Thoughts on Man

U >> Unknown >> Thoughts on Man

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27

[66] Plutarch, De Placitis Philosophorum. Diogenes Laertius.

In reality the observations and the facts of astronomy do not
depend either upon the magnitudes or the distances of the
heavenly bodies. They proceed in the first place upon what may
lie seen with the naked eye. They require an accurate and
persevering attention. They may be assisted by telescopes. But
they relate only to the sun and the planets. We are bound to
ascertain, as nearly as possible, the orbits described by the
different bodies in the solar system: but this has still nothing
to do, strictly speaking, with their magnitudes or distances. It
is required that we should know them in their relations to each
other; but it is no preliminary of just, of practical, it might
almost be said, of liberal science, that we should know any thing
of them absolutely.

The unlimited ambition of the nature of man has discovered itself
in nothing more than this, the amazing superstructure which the
votaries of contemplation within the last two hundred years have
built upon the simple astronomy of the ancients. Having begun to
compute the distances of miles by millions, it appears clearly
that nothing can arrest the more than eagle-flight of the human
mind. The distance of the nearest fixed star from the earth, we
are informed, is at least 7,000,000,000,000 miles, and of another
which the astronomers name, not less than 38 millions of millions
of miles. The particles of light are said to travel 193,940
miles in every second, which is above a million times swifter
than the progress of a cannon-ball[67]. And Herschel has
concluded, that the light issuing from the faintest nebulae he
has discovered, must have been at this rate two millions of years
in reaching the Barth[68].

[67] Ferguson, Section 216. "Light moves," says Brewster,
Optics, p. 2, "from one pole of the earth to the other in the
24th part of a second: a velocity which surpasses all
comprehension.

[68] Brinkley, Astronomy, p. 130.

SECTION III.

The next process of the modern astronomer is to affirm the
innumerable orbs around us, discovered with the naked eye, or
with which we are made acquainted by the aid of telescopes, to be
all stocked with rational inhabitants. The argument for this is,
that an all-wise and omnipotent creator could never have produced
such immense bodies, dispersed through infinite space, for any
meaner purpose, than that of peopling them with "intelligent
beings, formed for endless progression in perfection and
felicity[69]."

[69] See above, Essay XXI.

Now it appears to me, that, in these assertions, the modern
astronomers are taking upon themselves somewhat too boldly, to
expound the counsels of that mysterious power, to which the
universe is indebted for its arrangement and order.

We know nothing of God but from his works. Certain speculative
men have adventured to reason upon the source of all the system
and the wonders that we behold, a priori, and, having found that
the creator is all powerful, all wise, and of infinite goodness,
according to their ideas of power, wisdom and goodness, have from
thence proceeded to draw their inferences, and to shew us in what
manner the works of his hands are arranged and conducted by him.
This no doubt they have done with the purest intentions in the
world; but it is not certain, that their discretion has equalled
the boldness of their undertaking.

The world that we inhabit, this little globe of earth, is to us
an infinite mystery. Human imagination is unable to conceive any
thing more consummate than the great outline of things below.
The trees and the skies, the mountains and the seas, the rivers
and the springs, appear as if the design had been to realise the
idea of paradise. The freshness of the air, the silvery light of
day, the magnificence of the clouds, the gorgeous and soothing
colouring of the world, the profusion and exquisiteness of the
fruits and flowers of the earth, are as if nothing but joy and
delicious sensations had been intended for us. When we ascend to
the animal creation, the scene is still more admirable and
transporting. The birds and the beasts, the insects that skim
the air, and the fishes that live in the great deep, are a
magazine of wonders, that we may study for ever, without fear of
arriving at the end of their excellence. Last of all, comes the
crown of the creation, man, formed with looks erect, to commerce
with the skies. What a masterpiece of workmanship is his form,
while the beauty and intelligence of Gods seems to manifest
itself in his countenance! Look at that most consummate of all
implements, the human hand; think of his understanding, how
composed and penetrating; of the wealth of his imagination; of
the resplendent virtues he is qualified to display! "How
wonderful are thy works, Oh God; in wisdom hast thou created them
all!"

