  But it is\nprobable that this is only a secondary object, and that the change\nproduced by respiration upon the blood is of a much more important kind.\nOxygen, in its elastic state, has properties which are very\ncharacteristic: it gives out light by compression, which is not certainly\nknown to be the case with any other elastic fluid except those with which\noxygen has entered without undergoing combustion; and from the fire it\nproduces in certain processes, and from the manner in which it is\nseparated by positive electricity in the gaseous state from its\ncombinations, it is not easy to avoid the supposition that it contains,\nbesides its ponderable elements, some very subtle matter which is capable\nof assuming the form of heat and light.  My idea is that the common air\ninspired enters into the venous blood entire, in a state of dissolution,\ncarrying with it its subtle or ethereal part, which in ordinary cases of\nchemical change is given off; that it expels from the blood carbonic acid\ngas and azote; and that in the course of the circulation its ethereal\npart and its ponderable part undergo changes which belong to laws that\ncannot be considered as chemical--the ethereal part probably producing\nanimal heat and other effects, and the ponderable part contributing to\nform carbonic acid and other products.  The arterial blood is necessary\nto all the functions of life, and it is no less connected with the\nirritability of the muscles and the sensibility of the nerves than with\nthe performance of all the secretions.\n\n_Eub_.--No one can be more convinced than I am of the very limited extent\nof our knowledge in chemical physiology, and when I say that, having been\na disciple and friend of Dr. Black, I am still disposed to prefer his\nancient view to your new one, I wish merely to induce you to pause and to\nhear my reasons; they may appear insufficient to you, but I am anxious to\nexplain them.  First, then, in all known chemical changes in which oxygen\ngas is absorbed and carbonic acid gas formed, heat is produced.  I could\nmention a thousand instances, from the combustion of wood or spirits of\nwine to the fermentation of fruit or the putrefaction of animal matter.\nThis general fact, which may be almost called a law, is in favour of the\nview of Dr. Black.  Another circumstance in favour of it is, that those\nanimals which possess the highest temperature consume the greatest\nquantity of air, and, under different circumstances of action and repose,\nthe heat is in great measure proportional to the quantity of oxygen\nconsumed.  Then those animals which absorb the smallest quantity of air\nare cold-blooded.  Another argument in favour of Dr. Black's opinion is\nthe change of colour of blood from black to red, which seems to show that\nit loses carbon.\n\n_The Unknown_.--With the highest respect for the memory of Dr. Black, and\nfor the opinion of his disciple, I shall answer the arguments I have just\nheard.  I will not allow any facts or laws from the action of dead matter\nto apply to living structures; the blood is a living fluid, and of this\nwe are sure that it does not burn in respiration.  The terms warmth and\ncold, as applied to the blood of animals, are improper in the sense in\nwhich they have been just used; all animals are, in fact, warm-blooded,\nand the degrees of their temperature are fitted to the circumstances\nunder which they live, and those animals, the life of which is most\nactive, possess most heat, which may be the result of general actions,\nand not a particular effect of respiration.  Besides, a distinguished\nphysiologist has rendered it probable that the animal heat depends more\nupon the functions of the nerves than upon any result of respiration.  The\nargument derived from change of colour is perfectly delusive; it would\nnot follow if carbon were liberated from the blood that it must\nnecessarily become brighter; sulphur combining with charcoal becomes a\nclear fluid, and a black oxide of copper becomes red in uniting with a\nsubstance which abounds in carbon.  No change in sensible qualities can\never indicate with precision the nature of chemical change.  I shall\nresume my view, which I cannot be said to have fully developed.  When I\nstated that carbonic acid was formed in the venous blood in the processes\nof life, I meant merely to say that this blood, in consequence of certain\nchanges, became capable of giving off carbon and oxygen in union with\neach other, for the moment inorganic matter enters into the composition\nof living organs it obeys new laws.  The action of the gastric juice is\nchemical, and it will only dissolve dead matters, and it dissolves them\nwhen they are in tubes of metal as well as in the stomach, but it has no\naction upon living matter.  Respiration is no more a chemical process\nthan the absorption of chyle; and the changes that take place in the\nlungs, though they appear so simple, may be very complicated; it is as\nlittle philosophical to consider them as a mere combustion of carbon as\nto consider the formation of muscle from the arterial blood as\ncrystallisation.  There can be no doubt that all the powers and agencies\nof matter are employed in the purposes of organisation, but the phenomena\nof organisation can no more be referred to chemistry than those of\nchemistry to mechanics.  As oxygen stands in that electrical relation to\nthe other elements of animal matter which has been called\nelectropositive, it may be supposed that some electrical function is\nexercised by oxygen in the blood; but this is a mere hypothesis.  An\nattempt has been made founded on experiments on the decomposition of\nbodies by electricity to explain secretion by weak electrical powers, and\nto suppose the glands electrical organs, and even to imagine the action\nof the nerves dependent upon electricity; these, like all other notions\nof the same kind, appear to me very little refined.  If electrical\neffects be the exhibition of certain powers belonging to matter, which is\na fair supposition, then no change can take place without their being\nmore or less concerned; but to imagine the presence of electricity to\nsolve phenomena the cause of which is unknown is merely to substitute one\nundefined word for another.  In some animals electrical organs are found,\nbut then they furnish the artillery of the animal and means of seizing\nits prey and of its defence.  And speculations of this kind must be\nranked with those belonging to some of the more superficial followers of\nthe Newtonian philosophy, who explained the properties of animated nature\nby mechanical powers, and muscular action by the expansion and\ncontraction of elastic bladders; man, in this state of vague\nphilosophical inquiry, was supposed a species of hydraulic machine.  And\nwhen the pneumatic chemistry was invented, organic structures were soon\nimagined to be laboratories in which combinations and decompositions\nproduced all the effects of living actions; then muscular contractions\nwere supposed to depend upon explosions like those of the detonating\ncompounds, and the formation of blood from chyle was considered as a pure\nchemical solution.  And, now that the progress of science has opened new\nand extraordinary views in electricity, these views are not unnaturally\napplied by speculative reasoners to solve some of the mysterious and\nrecondite phenomena of organised beings.  But the analogy is too remote\nand incorrect; the sources of life cannot be grasped by such machinery;\nto look for them in the powers of electro-chemistry is seeking the living\namong the dead: that which touches will not be felt, that which sees will\nnot be visible, that which commands sensations will not be their subject.\n\n_Phil_.--I conclude, from what you last said, that though you are\ninclined to believe that some unknown subtle matter is added to the\norganised system by respiration, yet you would not have us believe that\nthis is electricity, or that there is any reason to suppose that\nelectricity has a peculiar and special share in producing the functions\nof life.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I wish to guard you against the adoption of any\nhypothesis on this recondite and abstruse subject.  But however difficult\nit may be to define the exact nature of respiration, yet the effect of it\nand its connexions with the functions of the body are sufficiently\nstriking.  By the action of air on the blood it is fitted for the\npurposes of life, and from the moment that animation is marked by\nsensation or volition, this function is performed, the punctum saliens in\nthe ovum seems to receive as it were the breath of life in the influence\nof air.  In the economy of the reproduction of the species of animals,\none of the most important circumstances is the aeration of the ovum, and\nwhen this is not performed, from the blood of the mother as in the\nmammalia by the placenta, there is a system for aerating as in the\noviparous reptiles or fishes, which enables the air freely to pass\nthrough the receptacles in which the eggs are deposited, or the egg\nitself is aerated out of the body through its coats or shell, and when\nair is excluded, incubation or artificial heat has no effect.  Fishes\nwhich deposit their eggs in water that contains only a limited portion of\nair, make combinations which would seem almost the result of scientific\nknowledge or reason, though depending upon a more unerring principle,\ntheir instinct for preserving their offspring.  Those fishes that spawn\nin spring or the beginning of summer and winch inhabit deep and still\nwaters, as the carp, bream, pike, tench, &c., deposit their eggs upon\naquatic vegetables, which by the influence of the solar light constantly\npreserve the water in a state of aeration.  The trout, salmon, hucho, and\nothers of the Salmo genus, which spawn in the beginning or end of winter,\nand which inhabit rivers fed by cold and rapid streams which descend from\nthe mountains, deposit their eggs in shallows on heaps of gravel, as near\nas possible to the source of the stream where the water is fully combined\nwith air; and to accomplish this purpose they travel for hundreds of\nmiles against the current, and leap over cataracts and dams: thus the\nSalmo salar ascends by the Rhone and the Aar to the glaciers of\nSwitzerland, the hucho by the Danube, the Isar, and the Save, passing\nthrough the lakes of the Tyrol and Styria to the highest torrents of the\nNoric and Julian Alps.\n\n_Phil_.--My own experience proves in the strongest manner the immediate\nconnection of sensibility with respiration; all that I can remember in my\naccident was a certain violent and painful sensation of oppression in the\nchest, which must have been immediately succeeded by loss of sense.\n\n_Eub_.--I have no doubt that all your suffering was over at the moment\nyou describe; as far as sensibility is concerned, you were inanimate when\nyour friend raised you from the bottom.  This distinct connection of\nsensibility with the absorption of air by the blood is, I think, in\nfavour of the idea advanced by our friend, that some subtle and ethereal\nmatter is supplied to the system in the elastic air which may be the\ncause of vitality.\n\n_The Unknown_.--Softly, if you please; I must not allow you to mistake my\nview.  I think it probable that some subtle matter is derived from the\natmosphere connected with the functions of life; but nothing can be more\nremote from my opinion than to suppose it the cause of vitality.\n\n_Phil_.--This might have been fully inferred from the whole tenor of your\nconversation, and particularly from that expression, \"that which commands\nsensation will not be their subject.\"  I think I shall not mistake your\nviews when I say that you do not consider vitality dependent upon any\nmaterial cause or principle.