Chapter IX: Part I: Canto II. 499-502 (2)

Of the past issues, that of the Tariff excites the most interest. This, it will be remembered, did not find a place in the early history of the country. Only in recent times has it occupied the attention of politicians, and been the occasion of vehement popular appeals. Regret is often expressed that it is the subject of party strife. It will be in the recollection of most persons that Mr. Webster made a vigorous effort to remove it from the list of party questions. What he was unable to do directly has been accomplished indirectly by the Mexican War. The debt of millions now entailed upon the country renders it necessary to impose a tariff which will satisfy the demands of all. Of course the debt must be paid; nor should we lose time in paying it, nor postpone it to the next generation. The people are not ready to meet it by direct taxation,--though, for one, I should be well pleased to see such a corrective applied to war. It can be paid only through the agency of a tariff, which, for this purpose, if for no other, must be supported by all parties. The Tariff, then, like the others, is no longer a political issue. If not obsolete, it is at least in abeyance.

These questions being out of the way, what remains for those who, in casting their votes, regard _principles_ rather than _men_? It is clear that the only question of present practical interest arises from the usurpations of the Slave Power and the efforts to extend Slavery. This is the vital question at this time. It is _the question of questions_. It was lately said in the Convention of the New York Democracy at Utica (and I am glad to quote that most respectable body of men), that the movement in which we are now engaged is the most important since the American Revolution. Something more may be said. _It is a continuance of the American Revolution._ It is an effort to carry into effect the principles of the Declaration of Independence, and to revive in the administration of our government the spirit of Washington, Franklin, and Jefferson,--to bring back the Constitution to the principles and practice of its early founders,--to the end that it shall promote Freedom, and not Slavery, and shall be administered in harmony with the spirit of Freedom, and not with the spirit of Slavery.

In the last will and testament of Washington are emphatic words, which may be adopted as the motto for the present contest. After providing for the emancipation of his slaves, to take place on the death of his wife, he says, "And I do hereby expressly forbid the sale or transportation out of the said Commonwealth of any slave I may die possessed of, _under any pretence whatsoever_."[243] So, at least, should the people of the United States expressly forbid the sale or transportation of any slave beyond their ancient borders, under any pretence whatsoever.

[243] Writings of Washington, ed. Sparks, Vol. I. p. 570.

Returning to our forefathers for their principles, let us borrow also something of their courage and union. Let us summon to our sides the majestic forms of those civil heroes whose firmness in council was equalled only by the firmness of Washington in war. Let us again awake to the eloquence of the elder Adams, animating his associates in Congress to independence; let us listen anew to the sententious wisdom of Franklin; let us be enkindled, as were the men of other days, by the fervid devotion to Freedom which flamed from the heart of Jefferson.

Instructed even by our enemies, let us be taught by the Slave Power itself. The few slaveholders are always united. Hence their strength. Like sticks in a fagot, they cannot be broken. Thus far the friends of Freedom have been divided. _Union_, then, must be our watchword,--union among men of all parties. By such union we consolidate an opposition which must prevail.

Let me call upon you, then, men of all parties, Whigs and Democrats, or howsoever named, to come forward and join in a common cause. Let us all leave the old organizations, and come together. In the crisis before us, it becomes us to forget past differences, and those names which have been the signal of strife. Only remembering our duties, when the fire-bell rings at midnight, we ask not if it be Whigs or Democrats who join us to extinguish the flames; nor do we make any such inquiry in selecting our leader then. To the strongest arm and the most generous soul we defer at once. To him we commit the direction of the engine. His hand grasps the pipe to pour the water upon the raging conflagration. So must we do now. Our leader must be the man who is the ablest and surest representative of the principles to which we are pledged.

Let Massachusetts, nurse of the men and principles that made our earliest revolution, vow herself anew to her early faith. Let her once more elevate the torch which she first held aloft, or, if need be, pluck fresh coals from the living altars of France, proclaiming, "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity,"--Liberty to the captive, Equality between master and slave, Fraternity with all men,--the whole comprehended in that sublime revelation of Christianity, the Brotherhood of Man.

In the contemplation of these great interests, the intrigues of party, the machinations of politicians, the combinations of office-seekers, all seem to pass from sight. Politics and morals, no longer divorced from each other, become one and inseparable in the holy wedlock of Christian sentiment. Such a union elevates politics, while it gives a new sphere to morals. Political discussions have a grandeur which they never before assumed. Released from topics which concern only the selfish squabble for gain, and are often independent of morals, they come home to the heart and conscience. A novel force passes into the contests of party, breathing into them the breath of a new life,--of Hope, Progress, Justice, Humanity.