But there are other parts of the system in which we live, which
do not seem to correspond with those already enumerated. Before
we proceed to people infinite space, it would be as well, if we
surveyed the surface of the earth we inhabit. What vast deserts
do we find in it; what immense tracks of burning sands! One half
of the globe is perhaps irreclaimable to the use of man. Then
let us think of earthquakes and tempests, of wasting hurricanes,
and the number of vessels, freighted with human beings, that are
yearly buried in the caverns oœ the ocean. Let us call to mind
in man, the prime ornament of the creation, all the diseases to
which his frame is subject,

Convulsions, epilepsies, fierce catarrhs,
Intestine stone and ulcer, colic pangs,
Demoniac frenzy, moping melancholy,
And moon-struck madness, pining atrophy,
Marasmus, and wide-wasting pestilence,
Dropsies, and asthmas, and joint-racking rheums.

The very idea of our killing, and subsisting upon the flesh of
animals, surely somewhat jars with our conceptions of infinite
benevolence.

But, when we look at the political history of man, the case is
infinitely worse. This too often seems one tissue of misery and
vice. War, conquest, oppression, tyranny, slavery,
insurrections, massacres, cruel punishments, degrading corporal
infliction, and the extinction of life under the forms of law,
are to be found in almost every page. It is as if an evil demon
were let loose upon us, and whole nations, from one decad of
years to another, were struck with the most pernicious madness.
Certain reasoners tell us that this is owing to the freedom of
will, without which man could not exist. But here we are
presented with an alternative, from which it is impossible for
human understanding to escape. Either God, according to our
ideas of benevolence, would remove evil out of the world, and
cannot; or he can, and will not. If he has the will and not the
power, this argues weakness; if he has the power and not the
will, this seems to be malevolence.

Let us descend from the great stage of the nations, and look into
the obscurities of private misery. Which of us is happy? What
bitter springs of misery overflow the human heart, and are borne
by us in silence! What cruel disappointments beset us! To what
struggles are we doomed, while we struggle often in vain! The
human heart seems framed, as if to be the capacious receptacle of
all imaginable sorrows. The human frame seems constructed, as if
all its fibres were prepared to sustain varieties of torment.
"In the sweat of thy brow shalt thou eat bread, till thou return
to the earth." But how often does that sweat prove ineffective!
There are men of whom sorrow seems to be the destiny, from which
they can never escape. There are hearts, into which by their
constitution it appears as if serenity and content could never
enter, but which are given up to all the furious passions, or are
for ever the prey of repining and depression.

Ah, little think the gay, licentious proud,
Whom pleasure, power and affluence surround,
How many pine in want! How many shrink
Into the sordid hut, how many drink
The cup of grief, and eat the bitter bread
Of misery!

And, which aggravates the evil, almost all the worst vices, the
most unprincipled acts, and the darkest passions of the human
mind, are bred out of poverty and distress. Satan, in the Book
of Job, says to the Almighty, "Thou hast blessed the work of thy
servant, and his substance is increased in the land. But put
forth thy hand now, and take away all that he hath; and he will
curse thee to thy face." The prayer of Agar runs, "Feed me with
food convenient for me; lest I be poor, and steal, and take the
name of my God in vain."

It is with a deep knowledge of the scenes of life, that the
prophet pronounces, "My thoughts are not your thoughts; neither
are your ways my ways, saith the Lord."

All reflecting persons, who have surveyed the state of the world
in which we live, have been struck with the contrarieties of
sublunary things; and many hypotheses have been invented to solve
the enigma. Some have maintained the doctrine of two principles,
Oromasdes and Arimanius, the genius of good and of evil, who are
perpetually contending with each other which shall have the
greatest sway in the fortunes of the world, and each alternately
acquiring the upper hand. Others have inculcated the theory of
the fall of man, that God at first made all things beautiful and
good, but that man has incurred his displeasure, and been turned
out of the paradise for which he was destined. Hence, they say,
has arisen the corruption of our nature. "There is none that
cloth good, no, not one. That every mouth may be stopped, and
all the world become guilty before God." But the solution that
has been most generally adopted, particularly in later days, is
that of a future state of retribution, in which all the
inequalities of our present condition shall be removed, the tears
of the unfortunate and the sufferer shall be wiped from their
eyes, and their agonies and miseries compensated. This, in other
words, independently of the light of revelation, is to infer
infinite wisdom and benevolence from what we see, and then,
finding the actual phenomena not to correspond with our theories,
to invent something of which we have no knowledge, to supply the
deficiency.

