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thence we

spread over far longer periods of time. Our conclusions will From constantly be found to gather incidental support and distinct- pass to the ness from illustrations presented by the aged populations of tion of all Europe. Asia, and the aborigines of Africa and America.

examina

The intellectual progress of Europe being of a nature an- The five ages of swering to that observed in the case of Greece, and this, in European life. its turn, being like that of an individual, we may conveniently separate it into arbitrary periods, sufficiently distinct from one another, though imperceptibly merging into each other. To these successive periods I shall give the titles of, 1, the Age of Credulity; 2, the Age of Inquiry; 3, the Age of Faith; 4, the Age of Reason; 5, the Age of Decrepitude; and shall use these designations in the division of my subject in its several chapters.

is ruled by

From the possibility of thus regarding the progress of a The world continent in definite and successive stages, answering respec- law. tively to the periods of individual life,—infancy, childhood, youth, maturity, old age, we may gather an instructive lesson. It is the same that we have learned from inquiries respecting the origin, maintenance, distribution, and extinction of animals and plants, their balancing against each other; from the variations of aspect and form of an individual man as determined by climate; from his social state, whether in repose or motion; from the secular variations of his opinions, and the gradual dominion of reason over society: this lesson is, that the government of the world is accomplished by immutable law.

Such a conception commends itself to the intellect of man by its majestic grandeur. It makes him discern the eternal through the vanishing of present events and through the shadows of time. From the life, the pleasures, the sufferings of humanity, it points to the impassive; from our wishes, wants, and woes, to the inexorable. Leaving the individual beneath the eye of Providence, it shows society under the finger of law. And the laws of Nature never vary; in their application they never hesitate nor are wanting.

But in thus ascending to primordial laws, and asserting

And yet there is free-will for man.

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their immutability, universality, and paramount control in the government of this world, there is nothing inconsistent with the free action of man. The appearance of things depends altogether on the point of view we occupy. He who is immersed in the turmoil of a crowded city sees nothing but the acts of men, aud, if he formed his opinion from his experience alone, must conclude that the course of events altogether depends on the uncertainties of human volition. But he who ascends to a sufficient elevation loses sight of the passing conflicts, and no longer hears the contentions. He discovers that the importance of individual action is diminishing, as the panorama beneath him is extending. And if he could attain to the truly philosophical, the general point of view, disengaging himself from all terrestrial influences and entanglements, rising high enough to see the whole globe at a glance, his acutest vision would fail to discover the slightest indication of man, his free-will or his works. In her resistless, onward sweep, in the clock-like precision of her daily and nightly revolution, in the well-known pictured forms of her continents and seas, now no longer dark and doubtful, but shedding forth a planetary light,-well might he ask what had become of all the aspirations and anxieties, the pleasures and agony of life. As the voluntary vanished from his sight, and the irresistible remained, and each movement became more and more distinct, well might he incline to disbelieve his own experience, and to question whether the seat of so much undying glory could be the place of so much human uncertainty, whether beneath the vastness, energy, and immutable course of a moving world, there lay concealed the feebleness and imbecility of man. Yet it is none the less true that these contradictory conditions co-exist,—Free-will and Fate, Uncertainty and Destiny, and all are watched by the sleepless eye of Providence. It is only the point of view that has changed, but on that how much has depended! A little nearer, we gather the successive ascertainments of human inquiry; a little further off, we realize the panoramic vision of the Deity. Well has a Hindu philosopher remarked, that he who stands by the bank of a flowing stream sees, in their

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order, the various parts as they successively glide by, but he who is placed on an exalted station views, at a glance, the whole as a motionless silvery thread among the fields. To the one there is the accumulating experience and knowledge of man in time, to the other there is the instantaneous and unsuccessive knowledge of God.

law.

Is there an object presented to us which does not bear the Changeability of mark of ephemeral duration? As respects the tribes of life, forms and unchangethey are scarcely worth a moment's thought, for the term of ability of the great majority of them is so brief that we may say they are born and die before our eyes. If we examine them, not as individuals, but as races, the same conclusion holds good, only the scale is enlarged from a few days to a few centuries. If from living we turn to lifeless nature, we encounter again the evidence of brief continuance. The sea is unceasingly remoulding its shores; hard as they are, the mountains are constantly yielding to frost and to rain; here an extensive tract of country is elevated, there it is depressed. We fail to find anything that is not undergoing change.