\n\n_The Unknown_.--You do not.  We are entirely ignorant on this subject,\nand I confess in the utmost humility my ignorance.  I know there have\nbeen distinguished physiologists who have imagined that by organisation\npowers not naturally possessed by matter were developed, and that\nsensibility was a property belonging to some unknown combination of\nunknown ethereal elements.  But such notions appear to me\nunphilosophical, and the mere substitution of unknown words for unknown\nthings.  I can never believe that any division, or refinement, or\nsubtilisation, or juxtaposition, or arrangement of the particles of\nmatter, can give to them sensibility; or that intelligence can result\nfrom combinations of insensate and brute atoms.  I can as easily imagine\nthat the planets are moving by their will or design round the sun, or\nthat a cannon ball is reasoning in making its parabolic curve.  The\nmaterialists have quoted a passage of Locke in favour of their doctrine,\nwho seemed to doubt \"whether it might not have pleased God to bestow a\npower of thinking on matter.\"  But with the highest veneration for this\ngreat reasoner, the founder of modern philosophical logic, I think there\nis little of his usual strength of mind in this doubt.  It appears to me\nthat he might as well have asked whether it might not have pleased God to\nmake a house its own tenant.\n\n_Eub_.--I am not a professed materialist; but I think you treat rather\ntoo lightly the modest doubts of Locke on this subject.  And without\nconsidering me as a partisan, you will, I hope, allow me to state some of\nthe reasons which I have heard good physiologists advance in favour of\nthat opinion to which you are so hostile.  In the first accretion of the\nparts of animated beings they appear almost like the crystallised matter,\nwith the simplest kind of life, scarcely sensitive.  The gradual\noperations by which they acquire new organs and new powers, corresponding\nto these organs, till they arrive at full maturity, forcibly strikes the\nmind with the idea that the powers of life reside in the arrangement by\nwhich the organs are produced.  Then, as there is a gradual increase of\npower corresponding to the increase of perfection of the organisation, so\nthere is a gradual diminution of it connected with the decay of the body.\nAs the imbecility of infancy corresponds to the weakness of organisation,\nso the energy of youth and the power of manhood are marked by its\nstrength; and the feebleness and dotage of old age are in the direct\nratio of the decline of the perfection of the organisation, and the\nmental powers in extreme old age seem destroyed at the same time with the\ncorporeal ones, till the ultimate dissolution of the frame, when the\nelements are again restored to that dead nature from which they were\noriginally derived.  Then, there was a period when the greatest\nphilosopher, statesman, or hero, that ever existed was a mere living\natom, an organised form with the sole power of perception; and the\ncombinations that a Newton formed before birth or immediately after\ncannot be imagined to have possessed the slightest intellectual\ncharacter.  If a peculiar principle be supposed necessary to\nintelligence, it must exist throughout animated nature.  The elephant\napproaches nearer to man in intellectual power than the oyster does to\nthe elephant; and a link of sensitive nature may be traced from the\npolypus to the philosopher.  Now, in the polypus the sentient principle\nis divisible, and from one polypus or one earthworm may be formed two or\nthree, all of which become perfect animals, and have perception and\nvolition; therefore, at least, the sentient principle has this property\nin common with matter, that it is divisible.  Then to these difficulties\nadd the dependence of all the higher faculties of the mind upon the state\nof the brain; remember that not only all the intellectual powers, but\neven sensibility is destroyed by the pressure of a little blood upon the\ncerebellum, and the difficulties increase.  Call to mind likewise the\nsuspension of animation in cases similar to that of our friend, when\nthere are no signs of life and when animation returns only with the\nreturn of organic action.  Surely in all these instances everything which\nyou consider as belonging to spirit appears in intimate dependence upon\nthe arrangements and properties of matter.\n\n_The Unknown_.--The arguments you have used are those which are generally\nemployed by physiologists.  They have weight in appearance, but not in\nreality.  They prove that a certain perfection of the machinery of the\nbody is essential to the exercise of the powers of the mind, but they do\nnot prove that the machine is the mind.  Without the eye there can be no\nsensations of vision, and without the brain there could be no recollected\nvisible ideas; but neither the optic nerve nor the brain can be\nconsidered as the percipient principle--they are but the instruments of a\npower which has nothing in common with them.  What may be said of the\nnervous system may be applied to a different part of the frame; stop the\nmotion of the heart, and sensibility and life cease, yet the living\nprinciple is not in the heart, nor in the arterial blood which it sends\nto every part of the system.  A savage who saw the operation of a number\nof power-looms weaving stockings cease at once on the stopping of the\nmotion of a wheel, might well imagine that the motive force was in the\nwheel; he could not divine that it more immediately depended upon the\nsteam, and ultimately upon a fire below a concealed boiler.  The\nphilosopher sees the fire which is the cause of the motion of this\ncomplicated machinery, so unintelligible to the savage; but both are\nequally ignorant of the divine fire which is the cause of the mechanism\nof organised structures.  Profoundly ignorant on this subject, all that\nwe can do is to give a history of our own minds.  The external world or\nmatter is to us in fact nothing but a heap or cluster of sensations; and,\nin looking back to the memory of our own being, we find one principle,\nwhich may be called the _monad_, or _self_, constantly present,\nintimately associated with a particular class of sensations, which we\ncall our own body or organs.  These organs are connected with other\nsensations, and move, as it were, with them in circles of existence,\nquitting for a time some trains of sensation to return to others; but the\nmonad is always present.  We can fix no beginning to its operations; we\ncan place no limit to them.  We sometimes, in sleep, lose the beginning\nand end of a dream, and recollect the middle of it, and one dream has no\nconnection with another; and yet we are conscious of an infinite variety\nof dreams, and there is a strong analogy for believing in an infinity of\npast existences, which must have had connection; and human life may be\nregarded as a type of infinite and immortal life, and its succession of\nsleep and dreams as a type of the changes of death and birth to which\nfrom its nature it is liable.  That the ideas belonging to the mind were\noriginally gained from those classes of sensations called organs it is\nimpossible to deny, as it is impossible to deny that mathematical truths\ndepend upon the signs which express them; but these signs are not\nthemselves the truths, nor are the organs the mind.  The whole history of\nintellect is a history of change according to a certain law; and we\nretain the memory only of those changes which may be useful to us--the\nchild forgets what happened to it in the womb; the recollections of the\ninfant likewise before two years are soon lost, yet many of the habits\nacquired in that age are retained through life.  The sentient principle\ngains thoughts by material instruments, and its sensations change as\nthose instruments change; and, in old age, the mind, as it were, falls\nasleep to awake to a new existence.  With its present organisation, the\nintellect of man is naturally limited and imperfect, but this depends\nupon its material machinery; and in a higher organised form, it may be\nimagined to possess infinitely higher powers.  Were man to be immortal\nwith his present corporeal frame, this immortality would only belong to\nthe machinery; and with respect to acquisitions of mind, he would\nvirtually die every two or three hundred years--that is to say, a certain\nquantity of ideas only could be remembered, and the supposed immortal\nbeing would be, with respect to what had happened a thousand years ago,\nas the adult now is with respect to what happened in the first year of\nhis life.  To attempt to reason upon the manner in which the organs are\nconnected with sensation would be useless; the nerves and brain have some\nimmediate relation to these vital functions, but how they act it is\nimpossible to say.  From the rapidity and infinite variety of the\nphenomena of perception, it seems extremely probable that there must be\nin the brain and nerves matter of a nature far more subtle and refined\nthan anything discovered in them by observation and experiment, and that\nthe immediate connection between the sentient principle and the body may\nbe established by kinds of ethereal matter, which can never be evident to\nthe senses, and which may bear the same relations to heat, light, and\nelectricity that these refined forms or modes of existence of matter bear\nto the gases.  Motion is most easily produced by the lighter species of\nmatter; and yet imponderable agents, such as electricity, possess force\nsufficient to overturn the weightiest structures.  Nothing can be farther\nfrom my meaning than to attempt any definition on this subject, nor would\nI ever embrace or give authority to that idea of Newton, who supposes\nthat the immediate cause of sensation may be in undulations of an\nethereal medium.  It does not, however, appear improbable to me that some\nof the more refined machinery of thought may adhere, even in another\nstate, to the sentient principle; for, though the organs of gross\nsensation--the nerves and brain--are destroyed by death, yet something of\nthe more ethereal nature, which I have supposed, may be less\ndestructible.  And I sometimes imagine that many of those powers, which\nhave been called instinctive, belong to the more refined clothing of the\nspirit; conscience, indeed, seems to have some undefined source, and may\nbear relation to a former state of being.\n\n_Eub_.--All your notions are merely ingenious speculations.  Revelation\ngives no authority to your ideas of spiritual nature; the Christian\nimmortality is founded upon the resurrection of the body.\n\n_The Unknown_.--This I will not allow.  Even in the Mosaic history of the\ncreation of man his frame is made in the image of God--that is, capable\nof intelligence; and the Creator breathes into it the breath of life, His\nown essence.  Then our Saviour has said, \"of the God of Abraham, of\nIsaac, and of Jacob.\"  \"He is not the God of the dead, but of the\nliving.\"  St. Paul has described the clothing of the spirit in a new and\nglorious body, taking the analogy from the living germ in the seed of the\nplant, which is not quickened till after apparent death; and the\ncatastrophe of our planet, which, it is revealed, is to be destroyed and\npurified by fire before it is fitted for the habitation of the blest, is\nin perfect harmony with the view I have ventured to suggest.\n\n_Eub_.--I cannot make your notions coincide with what I have been\naccustomed to consider the meaning of Holy Writ.  You allow everything\nbelonging to the material life to be dependent upon the organisation of\nthe body, and yet you imagine the spirit after death clothed with a new\nbody; and, in the system of rewards and punishments, this body is\nrendered happy or miserable for actions committed by another and extinct\nframe.  