The astronomer however proceeds from what we see of the globe of
earth, to fashion other worlds of which we have no direct
knowledge. Finding that there is no part of the soil of the
earth into which our wanderings can penetrate, that is not turned
to the account of rational and happy beings, creatures capable of
knowing and adoring their creator, that nature does nothing in
vain, and that the world is full of the evidences of his
unmingled beneficence, according to our narrow and imperfect
ideas of beneficence, (for such ought to be our premises) we
proceed to construct millions of worlds upon the plan we have
imagined. The earth is a globe, the planets are globes, and
several of them larger than our earth: the earth has a moon;
several of the planets have satellites: the globe we dwell in
moves in an orbit round the sun; so do the planets: upon these
premises, and no more, we hold ourselves authorised to affirm
that they contain "myriads of intelligent beings, formed for
endless progression in perfection and felicity." Having gone
thus far, we next find that the fixed stars bear a certain
resemblance to the sun; and, as the sun has a number of planets
attendant on him, so, we say, has each of the fixed stars,
composing all together "ten thousand times ten thousand"
habitable worlds.

All this is well, so long as we view it as a bold and ingenious
conjecture. On any other subject it would be so regarded; and we
should consider it as reserved for the amusement and
gratification of a fanciful visionary in the hour, when he gives
up the reins to his imagination. But, backed as it is by a
complexity of geometrical right lines and curves, and handed
forth to us in large quartos, stuffed with calculations, it
experiences a very different fortune. We are told that, "by the
knowledge we derive from astronomy, our faculties are enlarged,
our minds exalted, and our understandings clearly convinced, and
affected with the conviction, of the existence, wisdom, power,
goodness, immutability and superintendency of the supreme being;
so that, without an hyperbole, 'an undevout astronomer is
mad[e][70].'"

[70] Ferguson, Astronomy, Section I.

It is singular, how deeply I was impressed with this
representation, while I was a schoolboy, and was so led to
propose a difficulty to the wife of the master. I said, "I find
that we have millions of worlds round us peopled with rational
creatures. I know not that we have any decisive reason for
supposing these creatures more exalted, than the wonderful
species of which we are individuals. We are imperfect; they are
imperfect. We fell; it is reasonable to suppose that they have
fallen also. It became necessary for the second person in the
trinity to take upon him our nature, and by suffering for our
sins to appease the wrath of his father. I am unwilling to
believe that he has less commiseration for the inhabitants of
other planets. But in that case it may be supposed that since
the creation he has been making a circuit of the planets, and
dying on the cross for the sins of rational creatures in
uninterrupted succession." The lady was wiser than I, admonished
me of the danger of being over-inquisitive, and said we should
act more discreetly in leaving those questions to the judgment of
the Almighty.

But thus far we have reasoned only on one side of the question.
Our pious sentiments have led us to magnify the Lord in all his
works, and, however imperfect the analogy, and however obscure
the conception we can form of the myriads of rational creatures,
all of them no doubt infinitely varied in their nature, their
structure and faculties, yet to view the whole scheme with an
undoubting persuasion of its truth. It is however somewhat in
opposition to the ideas of piety formed by our less adventurous
ancestors, that we should usurp the throne of God,

Snatch from his hand the balance and the rod,

and, by means of our telescopes and our calculations, penetrate
into mysteries not originally intended for us. According to the
received Mosaic chronology we are now in the five thousand eight
hundred and thirty-fifth year from the creation: the Samaritan
version adds to this date. It is therefore scarcely in the
spirit of a Christian, that Herschel talks to us of a light,
which must have been two millions of years in reaching the earth.

Moses describes the operations of the Almighty, in one of the six
days devoted to the work of creation, as being to place "lights
in the firmament of heaven, to divide the day from the night, to
be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years, and to give
light upon the earth; two great lights, the greater to rule the
day, and the lesser the night; and the stars also." And Christ,
prophesying what is to happen in the latter days, says, "The sun
shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the
stars shall fall from heaven." Whatever therefore be the piety
of the persons, who talk to us of "ten thousand times ten
thousand worlds, all peopled with rational creatures," it
certainly is not a piety in precise accordance with the Christian
scriptures.