From this demonstration to-day, and the acclaim wafted to us from the Free States, it is easy to see that the great cause of Liberty, to which we now dedicate ourselves, will sweep the heart-strings of the people. It will smite all the chords with a might to draw forth emotions such as no political struggle ever awakened before. It will move the young, the middle-aged, and the old. It will find a voice in the social circle, and mingle with the flame of the domestic hearth. It will touch the souls of mothers, wives, sisters, and daughters, until the sympathies of all swell in one irresistible chorus of indignation against the deep damnation of lending new sanction to the enslavement of our brother man.

Come forward, then, men of all parties! let us range together. Come forth, all who thus far have kept aloof from parties! here is occasion for action. Men of Peace, come forth! All who in any way feel the wrong of Slavery, take your stand! Join us, lovers of Truth, of Justice, of Humanity! And let me call especially upon the young. You are the natural guardians of Freedom. In your firm resolves and generous souls she will find her surest protection. The young man who is not willing to serve in her cause, to suffer, if need be, in her behalf, gives little promise of those qualities which secure an honorable age.

THE LAW OF HUMAN PROGRESS.

AN ORATION BEFORE THE PHI BETA KAPPA SOCIETY OF UNION COLLEGE,
SCHENECTADY, JULY 25, 1848.

Secta fuit servare modum, finemque tenere,
Naturamque sequi, patriæque impendere vitam,
Nec sibi, sed toti genitum se credere mundo.

LUCAN, _Pharsalia_, Lib. II. 381-383.

Plus les lumières se répandent, plus les écarts de la moyenne vont en diminuant; plus, par conséquent, nous tendons à nous rapprocher de ce qui est beau et de ce qui est bien. La perfectibilité de l'espèce humaine résulte comme une conséquence nécessaire de toutes nos recherches.--QUETELET, _Sur l'Homme_, Tom. II. p. 326.

But at my back I always hear
Time's wingèd chariot hurrying near;
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity.

MARVELL, _To his Coy Mistress_.

ORATION.

From opposite parts of the country, from various schools of sentiment, we have come together, at this happy anniversary, to interchange salutations, to mingle in friendly communion, and to catch such words of cheer as the occasion shall convey. Here are the young, with freshest laurel of Alma Mater, with joy brightening and hope elevating the countenance, still unconscious of the toils which enter into the duties of the world. Here are they, too, of middle life, on whose weary foreheads the sun now pours his meridian ray, resting for a moment in these pleasant retreats to renew their strength. Here, also, are the fathers, crowned with length of days, and rich with ripened wisdom, withdrawn from active struggle, and dwelling much in meditation upon the Past. The Future, the Present, and the Past, all find their representatives in our Fraternity.

I speak of _our_ Fraternity; for, though a stranger among you, yet, as a member of this society in a sister University, and as a student of letters in moments snatched from other pursuits, I may claim kindred here. Let me speak, then, as to my own brethren. Invited by your partial kindness, it is my privilege to unfold some subject, which, while claiming your attention during this brief hour, may not improperly mingle with the memories of this anniversary. I would, if I could, utter truth which, while approved by the old, should sink deep into the souls of the young, filling them with strength for all good works. Mindful, then, of the occasion, deeply conscious of its requirements, solicitous of the harmony which becomes our literary festivals, I cannot banish from my thoughts a topic which is intimately connected with the movements of the present age,--nay, which explains and controls these movements, whether in the march of science, the triumphs of charity, the widespread convulsions of Europe, or the generous uprising of our own country in behalf of Freedom.

Wherever we turn is Progress,--in science, in literature, in knowledge of the earth, in knowledge of the skies, in intercourse among men, in the spread of liberty, in works of beneficence, in the recognition of Human Brotherhood. Thrones, where Authority seemed to sit secure, with the sanction of centuries, are shaken, and new-made constitutions come to restrain the aberrations of unlimited power. Men everywhere, breaking away from the Past, are pressing on to the things that are before.

Recall for one moment what has taken place during a brief span of time, hardly exceeding a year. I do not dwell on that mighty revolution in France, with whose throes the earth still shakes, and whose issues are yet unrevealed; I do not pause to contemplate the character of that Pontifical Reformer who has done so much to breathe into Europe the breath of a new life; I can only point to Sicily and Naples, rising against a besotted tyranny,--to Venice and Lombardy, claiming long-lost rights,--to all Italy, filled with the thought of Unity,--to Hungary, flaming with republican fires,--to Austria, roused at last against a patriarchal despotism,--to Prussia, taking her place among constitutional states,--to Germany, in its many principalities, throbbing with the strong pulse of Freedom. These things are present to your minds.