A particular organisation may impel to improper and immoral\ngratification; it does not appear to me, according to the principles of\neternal justice, that the body of the resurrection should be punished for\ncrimes dependent upon a conformation now dissolved and destroyed.\n\n_The Unknown_.--Nothing is more absurd, I may say more impious, than for\nman, with a ken surrounded by the dense mists of sense, to reason\nrespecting the decrees of eternal justice.  You adopt here the same\nlimited view that you embraced in reasoning against the indestructibility\nof the sentient principle in man from the apparent division of the living\nprinciple in the polypus, not recollecting that to prove a quality can be\nincreased or exalted does not prove that it can be annihilated.  If there\nbe, which I think cannot be doubted, a consciousness of good and evil\nconstantly belonging to the sentient principle in man, then rewards and\npunishments naturally belong to acts of this consciousness, to obedience,\nor disobedience; and the indestructibility of the sentient being is\nnecessary to the decrees of eternal justice.  On your view, even in this\nlife, just punishments for crimes would be almost impossible; for the\nmaterials of which human beings are composed change rapidly, and in a few\nyears probably not an atom of the primitive structure remains yet even\nthe materialist is obliged in old age to do penance for the sins of his\nyouth, and does not complain of the injustice of his decrepit body,\nentirely changed and made stiff by time, suffering for the intemperance\nof his youthful flexible frame.  On my idea, conscience is the frame of\nthe mind, fitted for its probation in mortality.  And this is in exact\naccordance with the foundations of our religion, the Divine origin of\nwhich is marked no less by its history than its harmony with the\nprinciples of our nature.  Obedience to its precepts not only prepares\nfor a better state of existence in another world, but is likewise\ncalculated to make us happy here.  We are constantly taught to renounce\nsensual pleasure and selfish gratifications, to forget our body and\nsensible organs, to associate our pleasures with mind, to fix our\naffections upon the great ideal generalisation of intelligence in the one\nSupreme Being.  And that we are capable of forming to ourselves an\nimperfect idea even of the infinite mind is, I think, a strong\npresumption of our own immortality, and of the distinct relation which\nour finite knowledge bears to eternal wisdom.\n\n_Phil_.--I am pleased with your views; they coincide with those I had\nformed at the time my imagination was employed upon the vision of the\nColosaeum, which I repeated to you, and are not in opposition with the\nopinions that the cool judgment and sound and humble faith of Ambrosio\nhave led me since to embrace.  The doctrine of the materialists was\nalways, even in my youth, a cold, heavy, dull, and insupportable doctrine\nto me, and necessarily tending to Atheism.  When I had heard, with\ndisgust, in the dissecting-rooms the plan of the physiologist of the\ngradual accretion of matter, and its becoming endowed with irritability,\nripening into sensibility and acquiring such organs as were necessary, by\nits own inherent forces, and at last rising into intellectual existence,\na walk into the green fields or woods by the banks of rivers brought back\nmy feelings from nature to God; I saw in all the powers of matter the\ninstruments of the Deity; the sunbeams, the breath of the zephyr,\nawakened animation in forms prepared by Divine intelligence to receive\nit; the insensate seed, the slumbering egg, which were to be vivified,\nappeared like the new-born animal, works of a Divine mind; I saw love as\nthe creative principle in the material world, and this love only as a\nDivine attribute.  Then, my own mind, I felt connected with new\nsensations and indefinite hopes, a thirst for immortality; the great\nnames of other ages and of distant nations appeared to me to be still\nliving around me; and, even in the funeral monuments of the heroic and\nthe great, I saw, as it were, the decree of the indestructibility of\nmind.  These feelings, though generally considered as poetical, yet, I\nthink, offer a sound philosophical argument in favour of the immortality\nof the soul.  In all the habits and instincts of young animals their\nfeelings or movements may be traced in intimate relation to their\nimproved perfect state; their sports have always affinities to their\nmodes of hunting or catching their food, and young birds, even in the\nnest, show marks of fondness which, when their frames are developed,\nbecome signs of actions necessary to the reproduction and preservation of\nthe species.  The desire of glory, of honour, of immortal fame, and of\nconstant knowledge, so usual in young persons of well-constituted minds,\ncannot, I think, be other than symptoms of the infinite and progressive\nnature of intellect--hopes which, as they cannot be gratified here,\nbelong to a frame of mind suited to a nobler state of existence.\n\n_The Unknown_.--Religion, whether natural or revealed, has always the\nsame beneficial influence on the mind.  In youth, in health, and\nprosperity, it awakens feelings of gratitude and sublime love, and\npurifies at the same time that it exalts; but it is in misfortune, in\nsickness, in age, that its effects are most truly and beneficially felt;\nwhen submission in faith and humble trust in the Divine will, from duties\nbecome pleasures, undecaying sources of consolation; then it creates\npowers which were believed to be extinct, and gives a freshness to the\nmind which was supposed to have passed away for ever, but which is now\nrenovated as an immortal hope; then it is the Pharos, guiding the wave-\ntost mariner to his home, as the calm and beautiful still basins or\nfiords, surrounded by tranquil groves and pastoral meadows, to the\nNorwegian pilot escaping from a heavy storm in the north sea, or as the\ngreen and dewy spot gushing with fountains to the exhausted and thirsty\ntraveller in the midst of the desert.  Its influence outlives all earthly\nenjoyments, and becomes stronger as the organs decay and the frame\ndissolves; it appears as that evening star of light in the horizon of\nlife, which, we are sure, is to become in another season a morning star,\nand it throws its radiance through the gloom and shadow of death.\n\n\n\n\nDIALOGUE THE FIFTH.  THE CHEMICAL PHILOSOPHER.\n\n\nI had been made religious by the conversations of Ambrosio in Italy; my\nfaith was strengthened and exalted by the opinions of the Unknown, for\nwhom I had not merely that veneration awakened by exalted talents, but a\nstrong affection founded upon the essential benefit of the preservation\nof my life owing to him.  I ventured, the evening after our visit to the\ncave of Adelsberg, to ask him some questions relating to his history and\nadventures.  He said, \"To attempt to give you any idea of the formation\nof my character would lead me into the history of my youth, which almost\napproaches to a tale of romance.  The source of the little information\nand intelligence I possess I must refer to a restless activity of spirit,\na love of glory which ever belonged to my infancy, and a sensibility\neasily excited and not easily conquered.  My parentage was humble, yet I\ncan believe a traditional history of my paternal grandmother, that the\norigin of our family was from an old Norman stock; I found this belief\nupon certain feelings which I can only refer to an hereditary source, a\npride of decorum, a tact and refinement even in boyhood, and which are\ncontradictory to the idea of an origin from a race of peasants.  Accident\nopened to me in early youth a philosophical career, which I pursued with\nsuccess.  In manhood fortune smiled upon me and made me independent; I\nthen really became a philosopher, and pursued my travels with the object\nof instructing myself and of benefiting mankind.  I have seen most parts\nof Europe, and conversed, I believe, with all the illustrious men of\nscience belonging to them.  My life has not been unlike that of the\nancient Greek sages.  I have added some little to the quantity of human\nknowledge, and I have endeavoured to add something to the quantity of\nhuman happiness.  In my early life I was a sceptic; I have informed you\nhow I became a believer, and I constantly bless the Supreme Intelligence\nfor the favour of some gleams of Divine light which have been vouchsafed\nto me in this our state of darkness and doubt.\"\n\n_Phil_.--I am surprised that with your powers you did not enter into a\nprofessional career either of law or politics; you would have gained the\nhighest honours and distinctions.\n\n_The Unknown_.--To me there never has been a higher source of honour or\ndistinction than that connected with advances in science.  I have not\npossessed enough of the eagle in my character to make a direct flight to\nthe loftiest altitudes in the social world, and I certainly never\nendeavoured to reach those heights by using the creeping powers of the\nreptile who, in ascending, generally chooses the dirtiest path, because\nit is the easiest.\n\n_Eub_.--I have often wondered that men of fortune and of rank do not\napply themselves more to philosophical pursuits; they offer a delightful\nand enviable road to distinction, one founded upon the blessings and\nbenefits conferred on our fellow-creatures; they do not supply the same\nsources of temporary popularity as successes in the senate or at the bar,\nbut the glory resulting from them is permanent and independent of vulgar\ntaste or caprice.  In looking back to the history of the last five reigns\nin England, we find Boyles, Cavendishes, and Howards, who rendered those\ngreat names more illustrious by their scientific honours; but we may in\nvain search the aristocracy now for philosophers, and there are very few\npersons who pursue science with true dignity; it is followed more as\nconnected with objects of profit than those of fame, and there are fifty\npersons who take out patents for supposed inventions for one who makes a\nreal discovery.\n\n_Phil_.--The information we have already received from you proves to me\nthat chemistry has been your favourite pursuit.  I am surprised at this.\nThe higher-mathematics and pure physics appear to me to offer much more\nnoble objects of contemplation and fields of discovery, and, practically\nconsidered, the results of the chemist are much more humble, belonging\nprincipally to the apothecary's shop and the kitchen.\n\n_Eub_.--I feel disposed to join you in attacking this favourite study of\nour friend, but merely to provoke him to defend it.  I wish our attack\nwould induce him to vindicate his science, and that we might enjoy a\nlittle of the sport of literary gladiators, at least, in order to call\nforth his skill and awaken his eloquence.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I have no objection.  Let there be a fair discussion;\nremember we fight only with foils, and the point of mine shall be covered\nwith velvet.  In your attack upon chemistry, Philalethes, you limited the\nuse of it to the apothecary's shop and the kitchen.  The first is an\nequivocal use; by introducing it into the kitchen you make it an art\nfundamental to all others.  But if what you had stated had really meant\nto be serious, it would not have deserved a reply; as it is in mere\nplayfulness, it shall not be thrown away.  I want eloquence, however, to\nadorn my subject, yet it is sufficiently exciting even to awaken feeling.\nPersons in general look at the magnificent fabric of civilized society as\nthe result of the accumulated labour, ingenuity, and enterprise of man\nthrough a long course of ages, without attempting to define what has been\nowing to the different branches of human industry and science; and\nusually attribute to politicians, statesmen, and warriors a much greater\nshare than really belongs to them in the work: what they have done is in\nreality little.  