176 CHAELES BABBAGE. 



at least as extensive as the existiDg one, and, therefore, that the Creator 

 who selected the present law must have foreseen the consequences of all 

 other laws. 



"The works of the Creator, ever present to our senses, give a living 

 and perpetual testimony of his wisdom and goodness far surpassing 

 any evidence transmitted through human testimony. The testimony 

 of men becomes fainter at every stage of transmission, while each new 

 inquiry into the works of the Almighty gives to us more exalted views 

 of his wisdom, his goodness, and his power." 



The true value of the Christian religion in Babbage's estimation rested 

 not upon speculative views of the Creator, which must necessarily be 

 different in each individual, according to the extent of the finite being 

 who employs his own feeble ];)owers in contemplating the infinite, but 

 rather upon those doctrines of kindness and benevolence which that re- 

 ligion claims and enforces, not merely in favor of man himself but of 

 every creature susceptible of pain or of happiness. 



There is something exceedingly refreshing in the original views Mr. 

 Baggage takes of every subject that comes within the scope of his 

 vision. His autobiography — for such in spite of his disclaimer it really 

 is — has the interest of a romance. He is never dull, never tiresome, 

 never cloudy. His style is clear as limpid water and natural as a run- 

 ning brook. He possesses a rich fund of humor, which flecks and dap- 

 ples even his mathematical descriptions like sunshine falling through 

 foliage. 



"A curious reflection" he says in the chapter we do not willingly 

 leave, "presents itself, when we meditate upon a state of rewards and 

 punishments in a future life. We must possess the memory of what we 

 did during our existence upon this earth in order to give them those 

 characteristics. In fact, memory seems to be the only faculty which 

 must, of necessity, be preserved in order to render a future state pos- 

 sible. 



" If memory be absolutely destroyed, our personal identity is lost. 



"Further reflection suggests that in a future state we may, as it were, 

 awake to the recollection that, previously to this ,our present life, we 

 existed in some former state, possibly in many former ones, and that 

 the then state of existence may have been the consequences of our con- 

 duct in those former stages. 



" It would be a very interesting research if naturalists could devise 

 any means of showing that the dragon fly, in its three stages of a grub 

 beneath the soil, an animal living in the water, and that of a flying 

 insect, had in the last stage any memory of its existence in its first. 



"Another question connected with this subject ofters still greater 

 difficulty. Man possesses five sources of knowledge through his senses : 

 He proudly thinks himself the highest work of the Almighty Architect, 

 but it is quite possible that he may be the very lowest. If other animals 

 possess senses of a different nature from ours, it can scarcely be possible 