SECTION IV.

It is also no more than just, that we should bear in mind the
apparent fitness or otherwise, of these bodies, so far as we are
acquainted with them, for the dwelling-place of rational
creatures. Not to mention the probable extreme coldness of
Jupiter and Saturn, the heat of the sunbeams in the planet
Mercury is understood to be such as that water would unavoidably
boil and be carried away[71], and we can scarcely imagine any
living substance that would not be dissolved and dispersed in
such an atmosphere. The moon, of which, as being so much nearer
to us, we may naturally be supposed to know most, we are told by
the astronomers has no water and no atmosphere, or, if any, such
an atmosphere as would not sustain clouds and ascending vapour.
To our eye, as seen through the telescope, it appears like a
metallic substance, which has been burned by fire, and so reduced
into the ruined and ragged condition in which we seem to behold
it. The sun appears to be still less an appropriate habitation
for rational, or for living creatures, than any of the planets.
The comets, which describe an orbit so exceedingly eccentric, and
are subject to all the excessive vicissitudes of heat and cold,
are, we are told, admirably adapted for a scene of eternal, or of
lengthened punishment for those who have acquitted themselves ill
in a previous state of probation. Buffon is of opinion, that all
the planets in the solar system were once so many portions of our
great luminary, struck off from the sun by the blow of a comet,
and so having received a projectile impulse calculated to carry
them forward in a right line, at the same time that the power of
attraction counteracts this impulse, and gives them that compound
principle of motion which retains them in an orbicular course.
In this sense it may be said that all the planets were suns;
while on the contrary Herschel pronounces, that the sun itself is
a planet, an opake body, richly stored with inhabitants[72].

[71] Encyclopaedia Londinensis, Vol. II, p. 355.

[72] Philosophical Transactions for 1795, p. 68.

The modern astronomers go on to account to us for the total
disappearance of a star in certain cases, which, they say, may be
in reality the destruction of a system, such as that of our sun
and its attendant planets, while the appearance of a new star
may, in like manner, be the occasional creation of a new system
of planets. "We ought perhaps," says Herschel, "to look upon
certain clusters of stars, and the destruction of a star now and
then in some thousands of ages, as the very means by which the
whole is preserved and renewed. These clusters may be the
laboratories of the universe, wherein the most salutary remedies
for the decay of the whole are prepared[73]."

[73] Philosophical Transactions for 1785, p. 217.

All this must appear to a sober mind, unbitten by the rage which
grows out of the heat of these new discoverers, to be nothing
less than astronomy run mad. This occasional creation of new
systems and worlds, is in little accordance with the Christian
scriptures, or, I believe, with any sober speculation upon the
attributes of the creator. The astronomer seizes upon some hint
so fine as scarcely by any ingenuity to be arrested, immediately
launches forth into infinite space, and in an instant returns,
and presents us with millions of worlds, each of them peopled
with ten thousand times ten thousand inhabitants.

We spoke a while since of the apparent unfitness of many of the
heavenly bodies for the reception of living inhabitants. But for
all this these discoverers have a remedy. They remind us how
unlike these inhabitants may be to ourselves, having other organs
than ours, and being able to live in a very different
temperature. "The great heat in the planet Mercury is no
argument against its being inhabited; since the Almighty could as
easily suit the bodies and constitutions of its inhabitants to
the heat of their dwelling, as he has done ours to the
temperature of our earth. And it is very probable that the
people there have such an opinion of us, as we have of the
inhabitants of Jupiter and Saturn; namely, that we must be
intolerably cold, and have very little light at so great a
distance from the sun."

These are the remarks of Ferguson[74]. One of our latest
astronomers expresses himself to the same purpose.

[74] Astronomy, Section 22.

"We have no argument against the planets being inhabited by
rational beings, and consequently by witnesses of the creator's
power, magnificence and benevolence, unless it be said that some
are much nearer the sun than the earth is, and therefore must be
uninhabitable from heat, and those more distant from cold.
Whatever objection this may be against their being inhabited by
rational beings, of an organisation similar to those on the
earth, it can have little force, when urged with respect to
rational beings in general.

"But we may examine without indulging too much in conjecture,
whether it be not possible that the planets may be possessed by
rational beings, and contain animals and vegetables, even little
different from those with which we are familiar.