Other events, of a different character, are not less signs of the age. Discovery has achieved one of its most brilliant, as also one of its most benign results. The genius of Leverrier, traversing the spaces of the heavens, has disclosed a new planet. By the application of ether, the dreaded pain of the surgical knife, and even the pangs of Nature, are soothed or removed, while Death is disarmed of something of its terrors.

These latter times have witnessed two spectacles of another nature and less regarded, which are of singular significance,--harbingers, I would call them, of those glad days of promise which we almost seem to touch. I would not exaggerate, and yet I must speak of them as they impress my own mind. To me they are of a higher order than any discovery in science, or any success in the acquisition of knowledge, or any political prosperity, inasmuch as they are the tokens of that moral elevation, and of that Human Brotherhood, without distinction of condition, nation, or race, which it is the supreme office of all science, all knowledge, and all politics to serve. I refer to the sailing of the Jamestown from Boston with succor to the starving poor of Ireland, and to the meeting of the Penitentiary Congress at Frankfort. All confess the beauty of that act, where prophecy seems fulfilled, by which a Ship of War was consecrated to a purpose of charity. Hardly less beautiful is the contemplation of that assembly at Frankfort (perhaps it is new to some whom I have the honor of addressing), where were delegates from most of the Christian nations,--from military France, Holland, Belgium, Switzerland, the States of Germany, England, Spain, Italy, Denmark, Poland, distant Russia, and frozen Norway,--convened for no purpose of war or diplomacy,--not to agitate selfish coalitions, not to adjust or disturb the seeming balance of Europe, not to exalt or abase the vaulting ambition of potentate or state, but calmly and in fraternal council to consider what could be done for those who are in prison, to hear the recital of efforts in their behalf among all the nations, and to encourage each other in this work. Such a Congress forms a truer epoch of Christian Progress--does it not?--than the Congress of Vienna, with the bespangled presence of great autocrats distributing the spoils of war, as the sailing of the Jamestown is a higher Christian triumph than any mere victory of blood.

Profoundly penetrated by these things, you will confess the Progress of Man. The earnest soul, enlightened by history, strengthened by philosophy, nursed to childish slumber by the simple prayer, "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven," confident in the final, though slow, fulfilment of the daily fulfilling promises of the Future, looks forward to the continuance of this Progress during unknown and infinite ages, as a _law_ of our being.

* * * * *

It is of this that I shall speak to-day. My subject is THE LAW OF HUMAN PROGRESS. In selecting this theme, I would not minister to the pride or gratulation of the Present, nor would I furnish motives for indifference or repose. Rather would I teach how small is the Present and all it contains, compared with the Future, and how duties increase with the grandeur upon which we enter, while we derive new encouragement from knowledge of the law which is our support and guide.

The subject is vast as it is interesting and important. It might well occupy a volume, rather than a brief discourse. In unfolding it, I shall speak _first_ of the history of this law, as seen in its origin, gradual development, and recognition,--and _next_ of its character, conditions, and limitations, with the duties it enjoins and the encouragements it affords.

I.

And, first, of its history. The recognition of this law has been reserved for comparatively recent times. Like other general laws governing the courses of Nature, it was unknown to Antiquity. The ignorance and prejudice which then prevailed with regard to the earth, the heavenly bodies, and their relations to the universe, found fit companionship with the wild speculations concerning the Human Family. The ignorant live only in the Present, whether of time or place. What they see and observe bounds their knowledge. Thus to the early Greek the heavens were upborne by the mountains, and the sun traversed daily in fiery chariot from east to west. So things seemed to him. But the true Destiny of the Human Family was as little comprehended.

Man, in his origin and history, was surrounded with fable; nor was there any correct idea of the principles determining the succession of events. Revolutions of states were referred sometimes to chance, sometimes to certain innate elements of decay. Plutarch did not hesitate to ascribe the triumphs of Rome, not to the operation of immutable law, but to the fortune of the Republic. And Polybius, whom Gibbon extols for wisdom and philosophical spirit, said that Carthage, being so much older than Rome, felt her decay so much the sooner; and the survivor, he announced, carried in her bosom the seeds of mortality. The image of youth, manhood, and age was applied to nations. Like mortals on earth, they were supposed to have a period of life, and a length of thread spun by the Fates, strong at first, but thinner and weaker with advancing time, till at last it was cut, and another nation, with newly twisted thread, commenced its career.

