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century shall have ended. No doubt the disappearance of all available 
energy is a matter of millions of years, perhaps of billions of years. But 
the disappearance of so much of our available energy that what remains 
may be entirely inadequate to supply the demands of a civilization such 
as we now have, is not a matter of millions of years, not even of thousands 
of years. 
The progress of man has been proportional to his mastery of, and use 
of, Nature’s resources. Thus we have the Stone Age, the Bronze Age, 
the Iron Age, and the Steel Age—the age of today. A 1914 model auto- 
mobile, if made of bronze or iron, would not run a mile. The invention 
of the automobile could not have preceded the invention of steel. Steel 
made possible the light weight engine of high power, without which flying 
machines would be impossible. Without steel most of the weapons, and 
instruments, and machines of today would be impossible. Without power 
they would be useless. So this has been called the Age of Power or the 
Age of Energy, or better still, the Age of Coal Energy, for coal supplies 
almost all the energies required to do the work of the world. King Coal 
reigns with a lavish hand. We feast at the table, apparently unmindful 
of the fact that we are nearing the dessert course of his final banquet. 
Our boasted triumphs over past generations are due to the fact that 
we have learned to use energy freely. We are not superior to those of 
earlier ages, in art, in architecture, in music, in intellect. We are vastly 
superior to them in our ability to make use of Nature’s mineral resources. 
I might even say in our ability to use coal, for without coal the production 
of iron and steel would be practically impossible and the mineral re- 
sources of the world would remain undeveloped. 
It is high time that we were awaking to the fact that civilization as 
we know it must disappear from the earth when the available energy has 
been exhausted. Concern over the social, intellectual, religious, and po- 
litical state of future generations is of secondary moment compared with 
the question of the existence of civilization itself. 
Each individual knows that he must die. But if he thinks the event 
somewhat remote he scarcely gives the matter a thought. He may even in- 
dulge in things that he knows will surely hasten the event. So with a race. 
We give no thought for the morrow, but continue to use and to waste 
Nature’s resources, knowing full well that the death of the race is the 
inevitable result, and that our prodigality is speeding the day. We make 
the mistake of supposing that the day is indefinitely removed. We 
