Life Progressive. 421 



reveal herself, thereby discovering hidden uses and unsus- 

 pected beauties, quite as marvellously as though he were 

 endowed with some entirely new organ of sense. Through 

 the discovery of printing, we are brought into communion 

 with the greatest minds, and thus the thoughts of a Shakes- 

 peare or a Tennyson, or the discoveries of a Newton or a 

 Darwin, become the common property of mankind. Already 

 the results of this all-important, though simple, process 

 have vastly improved our mental faculties, and day by 

 day, as books become cheaper, schools are established and 

 education more general, a greater and greater effect will be 

 produced. 



Nor are all these new sources of happiness accompanied 

 by any new liability to suffering. On the contrary, while 

 our pleasures are increased, our pains are lessened. In a 

 thousand ways we can avoid or diminish evils which to our 

 ancestors were great and unavoidable. No one can estimate 

 the misery which, for instance, the simple discovery of 

 chloroform has spared the human race. The capacity for 

 pain, so far as it can serve as a warning, remains all the 

 same, but the necessity for endurance has been greatly 

 diminished. With increased knowledge of the laws of 

 health, and attention thereto, disease will become less and 

 less frequent, and those tendencies to disease which we have 

 inherited from our ancestors will gradually die out, and, if 

 fresh seeds are not sown, the race will one day enjoy the 

 inestimable advantages of a more vigorous and healthy 

 existence. Thus, then, with the increasing influence of 

 science we may confidently look forward to a great improve- 

 ment in the condition of man. But it may be alleged that 

 our present sufferings and sorrows arise chiefly from sin, 

 and that any moral improvement must come from religion 

 and not from science. This separation of the two mighty 

 agents of improvement, the great misfortune of humanity, 

 has done more than anything else to retard the progress of 

 civilization. But even if we admit for the nonce that science 