In likening the life of a nation to the life of an individual man, there was error, commended by seeming truth, not yet entirely banished. It prevails still with many, who have not received the Law of Human Progress, teaching that all revolutions and changes are but links in the chain of development, or, it may be, turns in the grand _spiral_, by which the unknown infinite Future is connected with the Past. Nations have decayed, but never with the imbecility of age.

The ancients saw that there were changes, but did not detect the principles governing them, while a favorite fable and popular superstition conspired to turn attention back upon the Past, rather than forward to the Future. In the dawn of Greece, Hesiod, standing near the Father of Poetry, sang the descending mutations through which Mankind had seemed to travel. First came the Golden Age, so he fabled, when men lived secure and happy in pleasant association, without discord, without care, without toil, without weariness, while good of all kinds abounded, like the plentiful fruits which the earth spontaneously supplied. This was followed by the Silver Age, with a race inferior in form and disposition. Next was the Brazen Age, still descending in the scale, when men became vehement and robust, strong in body and stern in soul, building brazen houses, wielding brazen weapons, prompt to war, but not yet entirely wicked. Last, and unhappily his own, according to the poet, was the Iron Age, when straightway all evil raged forth; neither by day nor yet by night, did men rest from labor and sorrow; discord took the place of concord; the pious, the just, and the good were without favor; the man of force and the evil-doer were cherished; modesty and justice yielded to insolence and wrong. War now prevailed, and men lived in wretchedness.[244]

[244] Hesiod, Opera et Dies, 109-201.

Such, according to the Greek poet, was the succession of changes through which mankind had passed. This fable found a response. It was repeated by philosophy and history. Plato adorned and illustrated it. Strabo and Diodorus imparted to it their grave sanction. It was carried to Rome, with the other spoils of Greece. It was reproduced by Ovid, in flowing verses that have become a commonplace of literature. It was recognized by the tender muse of Virgil, the sportive fancy of Horace, and the stern genius of Juvenal. Songs and fables have ever exerted a powerful control over human opinion; nor is it possible to estimate the influence of this story in shaping unconsciously the thoughts of mankind. It is easy to understand that the youth of Antiquity,--let me say, too, the youth of later ages,--nay, of our own day, in our own schools and colleges,--nurtured by this literature, should learn to neglect the Future, and rather regard the Past. The words of Horace have afforded a polished expression to this prejudice of education:--

"Damnosa quid non imminuit dies?
Ætas parentum, pejor avis, tulit
Nos nequiores, mox daturos
Progeniem vitiosiorem."[245]

[245] Hor., Carm. III. vi. 45-48.

Barren as is classical literature in any just recognition of the continuity of events, any true appreciation of the movement of history, or any well-defined confidence in the Future, it were wrong to say that it never found a voice which seemed, in harmony with the Prophets and the Evangelists, to proclaim the advent of a better age. Virgil, in his Eclogue to Pollio,--the exact meaning of which is still a riddle,--breaks forth in words of vague aspiration, which have been sometimes supposed to herald the coming of the Saviour. The blessings of Peace are here foreshadowed, while the Golden Age seems to be not only behind, but also before. Thus, notwithstanding the prejudice of superstition and the constraint of ignorance, has the human heart, in longings for a better condition on earth, gone forward as the pioneer of Humanity.

To the superstition of Heathenism succeeded that of the Christian Church. The popular doctrine of an immediate millennium, inculcated by a succession of early fathers, took the place of ancient fable; and a Golden Age was placed in advance to animate the hope and perseverance of the faithful. It was believed that the anxieties and strifes filling the lives of men were all to be lost in a blissful Sabbath of a thousand years, when Christ with the triumphant band of saints would return to reign upon earth until the last and general resurrection. Vain and irrational as was the early form of this anticipation, it was not without advantage. It filled the souls of all who received it with aspirations for the Future, while it rudely prefigured that promised period--then, alas! how distant!--when the whole world will glow in the illumination of Christian truth. Among the means by which the Law of Human Progress has found acceptance, it is only just to mention this prophetic vision of the ancient Church.