The beginning of civilization is the discovery of some\nuseful arts by which men acquire property, comforts, or luxuries.  The\nnecessity or desire of preserving them leads to laws and social\ninstitutions.  The discovery of peculiar arts gives superiority to\nparticular nations; and the love of power induces them to employ this\nsuperiority to subjugate other nations, who learn their arts, and\nultimately adopt their manners; so that in reality the origin, as well as\nthe progress and improvement, of civil society is founded in mechanical\nand chemical inventions.  No people have ever arrived at any degree of\nperfection in their institutions who have not possessed in a high degree\nthe useful and refined arts.  The comparison of savage and civilized man,\nin fact, demonstrates the triumph of chemical and mechanical philosophy\nas the causes not only of the physical, but ultimately even of moral\nimprovement.  Look at the condition of man in the lowest state in which\nwe are acquainted with him.  Take the native of New Holland, advanced\nonly a few steps above the animal creation, and that principally by the\nuse of fire; naked, defending himself against wild beasts or killing them\nfor food only by weapons made of wood hardened in the fire, or pointed\nwith stones or fish bones; living only in holes dug out of the earth, or\nin huts rudely constructed of a few branches of trees covered with grass;\nhaving no approach to the enjoyment of luxuries or even comforts; unable\nto provide for his most pressing wants; having a language scarcely\narticulate, relating only to the great objects of nature, or to his most\npressing necessities or desires, and living solitary or in single\nfamilies, unacquainted with religion, government, or laws, submitted to\nthe mercy of nature or the elements.  How different is man in his highest\nstate of cultivation; every part of his body covered with the products of\ndifferent chemical and mechanical arts made not only useful in protecting\nhim from the inclemency of the seasons but combined in forms of beauty\nand variety; creating out of the dust of the earth from the clay under\nhis feet instruments of use and ornament; extracting metals from the rude\nore and giving to them a hundred different shapes for a thousand\ndifferent purposes; selecting and improving the vegetable productions\nwith which he covers the earth; not only subduing but taming and\ndomesticating the wildest, the fleetest, and the strongest inhabitants of\nthe wood, the mountain, and the air; making the winds carry him on every\npart of the immense ocean; and compelling the elements of air, water, and\neven fire as it were to labour for him; concentrating in small space\nmaterials which act as the thunderbolt, and directing their energies so\nas to destroy at immense distances; blasting the rock, removing the\nmountain, carrying water from the valley to the hill; perpetuating\nthought in imperishable words, rendering immortal the exertion of genius,\nand presenting them as common property to all awakening minds, becoming\nas it were the true image of divine intelligence receiving and bestowing\nthe breath of life in the influence of civilization.\n\n_Eub_.--Really you are in the poetical, not the chemical chair, or rather\non the tripod.  We claim from you some accuracy of detail, some minute\ninformation, some proofs of what you assert.  What you attribute to the\nchemical and mechanical arts, we might with the same propriety attribute\nto the fine arts, to letters, to political improvement, and to those\ninventions of which Minerva and Apollo and not Vulcan are the patrons.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I will be more minute.  You will allow that the rendering\nskins insoluble in water by combining with them the astringent principle\nof certain vegetables is a chemical invention, and that without leather,\nour shoes, our carriages, our equipages would be very ill made; you will\npermit me to say, that the bleaching and dying of wool and silk, cotton,\nand flax, are chemical processes, and that the conversion of them into\ndifferent clothes is a mechanical invention; that the working of iron,\ncopper, tin, and lead, and the other metals, and the combining them in\ndifferent alloys by which almost all the instruments necessary for the\nturner, the joiner, the stone-mason, the ship-builder, and the smith are\nmade, are chemical inventions; even the press, to the influence of which\nI am disposed to attribute as much as you can do, could not have existed\nin any state of perfection without a metallic alloy; the combining of\nalkali and sand, and certain clays and flints together to form glass and\nporcelain is a chemical process; the colours which the artist employs to\nframe resemblances of natural objects, or to create combinations more\nbeautiful than ever existed in Nature, are derived from chemistry; in\nshort, in every branch of the common and fine arts, in every department\nof human industry, the influence of this science is felt, and we may find\nin the fable of Prometheus taking the flame from heaven to animate his\nman of clay an emblem of the effects of fire in its application to\nchemical purposes in creating the activity and almost the life of civil\nsociety.\n\n_Phil_.--It appears to me that you attribute to science what in many\ncases has been the result of accident.  The processes of most of the\nuseful arts, which you call chemical, have been invented and improved\nwithout any refined views, without any general system of knowledge.\nLucretius attributes to accident the discovery of the fusion of the\nmetals; a person in touching a shell-fish observes that it emits a purple\nliquid as a dye, hence the Tyrian purple; clay is observed to harden in\nthe fire, and hence the invention of bricks, which could hardly fail\nultimately to lead to the discovery of porcelain; oven glass, the most\nperfect and beautiful of those manufactures you call chemical, is said to\nhave been discovered by accident; Theophrastus states that some merchants\nwho were cooking on lumps of soda or natron, near the mouth of the river\nBelus, observed that a hard and vitreous substance was formed where the\nfused natron ran into the sand.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I will readily allow that accident has had much to do\nwith the origin of the arts as with the progress of the sciences.  But it\nhas been by scientific processes and experiments that these accidental\nresults have been rendered really applicable to the purposes of common\nlife.  Besides, it requires a certain degree of knowledge and scientific\ncombination to understand and seize upon the facts which have originated\nin accident.  It is certain that in all fires alkaline substances and\nsand are fused together, and clay hardened; yet for ages after this\ndiscovery of fire, glass and porcelain were unknown till some men of\ngenius profited by scientific combination often observed but never\napplied.  It suits the indolence of those minds which never attempt\nanything, and which probably if they did attempt anything would not\nsucceed, to refer to accident that which belongs to genius.  It is\nsometimes said by such persons, that the discovery of the law of\ngravitation was owing to accident: and a ridiculous story is told of the\nfalling of an apple as the cause of this discovery.  As well might the\ninvention of fluxions or the architectural wonders of the dome of St.\nPeter's, or the miracles of art the St. John of Raphael or the Apollo\nBelvidere, be supposed to be owing to accidental combinations.  In the\nprogress of an art, from its rudest to its more perfect state, the whole\nprocess depends upon experiments.  Science is in fact nothing more than\nthe refinement of common sense making use of facts already known to\nacquire new facts.  Clays which are yellow are known to burn red;\ncalcareous earth renders flint fusible--the persons who have improved\nearthenware made their selections accordingly.  Iron was discovered at\nleast one thousand years before it was rendered malleable; and from what\nHerodotus says of this discovery, there can be little doubt that it was\ndeveloped by a scientific worker in metals.  Vitruvius tells us that the\nceruleum, a colour made of copper, which exists in perfection in all the\nold paintings of the Greeks and Romans and on the mummies of the\nEgyptians, was discovered by an Egyptian king; there is therefore every\nreason to believe that it was not the result of accidental combination,\nbut of experiments made for producing or improving colours.  Amongst the\nancient philosophers, many discoveries are attributed to Democritus and\nAnaxagoras; and, connected with chemical arts, the narrative of the\ninventions of Archimedes alone, by Plutarch, would seem to show how great\nis the effect of science in creating power.  In modern times, the\nrefining of sugar, the preparation of nitre, the manufacturing of acids,\nsalts, &c., are all results of pure chemistry.  Take gunpowder as a\nspecimen; no person but a man infinitely diversifying his processes and\nguided by analogy could have made such a discovery.  Look into the books\nof the alchemists, and some idea may be formed of the effects of\nexperiments.  It is true, these persons were guided by false views, yet\nthey made most useful researches; and Lord Bacon has justly compared them\nto the husbandman who, searching for an imaginary treasure, fertilised\nthe soil.  They might likewise be compared to persons who, looking for\ngold, discover the fragments of beautiful statues, which separately are\nof no value, and which appear of little value to the persons who found\nthem; but which, when selected and put together by artists and their\ndefective parts supplied, are found to be wonderfully perfect and worthy\nof conservation.  Look to the progress of the arts since they have been\nenlightened by a system of science, and observe with what rapidity they\nhave advanced.  Again, the steam-engine in its rudest form was the result\nof a chemical experiment; in its refined state it required the\ncombinations of all the most recondite principles of chemistry and\nmechanics, and that excellent philosopher who has given this wonderful\ninstrument of power to civil society was led to the great improvements he\nmade by the discoveries of a kindred genius on the heat absorbed when\nwater becomes steam, and of the heat evolved when steam becomes water.\nEven the most superficial observer must allow in this case a triumph of\nscience, for what a wonderful impulse has this invention given to the\nprogress of the arts and manufactories in our country, how much has it\ndiminished labour, how much has it increased the real strength of the\ncountry!  Acting as it were with a thousand hands, it has multiplied our\nactive population; and receiving its elements of activity from the bowels\nof the earth, it performs operations which formerly were painful,\noppressive, and unhealthy to the labourers, with regularity and\nconstancy, and gives security and precision to the efforts of the\nmanufacturer.  And the inventions connected with the steam-engine, at the\nsame time that they have greatly diminished labour of body, have tended\nto increase power of mind and intellectual resources.  Adam Smith well\nobserves that manufacturers are always more ingenious than husbandmen;\nand manufacturers who use machinery will probably always be found more\ningenious than handicraft manufacturers.  