"Is the sun the principal cause of the temperature of the earth?
We have reason to suppose that it is not. The mean temperature
of the earth, at a small depth from the surface, seems constant
in summer and in winter, and is probably coeval with its first
formation.

"At the planet Mercury, the direct heat of the sun, or its power
of causing heat, is six times greater than with us. If we
suppose the mean temperature of Mercury to be the same as of the
earth, and the planet to be surrounded with an atmosphere, denser
than that of the earth, less capable of transmitting heat, or
rather the influence of the sun to extricate heat, and at the
same time more readily conducting it to keep up an evenness of
temperature, may we not suppose the planet Mercury fit for the
habitation of men, and the production of vegetables similar to
our own?

"At the Georgium Sidus, the direct influence of the sun is 360
times less than at the earth, and the sun is there seen at an
angle not much greater than that under which we behold Venus,
when nearest. Yet may not the mean temperature of the Georgium
Sidus be nearly the same as that of the earth? May not its
atmosphere more easily transmit the influence of the sun, and may
not the matter of heat be more copiously combined, and more
readily extricated, than with us? Whence changes of season
similar to our own may take place. Even in the comets we may
suppose no great change of temperature takes place, as we know of
no cause which will deprive them of their mean temperature, and
particularly if we suppose, that on their approach towards the
sun, there is a provision for their atmosphere becoming denser.
The tails they exhibit, when in the neighbourhood of the sun,
seem in some measure to countenance this idea.

"We can hardly suppose the sun, a body three hundred times larger
than all the planets together, was created only to preserve the
periodic motions, and give light and heat to the planets. Many
astronomers have thought that its atmosphere only is luminous,
and its body opake, and probably of the same constitution as the
planets. Allowing therefore that its luminous atmosphere only
extricates heat, we see no reason why the sun itself should not
be inhabited[75]."

[75] Brinkley, Elements of Astronomy, Chap. IX.

There is certainly no end to the suppositions that may be made by
an ingenious astronomer. May we not suppose that we might do
nearly as well altogether without the sun, which it appears is at
present of little use to us as to warmth and heat? As to light,
the great creator might, for aught we know, find a substitute;
feelers, for example, endued with a certain acuteness of sense:
or, at all events, the least imaginable degree of light might
answer every purpose to organs adapted to this kind of twilight.
In that way the inhabitants of the Georgium Sidus are already
sufficiently provided for; they appear to have as little benefit
of the light as of the heat of the sun. How the satellites of
the distant planets are supplied with light is a mystery, since
their principals have scarcely any. Unless indeed, like the sun,
they have a luminous atmosphere, competent to enlighten a whole
system, themselves being opake. But in truth light in a greater
or less degree seems scarcely worthy of a thought, since the
inhabitants of the planet Mercury have not their eyes put out by
a light, scarcely inferior in radiance to that which is reflected
by those plates of burning brass, with which tyrants in some ages
were accustomed to extinguish the sense of vision in their
unfortunate victims. The comets also must be a delectable
residence; that of 1680 completing its orbit in 576 years, and
being at its greatest distance about eleven thousand two hundred
millions of miles from the sun, and at its least within less than
a third part of the sun's semi-diameter from its surface[76].
They must therefore have delightful vicissitudes of light and the
contrary; for, as to heat, that is already provided for.
Archdeacon Brinkley's postulate is, that these bodies are
"possessed by rational beings, and contain animals and
vegetables, little different from those with which we are
familiar."

[76] Ferguson, Section 93.

Now the only reason we have to believe in these extraordinary
propositions, is the knowledge we possess of the divine
attributes. From the force of this consideration it is argued
that God will not leave any sensible area of matter unoccupied,
and therefore that it is impossible that such vast orbs as we
believe surround us even to the extent of infinite space, should
not be "richly stored with rational beings, the capable witnesses
of his power, magnificence and benevolence." All difficulties
arising from the considerations of light, and heat, and a
thousand other obstacles, are to give way to the perfect insight
we have as to how the deity will conduct himself in every case
that can be proposed. I am not persuaded that this is agreeable
to religion; and I am still less convinced that it is compatible
with the sobriety and sedateness of common sense.

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27