AT HOME AND ABROAD 31 



The Editor of Great Thoughts asked him to 

 send a forecast of what would probably happen 

 during the twentieth century, and forwarded him 

 Dr. Parker's reply to the same question, the 

 general tenor of which may be gathered from 

 Sir John's answer. While drawing a lurid picture 

 of present iniquities, Dr. Parker felt equally 

 confident that a hundred years hence we should 

 all be sober, honest, religious, pure — in fact, much 

 the reverse of what we are now. 



To the Editor of Great Thoughts. 



Dear Sir — I much admire Dr. Parker's prophetic 

 insight into futurity, which, however, I do not share. 

 As a man of business I have spent much time and 

 thought in endeavouring to look a few weeks or months 

 ahead and though with quite as much success as I could 

 reasonably expect, not without surprises. 



Dr. Parker's remarks, however, suggest to me some 

 doubts, though I hardly venture to mention them. 



If, after many thousands of years, we are in a plight 

 so terrible — our Professions tainted, our Science and 

 Religion in deadly enmity, our Creed stunted, our Public 

 Companies swindles (though I observe with satisfaction 

 that he excepts private firms), our Women despised, our 

 Literature dominated by " miserable knavery," and 

 our Clergy incompetent — what reasonable grounds are 

 there for hopes that a few short years more will make so 

 great a change ? 



But it seems to me that some, at any rate, of his data 

 are wrong. I will only refer to a few. Science has never 

 been hostile to Religion. Scientific men, no doubt, 

 have been persecuted for discoveries, the truth of which 

 is now generally recognised. But Theologians have also 

 been constantly in conflict among themselves, and have 

 too often mistaken Anathemas for Arguments. 



Dr. Parker is also too sweeping in his condemnation 

 of Commercial Companies. The business morality of 

 the Nineteenth Century must be judged by our great 

 Insurance Offices, Banks, Railway Companies, etc., etc., 

 and the estimation in which they are held is shown 