You spoke of porcelain as a\nresult of accident; the improvements invented in this country, as well as\nthose made in Germany and France, have been entirely the result of\nchemical experiments; the Dresden and the Sevres manufactories have been\nthe work of men of science, and it was by multiplying his chemical\nresearches that Wedgewood was enabled to produce at so cheap a rate those\nbeautiful imitations which while they surpass the ancient vases in\nsolidity and perfection of material, equal them in elegance, variety, and\ntasteful arrangement of their forms.  In another department, the use of\nthe electrical conductor was a pure scientific combination, and the\nsublimity of the discovery of the American philosopher was only equalled\nby the happy application he immediately made of it.  In our own times it\nwould be easy to point out numerous instances in which great improvements\nand beneficial results connected with the comforts, the happiness, and\neven life of our fellow creatures have been the results of scientific\ncombinations; but I cannot do this without constituting myself a judge of\nthe works of philosophers who are still alive, whose researches are\nknown, whose labours are respected, and who will receive from posterity\npraises that their contemporaries hardly dare to bestow upon them.\n\n_Eub_.--We will allow that you have shown in many cases the utility of\nscientific investigation as connected with the progress of the useful\narts.  But, in general, both the principles of chemistry are followed,\nand series of experiments performed without any view to utility; and a\ngreat noise is made if a new metal or a new substance is discovered, or\nif some abstracted law is made known relating to the phenomena of nature;\nyet, amongst the variety of new substances, few have been applied to any\ntrifling use even, and the greater number have had no application at all.\nAnd with respect to the general views of the science, it would be\ndifficult to show that any real good had resulted from the discovery or\nextension of them.  It does not add much to the dignity of a pursuit that\nthose persons who have followed it for profit have really been most\nuseful, and that the mere artisan or chemical manufacturer has done more\nfor society than the chemical philosopher.  Besides, it has always\nappeared to me that it is in the nature of this science to encourage\nmediocrity and to attach importance to insignificant things; very slight\nchemical labours seem to give persons a claim to the title of\nphilosopher--to have dissolved a few grains of chalk in an acid, to have\nshown that a very useless stone contains certain known ingredients, or\nthat the colouring matter of a flower is soluble in acid and not in\nalkali, is thought by some a foundation for chemical celebrity.  I once\nbegan to attend a course of chemical lectures and to read the journals\ncontaining the ephemeral productions of this science; I was dissatisfied\nwith the nature of the evidence which the professor adopted in his\ndemonstrations, and disgusted with the series of observations and\nexperiments which were brought forward one month to be overturned the\nnext.  In November there was a Zingeberic acid, which in January was\nshown to have no existence; one year there was a vegetable acid, which\nthe next was shown to be the same as an acid known thirty years ago; to-\nday a man was celebrated for having discovered a new metal or a new\nalkali, and they flourished like the scenes in a new pantomime only to\ndisappear.  Then, the great object of the hundred triflers in the science\nappeared to be to destroy the reputation of the three or four great men\nwhose labours were really useful, and had in them something of dignity.\nAnd, there not being enough of trifling results or false experiments to\nfill up the pages of the monthly journals, the deficiency was supplied by\nsome crude theories or speculations of unknown persons, or by some ill-\njudged censure or partial praise of the editor.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I deny _in toto_ the accuracy of what you are advancing.\nI have already shown that real philosophers, not labouring for profit,\nhave done much by their own inventions for the useful arts; and, amongst\nthe new substances discovered, many have had immediate and very important\napplications.  The chlorine, or oxymuriatic gas of Scheele, was scarcely\nknown before it was applied by Berthollet to bleaching; scarcely was\nmuriatic acid gas discovered by Priestley, when Guyton de Morveau used it\nfor destroying contagion.  Consider the varied and diversified\napplications of platinum, which has owed its existence as a useful metal\nentirely to the labours of an illustrious chemical philosopher; look at\nthe beautiful yellow afforded by one of the new metals, chrome; consider\nthe medical effects of iodine in some of the most painful and disgusting\nmaladies belonging to human nature, and remember how short a time\ninvestigations have been made for applying the new substances.  Besides,\nthe mechanical or chemical manufacturer has rarely discovered anything;\nhe has merely applied what the philosopher has made known, he has merely\nworked upon the materials furnished to him.  We have no history of the\nmanner in which iron was rendered malleable; but we know that platinum\ncould only have been worked by a person of the most refined chemical\nresources, who made multiplied experiments upon it after the most\ningenious and profound views.  But, waiving all common utility, all\nvulgar applications, there is something in knowing and understanding the\noperation of Nature, some pleasure in contemplating the order and harmony\nof the arrangements belonging to the terrestrial system of things.  There\nis no absolute utility in poetry, but it gives pleasure, refines and\nexalts the mind.  Philosophic pursuits have likewise a noble and\nindependent use of this kind, and there is a double reason offered for\npursuing them, for whilst in their sublime speculations they reach to the\nheavens, in their application they belong to the earth; whilst they exalt\nthe intellect, they provide food for our common wants, and likewise\nminister to the noblest appetites and most exalted views belonging to our\nnature.  The results of this science are not like the temples of the\nancients, in which statues of the gods were placed, where incense was\noffered and sacrifices were performed, and which were presented to the\nadoration of the multitude founded upon superstitious feelings; but they\nare rather like the palaces of the moderns, to be admired and used, and\nwhere the statues, which in the ancients raised feelings of adoration and\nawe, now produce only feelings of pleasure, and gratify a refined taste.\nIt is surely a pure delight to know how and by what processes this earth\nis clothed with verdure and life, how the clouds, mists, and rain are\nformed, what causes all the changes of this terrestrial system of things,\nand by what divine laws order is preserved amidst apparent confusion.  It\nis a sublime occupation to investigate the cause of the tempest and the\nvolcano, and to point out their use in the economy of things, to bring\nthe lightning from the clouds and make it subservient to our experiments,\nto produce, as it were, a microcosm in the laboratory of art, and to\nmeasure and weigh those invisible atoms which, by their motions and\nchanges according to laws impressed upon them by the Divine Intelligence,\nconstitute the universe of things.  The true chemical philosopher sees\ngood in all the diversified forms of the external world.  Whilst he\ninvestigates the operations of infinite power guided by infinite wisdom,\nall low prejudices, all mean superstitions, disappear from his mind.  He\nsees man an atom amidst atoms fixed upon a point in space, and yet\nmodifying the laws that are around him by understanding them, and\ngaining, as it were, a kind of dominion over time and an empire in\nmaterial space, and exerting on a scale infinitely small a power seeming\na sort of shadow or reflection of a creative energy, and which entitles\nhim to the distinction of being made in the image of God and animated by\na spark of the Divine Mind.  Whilst chemical pursuits exalt the\nunderstanding, they do not depress the imagination or weaken genuine\nfeeling; whilst they give the mind habits of accuracy by obliging it to\nattend to facts, they likewise extend its analogies, and though\nconversant with the minute forms of things, they have for their ultimate\nend the great and magnificent objects of Nature.  They regard the\nformation of a crystal, the structure of a pebble, the nature of a clay\nor earth; and they apply to the causes of the diversity of our mountain\nchains, the appearances of the winds, thunderstorms, meteors, the\nearthquake, the volcano, and all those phenomena which offer the most\nstriking images to the poet and the painter.  They keep alive that\ninextinguishable thirst after knowledge which is one of the greatest\ncharacteristics of our nature, for every discovery opens a new field for\ninvestigation of facts, shows us the imperfection of our theories.  It\nhas justly been said that the greater the circle of light, the greater\nthe boundary of darkness by which it is surrounded.  This strictly\napplies to chemical inquiries, and hence they are wonderfully suited to\nthe progressive nature of the human intellect, which by its increasing\nefforts to acquire a higher kind of wisdom, and a state in which truth is\nfully and brightly revealed, seems, as it were, to demonstrate its\nbirthright to immortality.\n\n_Eub_.--I am glad that our opposition has led you to so complete a\nvindication of your favourite science.  I want no further proof of its\nutility.  I regret that I have not before made it a particular object of\nstudy.\n\n_Phil_.--As our friend has so fully convinced us of the importance of\nchemistry, I hope he will descend to some particulars as to its real\nnature, its objects, its instruments.  I would willingly have a\ndefinition of chemistry and some idea of the qualifications necessary to\nbecome a chemist, and of the apparatus essential for understanding what\nhas been already done in the science, and for pursuing new inquiries.\n\n_The Unknown_.--There is nothing more difficult than a good definition,\nfor it is scarcely possible to express in a few words the abstracted view\nof an infinite variety of facts.  Dr. Black has defined chemistry to be\nthat science which treats of the changes produced in bodies by motions of\ntheir ultimate particles or atoms, but this definition is hypothetical,\nfor the ultimate particles or atoms are mere creations of the\nimagination.  I will give you a definition, which will have the merit of\nnovelty and which is probably general in its application.  Chemistry\nrelates to those operations by which the intimate nature of bodies is\nchanged, or by which they acquire new properties.  This definition will\nnot only apply to the effects of mixture, but to the phenomena of\nelectricity, and, in short, to all the changes which do not merely depend\nupon the motion or division of masses of matter.  However difficult it\nmay have been to have given you a definition of chemistry, it is still\nmore difficult to give you a detail of all the qualities necessary for a\nchemical philosopher.  I will not name as many as Athenaeus has named for\na cook, who, he says, ought to be a mathematician, a theoretical\nmusician, a natural philosopher, a natural historian, &c., though you had\na disposition just now to make chemistry merely subservient to the uses\nof the kitchen.  But I will seriously mention some of the studies\nfundamental to the higher departments of this science; a man may be a\ngood practical chemist perhaps without possessing them, but he never can\nbecome a great chemical philosopher.  The person who wishes to understand\nthe higher departments of chemistry, or to pursue them in their most\ninteresting relations to the economy of Nature, ought to be well-grounded\nin elementary mathematics; he will oftener have to refer to arithmetic\nthan algebra, and to algebra than to geometry.  