All the legitimate influences of Christianity were in the same direction. Christianity is the religion of Progress. Here is a distinctive feature, which we vainly seek in any Heathen faith professed upon earth. Confucius, in his sublime morals, taught us not to do unto others what we would have them not do unto us; but the Chinese philosopher did not declare the ultimate triumph of this law. It was reserved for the Sermon on the Mount to reveal the vital truth, that all the highest commands of religion and duty, drawing in their train celestial peace, and marking the final goal of all Progress among men, shall one day be obeyed. "For verily I say unto you," says the Saviour, "till heaven and earth pass, _one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the Law, till all be fulfilled_."

There is nothing of good so vast or beautiful, nothing so distant or seemingly inaccessible, as to fall beyond the reach of these promises. Though imperfectly understood, or recognized, in the night of ignorance and prejudice, they were heralds of the dawn. In the advance of Modern Europe, they led the way, whispering, _Onward forever!_ Long before Philosophy deduced the Law of Human Progress from the history of man, the Gospel silently planted it in the human heart. There it rested, influencing powerfully, though gently, the march of events.

Slowly did it pass from the formularies of devotion into the convictions of reason and the treasury of science. Strange blindness! They, who, repeating the Lord's Prayer, daily called for _the coming of his kingdom on earth_, who professed implicit faith in the final fulfilment of the Law, still continued in Heathen ignorance of the significance and spirit of the Prayer they daily uttered and of the Law they daily recognized. They did not perceive that the kingdom of the Lord was to come, and the Law to be fulfilled by a continuity of daily labor. As modern civilization gradually unfolded itself amidst the multiplying generations of men, they witnessed the successive manifestations of power,--but perceived no Law. They looked upon the imposing procession of events, but did not discern the rule which guided the mighty series. Ascending from triumph to triumph, they saw dominion extended by the discoveries of intrepid navigators,--saw learning strengthened by the studies of accomplished scholars,--saw universities opening their portals to ingenuous youth in all corners of the land, from Aberdeen and Copenhagen to Toledo and Ferrara,--saw Art put forth new graces in the painting of Raffaelle, new grandeur in the painting, the sculpture, and the architecture of Michel Angelo,--caught the strains of poets, no longer cramped by ancient idioms, but flowing sweetly in the language learned at a mother's knee,--received the manifold revelations of science in geometry, mathematics, astronomy,--beheld the barbarism of the barbarous Art of War changed and refined, though barbarous still, by the invention of gunpowder,--witnessed knowledge of all kinds springing to unwonted power through the marvellous agency of the printing-press,--admired the character of _the Good Man of Peace_, as described in that work of unexampled circulation, translated into all modern languages, the "Imitation of Christ," by Thomas à Kempis,--listened to the apostolic preaching of Wyckliffe in England, Huss in Bohemia, Savonarola in Florence, Luther at Worms; and yet all these things, the harmonious expression of _progressive_ energies belonging to Man, token of an untiring advance, earnest of a mightier Future, seemed to teach no certain lesson.

The key to this advance had not been found. It was not seen that the constant desire for improvement implanted in man, with the constant effort consequent thereon in a life susceptible of indefinite Progress, caused, naturally, under the laws of a beneficent God, an indefinite advance,--that the evil passions of individuals, or of masses, while retarding, could not permanently restrain this divine impulse,--and that each generation, by irresistible necessity, added to the accumulations of the Past, and in this way prepared a higher Future. To all ignorant of this tendency, history, instead of a connected chain, with cause and effect in natural order, is nothing but a disconnected, irregular series of incidents, like separate and confused circles having no common bond. It is a dark chaos, embroiled by "chance, high arbitress," or swayed by some accidental man, fortunate in position or power. Even Macchiavelli, the consummate historian and politician of his age,--Bodin, the able speculator upon Government,--Bossuet, the eloquent teacher of religion and history,--Grotius, the illustrious founder of the Laws of Nations,--whose large intelligence should have grasped the true philosophy of events,--all failed to recognize in them any prevailing law or governing principle.

It was reserved for a professor at Naples, Giambattista Vico, in the early part of the last century, to review the history of the Past, analyze its movements, and finally disclose the existence of a primitive rule or law by which these movements were effected. His work, entitled "The Principles of a New Science concerning the Common Nature of Nations,"[246] first published in 1725, constitutes an epoch in historical studies. Recent Italian admirers vindicate for its author a place among great discoverers, by the side of Descartes, Galileo, Bacon, and Newton.[247] Without undertaking to question, or to adopt, this lofty homage to a name little known, it will not be doubted, that, as author of an elaborate work devoted expressly to the philosophy of history, at a period when history was supposed to be without philosophy, he deserves honorable mention.

