THE SERVICE OF MAN. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY. A RUINED temple, with its fallen columns and broken arches, has often been taken as a suggestive example and type of the transitory nature of all human handiwork. "Here we see "-so runs the parable of the moralist-" the inevitable end of man's most ambitious efforts. Time and the elements cast down and consume his proudest fabrics. He builds high, and decorates with sculptured ornament his palaces and fanes. But his work is hardly finished before decay begins to efface its beauty, and sap its strength. Soon the building follows the builder to an equal dust, and the universal empire of Death alone survives over the tombs of departed glory and greatness." } The parable of the moralist is only too true. B Decay and death are stamped not only on man and his works, but on all that surrounds him, on all that he sees and touches. Nature herself decays as surely, if not as rapidly, as the work of his hands. The everlasting hills are daily and hourly being worn away. Alps, Andes and Himalayas, are all in process of a degradation of which there is no repair. Nay, the Sun himself, the universal author and giver of life in our planet, is only a temporary blaze-a fire perhaps already more than half burnt out, hastening to its final consummation of cold and lightless ashes. And probably no other fate is in store for the countless stars which bespangle the nightly firmament. The animalcule, whose existence is measured by a summer's day, and the galaxy which illumines the heavens for millions of ages, are alike subject to the common law of all life-growth, decay, and death. Some may think that an exception ought to be made to this statement in favour of the perennial vitality of Truth. Truth, it will be said, does not wear out, decay, and die. The Elements of Euclid are as true now as they were two thousand years ago. Truths obtained by induction and verified by experiment, or by correct deduction from true principles, do not change and pass away with the generations of men who hold them. It is therefore rash, such objectors would say, to assert that all things connected with man are destined to ultimate extinction. His reason is independent of time, and has that in it which belongs to eternity. All must see this in regard to the incontrovertible truths established by science; many see it in tuitions of the mind, and others in doctrines of religion supposed to be divinely revealed. It is often added, that it is fortunate for man that, amid the constant change going on in the phenomenal world, a permanent reality does exist, on which he can lay hold-eternal truth. It would be careless to overlook the importance of this counter-statement. About the permanence of truth there can be no question. Whether it be obtained by observation, generalization, or deduction, verified by experiment and proof, we may safely assert that such truth will last as long as the human mind remains constituted as it is. But does that entitle us to claim eternal duration for any truth? No one believes that the human race will last for ever. There is a probability amounting almost to a certainty, that neither man nor his dwelling-place will exist beyond a certain, though it may be a very large number of years. Now, when the human race shall have ceased to exist, would it be correct to say that the truths cognized by the human mind. will survive it? This could only be maintained by Decay and death are stamped not only on man and his works, but on all that surrounds him, on all that he sees and touches. Nature herself decays as surely, if not as rapidly, as the work of his hands. The everlasting hills are daily and hourly being worn away. Alps, Andes and Himalayas, are all in process of a degradation of which there is no repair. Nay, the Sun himself, the universal author and giver of life in our planet, is only a temporary blaze-a fire perhaps already more than half burnt out, hastening to its final consummation of cold and lightless ashes. And probably no other fate is in store for the countless stars which bespangle the nightly firmament. The animalcule, whose existence is measured by a summer's day, and the galaxy which illumines the heavens for millions of ages, are alike subject to the common law of all life-growth, decay, and death. Some may think that an exception ought to be made to this statement in favour of the perennial vitality of Truth. Truth, it will be said, does not wear out, decay, and die. The Elements of Euclid are as true now as they were two thousand years ago. Truths obtained by induction and verified by experiment, or by correct deduction from true principles, do not change and pass away with the generations of men who hold them. It is therefore rash, such |