But all these sciences\nlend their aid to chemistry; arithmetic, in determining the proportions\nof analytical results and the relative weights of the elements of bodies;\nalgebra, in ascertaining the laws of the pressure of elastic fluids, the\nforce of vapour as dependent upon temperature, and the effects of masses\nand surfaces on the communication and radiation of heat; the applications\nof geometry are principally limited to the determination of the\ncrystalline forms of bodies, which constitute the most important type of\ntheir nature, and often offer useful hints for analytical researches\nrespecting their composition.  The first principles of natural philosophy\nor general physics ought not to be entirely unknown to the chemist.  As\nthe most active agents are fluids, elastic fluids, heat, light, and\nelectricity, he ought to have a general knowledge of mechanics,\nhydrodynamics, pneumatics, optics, and electricity.  Latin and Greek\namong the dead and French among the modern languages are necessary, and,\nas the most important after French, German and Italian.  In natural\nhistory and in literature what belongs to a liberal education, such as\nthat of our universities, is all that is required; indeed, a young man\nwho has performed the ordinary course of college studies which are\nsupposed fitted for common life and for refined society, has all the\npreliminary knowledge necessary to commence the study of chemistry.  The\napparatus essential to the modern chemical philosopher is much less bulky\nand expensive than that used by the ancients.  An air pump, an electrical\nmachine, a voltaic battery (all of which may be upon a small scale), a\nblow-pipe apparatus, a bellows and forge, a mercurial and water-gas\napparatus, cups and basins of platinum and glass, and the common reagents\nof chemistry, are what are required.  All the implements absolutely\nnecessary may be carried in a small trunk, and some of the best and most\nrefined researches of modern chemists have been made by means of an\napparatus which might with ease be contained in a small travelling\ncarriage, and the expense of which is only a few pounds.  The facility\nwith which chemical inquiries are carried on, and the simplicity of the\napparatus, offer additional reasons, to those I have already given, for\nthe pursuit of this science.  It is not injurious to the health; the\nmodern chemist is not like the ancient one, who passed the greater part\nof his time exposed to the heat and smoke of a furnace and the\nunwholesome vapours of acids and alkalies and other menstrua, of which,\nfor a single experiment, he consumed several pounds.  His processes may\nbe carried on in the drawing-room, and some of them are no less beautiful\nin appearance than satisfactory in their results.  It was said, by an\nauthor belonging to the last century, of alchemy, \"that its beginning was\ndeceit, its progress labour, and its end beggary.\"  It may be said of\nmodern chemistry, that its beginning is pleasure, its progress knowledge,\nand its objects truth and utility.  I have spoken of the scientific\nattainments necessary for the chemical philosopher; I will say a few\nwords of the intellectual qualities necessary for discovery or for the\nadvancement of the science.  Amongst them patience, industry, and\nneatness in manipulation, and accuracy and minuteness in observing and\nregistering the phenomena which occur, are essential.  A steady hand and\na quick eye are most useful auxiliaries; but there have been very few\ngreat chemists who have preserved these advantages through life; for the\nbusiness of the laboratory is often a service of danger, and the\nelements, like the refractory spirits of romance, though the obedient\nslave of the magician, yet sometimes escape the influence of his talisman\nand endanger his person.  Both the hands and eyes of others, however, may\nbe sometimes advantageously made use of.  By often repeating a process or\nan observation, the errors connected with hasty operations or imperfect\nviews are annihilated; and, provided the assistant has no preconceived\nnotions of his own, and is ignorant of the object of his employer in\nmaking the experiment, his simple and bare detail of facts will often be\nthe best foundation for an opinion.  With respect to the higher qualities\nof intellect necessary for understanding and developing the general laws\nof the science, the same talents I believe are required as for making\nadvancement in every other department of human knowledge; I need not be\nvery minute.  The imagination must be active and brilliant in seeking\nanalogies; yet entirely under the influence of the judgment in applying\nthem.  The memory must be extensive and profound; rather, however,\ncalling up general views of things than minute trains of thought.  The\nmind must not be, like an encyclopedia, a burthen of knowledge, but\nrather a critical dictionary which abounds in generalities, and points\nout where more minute information may be obtained.  In detailing the\nresults of experiments and in giving them to the world, the chemical\nphilosopher should adopt the simplest style and manner; he will avoid all\nornaments as something injurious to his subject, and should bear in mind\nthe saying of the first king of Great Britain respecting a sermon which\nwas excellent in doctrine but overcharged with poetical allusions and\nfigurative language, \"that the tropes and metaphors of the speaker were\nlike the brilliant wild flowers in a field of corn--very pretty, but\nwhich did very much hurt the corn.\"  In announcing even the greatest and\nmost important discoveries, the true philosopher will communicate his\ndetails with modesty and reserve; he will rather be a useful servant of\nthe public, bringing forth a light from under his cloak when it is needed\nin darkness, than a charlatan exhibiting fireworks and having a trumpeter\nto announce their magnificence.  I see you are smiling, and think what I\nam saying in bad taste; yet, notwithstanding, I will provoke your smiles\nstill further by saying a word or two on his other moral qualities.  That\nhe should be humble-minded, you will readily allow, and a diligent\nsearcher after truth, and neither diverted from this great object by the\nlove of transient glory or temporary popularity, looking rather to the\nopinion of ages than to that of a day, and seeking to be remembered and\nnamed rather in the epochas of historians than in the columns of\nnewspaper writers or journalists.  He should resemble the modern\ngeometricians in the greatness of his views and the profoundness of his\nresearches, and the ancient alchemists in industry and piety.  I do not\nmean that he should affix written prayers and inscriptions of\nrecommendations of his processes to Providence, as was the custom of\nPeter Wolfe, and who was alive in my early days, but his mind should\nalways be awake to devotional feeling, and in contemplating the variety\nand the beauty of the external world, and developing its scientific\nwonders, he will always refer to that infinite wisdom through whose\nbeneficence he is permitted to enjoy knowledge; and, in becoming wiser,\nhe will become better, he will rise at once in the scale of intellectual\nand moral existence, his increased sagacity will be subservient to a more\nexalted faith, and in proportion as the veil becomes thinner through\nwhich he sees the causes of things he will admire more the brightness of\nthe divine light by which they are rendered visible.\n\n\n\n\nDIALOGUE THE SIXTH.  POLA, OR TIME.\n\n\nDuring our stay in Illyria, I made an excursion by water with the\nUnknown, my preserver, now become my friend, and Eubathes, to Pola, in\nIstria.  We entered the harbour of Pola in a felucca when the sun was\nsetting; and I know no scene more splendid than the amphitheatre seen\nfrom the sea in this light.  It appears not as a building in ruins, but\nlike a newly erected work, and the reflection of the colours of its\nbrilliant marble and beautiful forms seen upon the calm surface of the\nwaters gave to it a double effect--that of a glorious production of art\nand of a magnificent picture.  We examined with pleasure the remains of\nthe arch of Augustus and the temple, very perfect monuments of imperial\ngrandeur.  But the splendid exterior of the amphitheatre was not in\nharmony with the bare and naked walls of the interior; there were none of\nthose durable and grand seats of marble, such as adorn the amphitheatre\nof Verona, from which it is probable that the whole of the arena and\nconveniences for the spectators had been constructed of wood.  Their\ntotal disappearance led us to reflect upon the causes of the destruction\nof so many of the works of the older nations.  I said, in our\nmetaphysical abstractions, we refer the changes, the destruction of\nmaterial forms, to time, but there must be physical laws in Nature by\nwhich they are produced; and I begged our new friend to give us some\nideas on this subject in his character of chemical philosopher.  If human\nscience, I said, has discovered the principle of the decay of things, it\nis possible that human art may supply means of conservation, and bestow\nimmortality on some of the works which appear destined by their\nperfection for future ages.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I shall willingly communicate to you my views of the\noperation of time, philosophically considered.  A great philosopher has\nsaid, man can in no other way command Nature but in obeying her laws;\nand, in these laws, the principle of change is a principle of life;\nwithout decay, there can be no reproduction; and everything belonging to\nthe earth, whether in its primitive state, or modified by human hands, is\nsubmitted to certain and immutable laws of destruction, as permanent and\nuniversal as those which produce the planetary motions.  The property\nwhich, as far as our experience extends, universally belongs to matter,\ngravitation, is the first and most general cause of change in our\nterrestrial system; and, whilst it preserves the great mass of the globe\nin a uniform state, its influence is continually producing alterations\nupon the surface.  The water, raised in vapour by the solar heat, is\nprecipitated by the cool air in the atmosphere; it is carried down by\ngravitation to the surface, and gains its mechanical force from this law.\nWhatever is elevated above the superfices by the powers of vegetation or\nanimal life, or by the efforts of man, by gravitation constantly tends to\nthe common centre of attraction; and the great reason of the duration of\nthe pyramid above all other forms is, that it is most fitted to resist\nthe force of gravitation.  The arch, the pillar, and all perpendicular\nconstructions, are liable to fall when a degradation from chemical or\nmechanical causes takes place in their inferior parts.  The forms upon\nthe surface of the globe are preserved from the influence of gravitation\nby the attraction of cohesion, or by chemical attraction; but if their\nparts had freedom of motion, they would all be levelled by this power,\ngravitation, and the globe would appear as a plane and smooth oblate\nspheroid, flattened at the poles.  The attraction of cohesion or chemical\nattraction, in its most energetic state, is not liable to be destroyed by\ngravitation; this power only assists the agencies of other causes of\ndegradation.  Attraction, of whatever kind, tends, as it were, to produce\nrest--a sort of eternal sleep in Nature.  The great antagonist power is\nheat.  