682 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



tween gravitation and ethereal vibration, which constitute, in the last 

 analysis, the true correlative jt)riwc}^^es of which evolution and disso- 

 lution are the corresponding processes. These are the agencies which 

 are at all times antagonizing each other in all parts of the universe, 

 and whose exact equality in it seems to form a logical tenet of the 

 modern cosmology. A certain golden mean between these forces, but 

 in which the former must j)redominate, results in organization ; star- 

 systems are formed in space, and life is developed out of the plane- 

 tary elements. Such appears to be the state of all the matter within 

 the range of human observation. For, whatever may be the condi- 

 tion of other worlds or other regions of space, the phenomena of our 

 world and our portion of space belong to the ascending series ; and 

 whatever may be the final doom of our planet and our universe, both 

 are now in a state of progress, and are still rejoicing in the morning 

 of creation. 







PESSIMISM AND ITS ANTIDOTE. 



By CHAELES NISBET. 



THE consideration of general questions not admitting of definite 

 answer, and always throwing us back on the consciousness of 

 the extreme limitation of our knowledge, is not a profitable direction 

 of mind, nor to be recommended as an exclusive study. 



Still, occasionally, it may be wholesome, as it has confessedly a 

 strange attraction for us, to journey to the confines of our little island 

 of knowledge, and thence speculate a little on the trackless ocean of 

 mystery to the navigation of which science and logic are alike inade- 

 quate. All true religion is founded on this consciousness of the infi- 

 nite, of an ultimatum transcending our comprehension, but stimulating 

 and exercising our faith. 



The moral government of the world, the spiritual tendency, or 

 indeed any dominant direction, of things, is not patent to the fleeting 

 glance, does not reveal itself even to the most strenuous thought. 

 The history of the world presents itself rather as a Jeremiad, as a 

 bottomless chaos in which evil and good w^restle with each other for 

 the mastery, and where evil generally boasts the vast majority of 

 forces. 



Savage countries lie thousands of years morally stagnating or 

 decomj^osing, often physically starving, ground down under cruel des- 

 potisms and superstitions, reducing one another in perpetual warfares. 

 The pages of the most favored countries show long chapters of declen- 

 sion, and the moral influxes, like angels' visits, only few and far be- 

 tween. The cause of Brutus opens the way to Cgesarism and death. 

 Spain shares in the tide of new life, but that life is zealously extin- 