Then forms are in their nature transitory, law is everlasting. If from visible forms we turn to directing law, how vast is the difference! We pass from the finite, the momentary, the incidental, the conditioned, to the illimitable, the eternal, the necessary, the unshackled.

of this book

the control

human

affairs.

It is of law that I am to speak in this book. In a world The object composed of vanishing forms, I am to vindicate the imperish- is to assert ability, the majesty of law, and to show how man proceeds, of law in in his social march, in obedience to it. I am to lead my reader, perhaps in a reluctant path, from the outward phantasmagorial illusions which surround us, and so ostentatiously obtrude themselves on our attention, to something that lies in silence and strength behind. I am to draw his thoughts from the tangible to the invisible, from the limited to the universal, from the changeable to the invariable, from the transitory to the eternal; from the expedients and volitions so largely amusing the life of man, to the predestined and resistless issuing from the fiat of God.

Description

of Europe.

CHAPTER II.

OF EUROPE: ITS TOPOGRAPHY AND ETHNOLOGY.

ITS PRIMITIVE MODES OF THOUGHT, AND THEIR PROGRESSIVE VARIATIONS,
MANIFESTED IN THE GREEK AGE OF CREDULITY.

E

UROPE is geographically a peninsula, and historically a dependency of Asia.

It is constructed on the western third of a vast mountainaxis, which reaches in a broken and irregular course from the Sea of Japan to the Bay of Biscay. On the flanks of this range, peninsular slopes are directed toward the south, and extensive plateaus to the north. The culminating point in Europe is Mont Blanc, 16,000 feet above the level of the sea. The axis of elevation is not the axis of figure; the incline to the south is much shorter and steeper than that to the north. The boundless plains of Asia are prolonged through Germany and Holland. An army may pass from the Pacific to the Atlantic Ocean, a distance of more than six thousand miles, without encountering any elevation of more than a few hundred feet. The descent from Asia into Europe is indicated in a general manner by the mean elevation of the two continents above the level of the sea, that for Asia being 1132 The great feet, and for Europe 671. Through the avenue thus open to them, the Oriental hordes have again and again precipitated themselves on the West. With an abundance of springs and head-waters, but without any stream capable of offering a serious obstacle, this track has a temperature well suited to military movements. It coincides generally with the annual

path-zone.

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isothermal line of 50°, skirting the northern boundary beyond which the vine ceases to grow, and the limiting region beyond which the wild boar does not pass.

and interior

Constructed thus, Europe is not easily accessible from Exterior Asia, a fact of no little moment in its ancient history, but it accessibility. is also singularly accessible interiorly, or from one of its parts to another. Still more, its sea-line is so broken, it has so many intrusive gulfs and bays, that, its surface considered, its maritime coast is greater than that of any other continent. In this respect it contrasts strikingly with Africa. Europe has one mile of coast-line for every 156 square miles of surface, Africa has only one for every 623. This extensive maritime contact adds, of course, greatly to its interior as well as exterior accessibility.

tion of heat

The mean annual temperature of the European countries Distribuon the southern slope of the mountain axis is from 60° to in Europe; 70° F., but of those to the north the heat gradually declines, until, at the extreme limit on the shores of Zembla, the ground is perpetually frozen. As on the other parts of the globe, the climate does not correspond to the latitude, but is disturbed by several causes, among which may be distinguished the great Atlantic current-the Gulf Stream coming from America and the Sahara Desert. The latter gives to the south of Europe an unduly high heat, and the former to Ireland, England, and the entire west a genial temperature. Together they press into higher latitudes the annual isothermal lines. If in Europe there are no deserts, there are none of those impenetrable forests seen in tropical countries. From the westerly shores of Portugal, France, and Ireland, the humidity diminishes as we pass to the east, and, indeed, if we advance into Asia, disappears in the desert of Gobi. There are no vast homogeneous geographical areas as in Asia, and therefore no wide-spread uniformity in the races of men.

But not only is the temperature of the European continent elevated by the Gulf Stream and the south-west wind, its luxuriance of vegetation depends on them; for luxuriance of vegetation is determined, among other things, by the supply And the quantity of of rain. A profusion gives to South America its amazing rain.

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