[246] Principj di una Scienza nuova d'intorno alla comune Natura
delle Nazioni. The fourth book is entitled _Del corso che fanno
le nazioni_; the fifth book, _Del ricorso delle cose humane nel
risurgere che fanno le nazioni_.

[247] Cataldo Jannelli, Cenni sulla Natura et Necessità della
Scienza delle Cose et delle Storie Umane. Cap. 3, sec. 6.

Vico taught regard not merely for the individual and the nation, but the race, and showed, that, whatever the fortunes of individuals, Humanity advances,--that no blind or capricious chance controls the course of human affairs, but that whatever is done proceeds directly, under God, from the forces and faculties of men, and thus can have no true cause except in the nature of things,--excluding, of course, the idea of chance. He recognized three principles at the foundation of civilization: first, the existence of Divine Providence; secondly, the necessity of moderating the passions; and, thirdly, the immortality of the soul: three primal truths, answering to three historical facts of universal acceptance,--religion, marriage, and sepulture. Three stages marked the history of mankind: first, the divine, or theocratic; next, the heroic; and, lastly, the human. These appeared in Antiquity, and were reproduced, as he fancied, in modern times. Ingenuity and novelty are stamped upon this exposition, which is elevated by the exclusion of chance and the recognition of God.

While recognizing Humanity as governed by law, and with a common dependence, the Neapolitan professor failed to perceive that this same law and this common dependence promise to conduct it through unknown and infinite stages. Believing monarchy a perfect government, he did not see beyond the time of kings. Like others before him, and even in our own day, he was perplexed by the treacherous image of youth, manhood, and age, which he applied to nations, as to the individual man. No discovery is complete, and that of Vico, while most ingenious and fruitful, failed to grasp the whole law of the Future.

Meanwhile a gigantic genius in Germany,--whose vision, no less comprehensive than penetrating, embraced the whole circumference of knowledge and reached into the undiscovered Future, to whom the complexities of mathematics, the subtilties of philology, the mazes of philosophy, the courses of history, the rules of jurisprudence, and the heights of theology were all equally familiar,--Leibnitz, that more than imperial conqueror in the realms of universal knowledge,--the greatest, perhaps, of Human Intelligences,--enunciated the Law of Progress in all the sciences and all the concerns of life. The Present, born of the Past, he said, is pregnant with the Future. It is by a sure series that we advance, using and enjoying all our gifts for health of body and improvement of mind. Everything, from the simplest substance up to man, progresses towards God, the Infinite Being, Source of all other beings; and in bold words, which may require explanation, he says, "Man seems able to arrive at perfection": _Videtur homo ad perfectionem venire posse_.[248]

[248] Leibnitz, Opera Omnia (ed. Dutens), Tom. VI. p. 309:
_Leibnitiana_, Art. LXXIV.--"Ut semper _certa serie progredi_
valeamus." Opera Philosophica, p. 85, Art. XI., _De Scientia
Universali_.--See also _Théodicée_, § 341.

Leibnitz saw the Law of Progress by intuition, and became its herald. But there is no reason to believe that he appreciated its transcendent importance as a rule of conduct, and submitted his great powers to its influence. He saw more than Vico, but he did not discern the practical guide he had discovered. And yet, recognizing this law, the gates of the Future were open to him, and he saw Man in distant perspective, arrived at heights of happiness which he cannot now conceive. The vision of Universal Peace was to him no longer a vision, but the practical idea of humane statesmen, while he bent his incomparable genius to the discovery of a new agent of intercourse among men,--the aspiration of other philosophers since his day,--a Universal Language, where the confusion of tongues will be forgotten, and the union of hearts be consummated in the union of speech.

Close upon Leibnitz came Lessing, whose genius, less universal, but more exquisite, made him the regenerator of German literature. His soul was touched by sympathy for all mankind, and he saw its sure advance. Almost by his side was Herder, gifted among a gifted people, who in his "Philosophy of History" portrays Humanity in its incessant progress from small beginnings of ignorance and barbarism, when wrong and war and slavery prevail, to the recognition of reason and justice as the rule of life. "There is nothing enthusiastical," he says in that work, which is a classic of German prose, "in the hope, that, wherever men dwell, at some future period will dwell men rational, just, and happy,--happy, not through the means of their own reason alone, but of the common reason of their whole fraternal race."[249] In these last words the Law of Progress is announced, with all its promises.

[249] Philosophie der Geschichte der Menschheit, tr. Churchill,