By the influence of the sun the globe is exposed to great\nvarieties of temperature; an addition of heat expands bodies, and an\nabstraction of heat causes them to contract; by variation of heat,\ncertain kinds of matter are rendered fluid, or elastic, and changes from\nfluids into solids, or from solids or fluids into elastic substances, and\n_vice versa_, are produced; and all these phenomena are connected with\nalterations tending to the decay or destruction of bodies.  It is not\nprobable that the mere contraction or expansion of a solid, from the\nsubtraction or addition of heat, tends to loosen its parts; but if water\nexists in these parts, then its expansion, either in becoming vapour or\nice, tends not only to diminish their cohesion, but to break them into\nfragments.  There is, you know, a very remarkable property of water--its\nexpansion by cooling, and at the time of becoming ice--and this is a\ngreat cause of destruction in the northern climates; for where ice forms\nin the crevices or cavities of stones, or when water which has penetrated\ninto cement freezes, its expansion acts with the force of the lever or\nthe screw in destroying or separating the parts of bodies.  The\nmechanical powers of water, as rain, hail, or snow, in descending from\nthe atmosphere, are not entirely without effect; for in acting upon the\nprojections of solids, drops of water or particles of snow, and still\nmore of hail, have a power of abrasion, and a very soft substance, from\nits mass assisting gravitation, may break a much harder one.  The\nglacier, by its motion, grinds into powder the surface of the granite\nrock; and the Alpine torrents, that have their origin under glaciers, are\nalways turbid, from the destruction of the rocks on which the glacier is\nformed.  The effect of a torrent in deepening its bed will explain the\nmechanical agency of fluid-water, though this effect is infinitely\nincreased, and sometimes almost entirely dependent, upon the solid\nmatters which are carried down by it.  An angular fragment of stone in\nthe course of ages moved in the cavity of a rock makes a deep round\nexcavation, and is worn itself into a spherical form.  A torrent of rain\nflowing down the side of a building carries with it the silicious dust,\nor sand, or matter which the wind has deposited there, and acts upon a\nscale infinitely more minute, but according to the same law.  The\nbuildings of ancient Rome have not only been liable to the constant\noperation of the rain-courses, or minute torrents produced by rains, but\neven the Tiber, swollen with floods of the Sabine mountains and the\nApennines, has often entered into the city, and a winter seldom passes\naway in which the area of the Pantheon has not been filled with water,\nand the reflection of the cupola seen in a smooth lake below.  The\nmonuments of Egypt are perhaps the most ancient and permanent of those\nbelonging to the earth, and in that country rain is almost unknown.  And\nall the causes of degradation connected with the agency of water act more\nin the temperate climates than in the hot ones, and most of all in those\ncountries where the inequalities of temperature are greatest.  The\nmechanical effects of air are principally in the action of winds in\nassisting the operation of gravitation, and in abrading by dust, sand,\nstones, and atmospheric water.  These effects, unless it be in the case\nof a building blown down by a tempest, are imperceptible in days, or even\nyears; yet a gentle current of air carrying the silicious sand of the\ndesert, or the dust of a road for ages against the face of a structure,\nmust ultimately tend to injure it, for with infinite or unlimited\nduration, an extremely small cause will produce a very great effect.  The\nmechanical agency of electricity is very limited; the effects of\nlightning have, however, been witnessed, even in some of the great\nmonuments of antiquity, the Colosaeum at Rome, for instance; and only\nlast year, in a violent thunderstorm, some of the marble, I have been\ninformed, was struck from the top of one of the arches in this building,\nand a perpendicular rent made, of some feet in diameter.  But the\nchemical effects of electricity, though excessively slow and gradual, yet\nare much more efficient in the great work of destruction.  It is to the\ngeneral chemical doctrines of the changes produced by this powerful agent\nthat I must now direct your especial attention.\n\n_Eub_.--Would not the consideration of the subject have been more\ndistinct, and your explanations of the phenomena more simple, had you\ncommenced by dividing the causes of change into mechanical and chemical;\nif you had first considered them separately, and then their joint\neffects?\n\n_The Unknown_.--The order I have adopted is not very remote from this.\nBut I was perhaps wrong in treating first of the agency of gravitation,\nwhich owes almost all its powers to the operation of other causes.  In\nconsequence of your hint, I shall alter my plan a little, and consider\nfirst the chemical agency of water, then that of air, and lastly that of\nelectricity.  In every species of chemical change, temperature is\nconcerned.  But unless the results of volcanoes and earthquakes be\ndirectly referred to this power, it has no chemical effect in relation to\nthe changes ascribed to time simply considered as heat, but its\noperations, which are the most important belonging to the terrestrial\ncycle of changes, are blended with, or bring into activity, those of\nother agents.  One of the most distinct and destructive agencies of water\ndepends upon its solvent powers, which are usually greatest when its\ntemperature is highest.  Water is capable of dissolving, in larger or\nsmaller proportions, most compound bodies, and the calcareous and\nalkaline elements of stones are particularly liable to this kind of\noperation.  When water holds in solution carbonic acid, which is always\nthe case when it is precipitated from the atmosphere, its power of\ndissolving carbonate of lime is very much increased, and in the\nneighbourhood of great cities, where the atmosphere contains a large\nproportion of this principle, the solvent powers of rain upon the marble\nexposed to it must be greatest.  Whoever examines the marble statues in\nthe British Museum, which have been removed from the exterior of the\nParthenon, will be convinced that they have suffered from this agency;\nand an effect distinct in the pure atmosphere and temperate climate of\nAthens, must be upon a higher scale in the vicinity of other great\nEuropean cities, where the consumption of fuel produces carbonic acid in\nlarge quantities.  Metallic substances, such as iron, copper, bronze,\nbrass, tin, and lead, whether they exist in stones, or are used for\nsupport or connection in buildings, are liable to be corroded by water\nholding in solution the principles of the atmosphere; and the rust and\ncorrosion, which are made, poetically, qualities of time, depend upon the\noxidating powers of water, which by supplying oxygen in a dissolved or\ncondensed state enables the metals to form new combinations.  All the\nvegetable substances, exposed to water and air, are liable to decay, and\neven the vapour in the air, attracted by wood, gradually reacts upon its\nfibres and assists decomposition, or enables its elements to take new\narrangements.  Hence it is that none of the roofs of ancient buildings\nmore than a thousand years old remain, unless it be such as are\nconstructed of stone, as those of the Pantheon of Rome and the tomb of\nTheodoric at Ravenna, the cupola of which is composed of a single block\nof marble.  The pictures of the Greek masters, which were painted on the\nwood of the abies, or pine of the Mediterranean, likewise, as we are\ninformed by Pliny, owed their destruction not to a change in the colours,\nnot to the alteration of the calcareous ground on which they were\npainted, but to the decay of the tablets of wood on which the intonaco or\nstucco was laid.  Amongst the substances employed in building, wood,\niron, tin, and lead, are most liable to decay from the operation of\nwater, then marble, when exposed to its influence in the fluid form;\nbrass, copper, granite, sienite, and porphyry are more durable.  But in\nstones, much depends upon the peculiar nature of their constituent parts;\nwhen the feldspar of the granite rocks contains little alkali or\ncalcareous earth, it is a very permanent stone; but, when in granite,\nporphyry, or sienite, either the feldspar contains much alkaline matter,\nor the mica, schorl, or hornblende much protoxide of iron, the action of\nwater containing oxygen and carbonic acid on the ferruginous elements\ntends to produce the disintegration of the stone.  The red granite, black\nsienite, and red porphyry of Egypt, which are seen at Rome in obelisks,\ncolumns, and sarcophagi, are amongst the most durable compound stones;\nbut the grey granites of Corsica and Elba are extremely liable to undergo\nalteration: the feldspar contains much alkaline matter; and the mica and\nschorl, much protoxide of iron.  A remarkable instance of the decay of\ngranite may be seen in the Hanging Tower of Pisa; whilst the marble\npillars in the basement remain scarcely altered, the granite ones have\nlost a considerable portion of their surface, which falls off continually\nin scales, and exhibits everywhere stains from the formation of peroxide\nof iron.  The kaolin, or clay, used in most countries for the manufacture\nof fine porcelain or china, is generally produced from the feldspar of\ndecomposing granite, in which the cause of decay is the dissolution and\nseparation of the alkaline ingredients.\n\n_Eub_.--I have seen serpentines, basalts, and lavas which internally were\ndark, and which from their weight, I should suppose, must contain oxide\nof iron, superficially brown or red, and decomposing.  Undoubtedly this\nwas from the action of water impregnated with air upon their ferruginous\nelements.\n\n_The Unknown_.--You are perfectly right.  There are few compound stones,\npossessing a considerable specific gravity, which are not liable to\nchange from this cause; and oxide of iron amongst the metallic substances\nanciently known, is the most generally diffused in nature, and most\nconcerned in the changes which take place on the surface of the globe.\nThe chemical action of carbonic acid is so much connected with that of\nwater, that it is scarcely possible to speak of them separately, as must\nbe evident from what I have before said; but the same action which is\nexerted by the acid dissolved in water is likewise exerted by it in its\nelastic state, and in this case the facility with which the quantity is\nchanged makes up for the difference of the degree of condensation.  There\nis no reason to believe that the azote of the atmosphere has any\nconsiderable action in producing changes of the nature we are studying on\nthe surface; the aqueous vapour, the oxygen and the carbonic acid gas,\nare, however, constantly in combined activity, and above all the oxygen.\nAnd, whilst water, uniting its effects with those of carbonic acid, tends\nto disintegrate the parts of stones, the oxygen acts upon vegetable\nmatter.  And this great chemical agent is at once necessary, in all the\nprocesses of life and in all those of decay, in which Nature, as it were,\ntakes again to herself those instruments, organs, and powers, which had\nfor a while been borrowed and employed for the purpose or the wants of\nthe living principle.  Almost everything effected by rapid combinations\nin combustion may also be effected gradually by the slow absorption of\noxygen; and though the productions of the animal and vegetable kingdom\nare much more submitted to the power of atmospheric agents than those of\nthe mineral kingdom, yet, as in the instances which have just been\nmentioned, oxygen gradually destroys the equilibrium of the elements of\nstones, and tends to reduce into powder, to render fit for soils, even\nthe hardest aggregates belonging to our globe.  