ery bold man
would undertake to conjecture! 'The time will come,' said Lichtenberg,
in scorn at the materialising tendencies of modern thought; 'the time
will come when the belief in God will be as the tales with which old
women frighten children; when the world will be a machine, the ether a
gas, and God will be a force.' Mankind, if they last long enough on the
earth, may develope strange things out of themselves; and the growth of
what is called the Positive Philosophy is a curious commentary on
Lichtenberg's prophecy. But whether the end be seventy years hence, or
seven hundred--be the close of the mortal history of humanity as far
distant in the future as its shadowy beginnings seem now to lie behind
us--this only we may foretell with confidence--that the riddle of man's
nature will remain unsolved. There will be that in him yet which
physical laws will fail to explain--that something, whatever it be, in
himself and in the world, which science cannot fathom, and which
suggests the unknown possibilities of his origin and his destiny. There
will remain yet

Those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things;
Falling from us, vanishings--
Blank misgivings of a creature
Moving about in worlds not realised--
High instincts, before which our mortal nature
Doth tremble like a guilty thing surprised.

There will remain

Those first affections--
Those shadowy recollections--
Which, be they what they may,
Are yet the fountain-light of all our day--
Are yet the master-light of all our seeing--
Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make
Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the Eternal Silence.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] It is objected that Geology is a science: yet that Geology cannot
foretell the future changes of the earth's surface. Geology is not a
century old, and its periods are measured by millions of years. Yet, if
Geology cannot foretell future facts, it enabled Sir Roderick Murchison
to foretell the discovery of Australian gold.

[B] February 1864.

TIMES OF ERASMUS AND LUTHER:

THREE LECTURES

DELIVERED AT NEWCASTLE, 1867.

LECTURE I.

Ladies and Gentlemen,--I do not know whether I have made a very wise
selection in the subject which I have chosen for these Lectures. There
was a time--a time which, measured by the years of our national life,
was not so very long ago--when the serious thoughts of mankind were
occupie