Electricity, as a\nchemical agent, may be considered not only as directly producing an\ninfinite variety of changes, but likewise as influencing almost all which\ntake place.  There are not two substances on the surface of the globe\nthat are not in different electrical relations to each other; and\nchemical attraction itself seems to be a peculiar form of the exhibition\nof electrical attraction; and wherever the atmosphere, or water, or any\npart of the surface of the earth gains accumulated electricity of a\ndifferent kind from the contiguous surfaces, the tendency of this\nelectricity is to produce new arrangements of the parts of these\nsurfaces; thus a positively electrified cloud, acting even at a great\ndistance on a moistened stone, tends to attract its oxygenous, or\nacidiform or acid, ingredients, and a negatively electrified cloud has\nthe same effect upon its earthy, alkaline, or metallic matter.  And the\nsilent and slow operation of electricity is much more important in the\neconomy of Nature than its grand and impressive operation in lightning\nand thunder.  The chemical agencies of water and air are assisted by\nthose of electricity; and their joint effects combined with those of\ngravitation and the mechanical ones I first described are sufficient to\naccount for the results of time.  But the physical powers of Nature in\nproducing decay are assisted likewise by certain agencies or energies of\norganised beings.  A polished surface of a building or a statue is no\nsooner made rough from the causes that have been mentioned than the seeds\nof lichens and mosses, which are constantly floating in our atmosphere,\nmake it a place of repose, grow, and increase, and from their death,\ntheir decay, and decomposition carbonaceous matter is produced, and at\nlength a soil is formed, in which grass can fix its roots.  In the\ncrevices of walls, where this soil is washed down, even the seeds of\ntrees grow, and, gradually as a building becomes more ruined, ivy and\nother parasitical plants cover it.  Even the animal creation lends its\naid in the process of destruction when man no longer labours for the\nconservation of his works.  The fox burrows amongst ruins, bats and birds\nnestle in the cavities in walls, the snake and the lizard likewise make\nthem their habitation.  Insects act upon a smaller scale, but by their\nunited energies sometimes produce great effect; the ant, by establishing\nher colony and forming her magazines, often saps the foundations of the\nstrongest buildings, and the most insignificant creatures triumph, as it\nwere, over the grandest works of man.  Add to these sure and slow\noperations the devastations of war, the effects of the destructive zeal\nof bigotry, the predatory fury of barbarians seeking for concealed wealth\nunder the foundations of buildings, and tearing from them every metallic\nsubstance, and it is rather to be wondered that any of the works of the\ngreat nations of antiquity are still in existence.\n\n_Phil_.--Your view of the causes of devastation really is a melancholy\none.  Nor do I see any remedy; the most important causes will always\noperate.  Yet, supposing the constant existence of a highly civilised\npeople, the ravages of time might be repaired, and by defending the\nfinest works of art from the external atmosphere, their changes would be\nscarcely perceptible.\n\n_Eub_.--I doubt much whether it is for the interests of a people that its\npublic works should be of a durable kind.  One of the great causes of the\ndecline of the Roman Empire was that the people of the Republic and of\nthe first empire left nothing for their posterity to do; aqueducts,\ntemples, forums, everything was supplied, and there were no objects to\nawaken activity, no necessity to stimulate their inventive faculties, and\nhardly any wants to call forth their industry.\n\n_The Unknown_.--At least, you must allow the importance of preserving\nobjects of the fine arts.  Almost everything we have worthy of admiration\nis owing to what has been preserved from the Greek school, and the\nnations who have not possessed these works or models have made little or\nno progress towards perfection.  Nor does it seem that a mere imitation\nof Nature is sufficient to produce the beautiful or perfect; but the\nclimate, the manners, customs, and dress of the people, its genius and\ntaste, all co-operate.  Such principles of conservation as Philalethes\nhas referred to are obvious.  No works of excellence ought to be exposed\nto the atmosphere, and it is a great object to preserve them in\napartments of equable temperature and extremely dry.  The roofs of\nmagnificent buildings should be of materials not likely to be dissolved\nby water or changed by air.  Many electrical conductors should be placed\nso as to prevent the slow or the rapid effects of atmospheric\nelectricity.  In painting, lapis lazuli or coloured hard glasses, in\nwhich the oxides are not liable to change, should be used, and should be\nlaid on marble or stucco encased in stone, and no animal or vegetable\nsubstances, except pure carbonaceous matter, should be used in the\npigments, and none should be mixed with the varnishes.\n\n_Eub_.--Yet, when all is done that can be done in the work of\nconservation, it is only producing a difference in the degree of\nduration.  And from the statements that our friend has made it is evident\nthat none of the works of a mortal being can be eternal, as none of the\ncombinations of a limited intellect can be infinite.  The operations of\nNature, when slow, are no less sure; however man may for a time usurp\ndominion over her, she is certain of recovering her empire.  He converts\nher rocks, her stones, her trees, into forms of palaces, houses, and\nships; he employs the metals found in the bosom of the earth as\ninstruments of power, and the sands and clays which constitute its\nsurface as ornaments and resources of luxury; he imprisons air by water,\nand tortures water by fire to change or modify or destroy the natural\nforms of things.  But, in some lustrums his works begin to change, and in\na few centuries they decay and are in ruins; and his mighty temples,\nframed as it were for immortal and divine purposes, and his bridges\nformed of granite and ribbed with iron, and his walls for defence, and\nthe splendid monuments by which he has endeavoured to give eternity even\nto his perishable remains, are gradually destroyed; and these structures,\nwhich have resisted the waves of the ocean, the tempests of the sky, and\nthe stroke of the lightning, shall yield to the operation of the dews of\nheaven, of frost, rain, vapour, and imperceptible atmospheric influences;\nand, as the worm devours the lineaments of his mortal beauty, so the\nlichens and the moss and the most insignificant plants shall feed upon\nhis columns and his pyramids, and the most humble and insignificant\ninsects shall undermine and sap the foundations of his colossal works,\nand make their habitations amongst the ruins of his palaces and the\nfalling seats of his earthly glory.\n\n_Phil_.--Your history of the laws of the inevitable destruction of\nmaterial forms recalls to my memory our discussion at Adelsberg.  The\nchanges of the material universe are in harmony with those which belong\nto the human body, and which you suppose to be the frame or machinery of\nthe sentient principle.  May we not venture to imagine that the visible\nand tangible world, with which we are acquainted by our sensations, bears\nthe same relation to the Divine and Infinite Intelligence that our organs\nbear to our mind, with this only difference, that in the changes of the\ndivine system there is no decay, there being in the order of things a\nperfect unity, and all the powers springing from one will and being a\nconsequence of that will, are perfectly and unalterably balanced.  Newton\nseemed to apprehend, that in the laws of the planetary motions there was\na principle which would ultimately be the cause of the destruction of the\nsystem.  Laplace, by pursuing and refining the principles of our great\nphilosopher, has proved that what appeared sources of disorder are, in\nfact, the perfecting machinery of the system, and that the principle of\nconservation is as eternal as that of motion.\n\n_The Unknown_.--I dare not offer any speculations on this grand and awful\nsubject.  We can hardly comprehend the cause of a simple atmospheric\nphenomenon, such as the fall of a heavy body from a meteor; we cannot\neven embrace in one view the millionth part of the objects surrounding\nus, and yet we have the presumption to reason upon the infinite universe\nand the eternal mind by which it was created and is governed.  On these\nsubjects I have no confidence in reason, I trust only to faith; and, as\nfar as we ought to inquire, we have no other guide but revelation.\n\n_Phil_.--I agree with you that whenever we attempt metaphysical\nspeculations, we must begin with a foundation of faith.  And being sure\nfrom revelation that God is omnipotent and omnipresent, it appears to me\nno improper use of our faculties to trace even in the natural universe\nthe acts of His power and the results of His wisdom, and to draw\nparallels from the infinite to the finite mind.  Remember, we are taught\nthat man was created in the image of God, and, I think, it cannot be\ndoubted that in the progress of society man has been made a great\ninstrument by his energies and labours for improving the moral universe.\nCompare the Greeks and Romans with the Assyrians and Babylonians, and the\nancient Greeks and Romans with the nations of modern Christendom, and it\ncannot, I think, be questioned that there has been a great superiority in\nthe latter nations, and that their improvements have been subservient to\na more exalted state of intellectual and religious existence.  If this\nlittle globe has been so modified by its powerful and active inhabitants,\nI cannot help thinking that in other systems beings of a superior nature,\nunder the influence of a divine will, may act nobler parts.  We know from\nthe sacred writings that there are intelligences of a higher nature than\nman, and I cannot help sometimes referring to my vision in the Colosaeum,\nand in supposing some acts of power of those genii or seraphs similar to\nthose which I have imagined in the higher planetary systems.  There is\nmuch reason to infer from astronomical observations that great changes\ntake place in the system of the fixed stars: Sir William Herschel,\nindeed, seems to have believed that he saw nebulous or luminous matter in\nthe process of forming suns, and there are some astronomers who believe\nthat stars have been extinct; but it is more probable that they have\ndisappeared from peculiar motions.  It is, perhaps, rather a poetical\nthan a philosophical idea, yet I cannot help forming the opinion that\ngenii or seraphic intelligences may inhabit these systems and may be the\nministers of the eternal mind in producing changes in them similar to\nthose which have taken place on the earth.  Time is almost a human word\nand change entirely a human idea; in the system of Nature we should\nrather say progress than change.  The sun appears to sink in the ocean in\ndarkness, but it rises in another hemisphere; the ruins of a city fall,\nbut they are often used to form more magnificent structures as at Rome;\nbut, even when they are destroyed, so as to produce only dust, Nature\nasserts her empire over them, and the vegetable world rises in constant\nyouth, and--in a period of annual successions, by the labours of man\nproviding food--vitality, and beauty upon the wrecks of monuments, which\nwere once raised for purposes of glory, but which are now applied to\nobjects of utility.","title":"Consolations in Travel; or, the Last Days of a Philosopher","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":54694}