CHAPTER XII

GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

"On the other hand, after observing how the processes that have brought things to their present stage are still going on, not with a decreasing rapidity indicating approach to cessation, but with an increasing rapidity that implies long continuance and immense transformations; there follows the conviction that the remote future has in store, forms of social life higher than any we have imagined: there comes a faith transcending that of the Radical, whose aim is some re-organisation admitting of comparison to organisations which exist. And while this conception of societies has naturally evolved, beginning with small and simple types which have their short existences and disappear, advancing to higher types that are larger, more complex, and longer-lived, coming to still-higher types like our own, great in size, complexity, and duration, and promising types transcending these in times after existing societies have died away--while this conception of societies implies that in the slow course of things changes almost immeasurable in amount are possible, it also implies that but small amounts of such changes are possible, within "short periods"--Herbert Spencer: The Study of Sociology, Chapter XVI.

It has repeatedly been necessary, in the course of this survey, to stimulate the indulgence of the reader by a reminder, based upon the speed of our progress in the past and its steady acceleration in recent decades, that there is much more danger of underestimating than of exaggerating the advances likely to have been achieved a hundred years hence. In order to guard against misconception of the manner in which these advances will be brought about, it is now advisable to mention specifically what has been once or twice hinted parenthetically, namely, the fact that the progress of the Future is certain to be produced in a way perfectly capable of being deduced from the manner of our progress in the past. One of the most fruitful causes of error in existing prognostications has been the tacit assumption that, at some vague moment in the spacious middle-distance of the coming time, sudden and cataclysmal movements of society, and also unexpected and revolutionary discoveries in science, will occur: and it is as a precaution against one aspect of this mistake that a weighty quotation from the writings of one of the sanest and most perspicuous thinkers who have ever written upon that science of society which he may almost be said to have created has been recalled to the memory of the reader at the head of this chapter.

The forecast now almost concluded, imperfect and visionary as it must necessarily be, was commenced with some reflections on the rate of future progress made probable by the movements of the recent past. But nothing whatever can be deduced from what history, remote or recent, shows us, to suggest that any stable institution can be created otherwise than by steady development: it is only the speed of development which is likely to alter, and even this will only alter by a progression gaining impetus from the influence of its own components. Whether we consider material improvements effected by science and invention and the interaction of these; or social improvements effected by readjustment of the conditions of life forced upon us through the influence of intellectual and moral changes in the individual units of society making themselves felt as aggregated forces; the manner of attainment is nearly identical. It is commonly objected to this view, that whereas science and invention commonly progress in a movement characterised (so to speak) by a succession of jerks, social conditions change imperceptibly. But thus to object is to overlook the fact that, while no doubt society develops from time to time certain needs whose growth is so steady as to preclude the possibility of pointing to a final moment when the satisfaction of them has become at length inevitable, yet, when this satisfaction is gained by legislative enactment, there is always a moment when the public, ripe for a given reform, takes definite possession of it. For example (to name a comparatively recent case), no doubt the desire for some method by which the public could distinguish between foreign and home-made articles of merchandise had for some time been generally felt before the passing of the Merchandise Marks Act fixed a moment at which all dubiety on the subject would vanish, by endeavouring to require that any imported object bearing marks calculated to give the impression that it had been manufactured in England should also bear a definite and correct statement as to its place of origin. Whether we consider this enactment to have been desirable or not, it is impossible to deny that there was a specific moment when it took effect. And similarly, the bill for the repression of secret commissions in business has come so near to being passed through Parliament that many people imagine it to be already law, though it is not, at the time of writing, even (in a technical sense) before the legislature. Without question, therefore, public opinion is ripe for this reform, and has with great gradualness become so: but the reform itself, when it takes place (as it may quite conceivably have taken place by the time this book is printed), will occur suddenly. There will be a day when the manager of a business house could, with immunity from any overt punishment except the loss of his employment, receive a secret bribe from another house with which he was doing business on behalf of his master; and a succeeding day on which, for the same offence against commercial integrity, he could be charged before a magistrate and ultimately punished by the law. Thus the difference between scientific progress and social progress is not so great as has been sometimes imagined. And on the other hand, although to the casual observer scientific discoveries and new inventions often appear to have been attained at a single step, to a person interested in the particular branch of science, or the particular path of invention where a new achievement occurs, it is generally quite evident that the latter has been led up to by steady progress extending over a long period. The existence of unidentified constituents in atmospheric air, for instance, must have been long suspected before the isolation of argon gave, to the public eye, the impression of a sudden discovery: and astronomical disturbances have generally puzzled a great army of observers for a long time before the public is indulged by the announcement of a "new" star in the heavens.

To the reader who has been good enough to grant any validity at all to the arguments by which I have sought to show that, as time goes on, there will be a decreasing tendency to attempt desired reforms by legislative process, and an increasing tendency to make the public the guardian of its own security, it will be evident that any differences which exist between the nature of scientific progress and the nature of social progress are likely to be accentuated rather than diminished in the course of this century. A change brought about by the spontaneous activity of the people naturally occurs without the definite line of demarcation created by an Act of Parliament.

But there is one way in which the analogy between scientific and social progress will be noteworthy. It is a commonplace of industrial history that an improvement in one machine, or the introduction of some novel method of applying power, always produces, and may very often necessitate, modifications in a number of procedures not previously seen to be connected with it: and great results from little causes flow. No one foresaw, when Mr Edison discovered the differences in the electrical conductivity of carbon induced by slight variations of pressure--a discovery at first utilised only in the micro-tasimeter, the appliance used for measuring small changes in the size of objects submitted to it--that the same discovery would presently render commercially practicable the electrical transmission of speech and numerous other conveniences, themselves the progenitors of fresh inventions now in constant use. Similarly, political and social changes quite easy to foresee will undoubtedly have effects which in their entirety no one can possibly foresee. The rate of advancement cannot be calculated like a geometrical progression: all that we can hope to do is to realise more or less vaguely the acceleration which the action and interaction of anticipated (and often antagonistic) forces will produce; the general manner of the world's progress representing the resultant of their activities. What we must constantly keep in mind is the fact that changes in the institutions of society can only be stable when they are the result of corresponding changes in the temper of the age which yields them. As this temper is a thing of gradual development, we must believe that many temporary expedients will have to be tolerated by advanced thinkers since (as Spencer remarks) society can only be held together when the institutions existing, and the conceptions generally current, are in tolerable harmony. We can foresee many changes which will be in beneficent existence a hundred years hence; but it would be irrational to show impatience because these changes cannot be immediately proposed; since, being not yet in harmony with the current conceptions of the world, their immediate adoption would be mischievous instead of beneficial, and their results anarchic instead of stable. For a great many years we must go on passing laws for the regulation of social life, which we can quite easily perceive that the altered social life of a future age will not need, because they would be injurious to it. The zealous reformer who wishes, as we must all wish, to help the world in its wearied way to perfection must aim rather to assist the mind of people to demand greater reforms than it could as yet assimilate, than to procure the arrival of reforms for which society is not yet ripe, and must be content with the effort

"... to ease the burden of the world Laboriously tracing what must be And what may yet be better."

To say this is not to deprecate the greatest possible energy in all endeavour that makes for progress. The doctrine, founded upon a perception of the impossibility of regenerating society except by utilising the natural and evolutionary movement of society itself, that nothing ought to be done except to wait upon this movement, betrays an evident confusion of thought, akin to the fallacy of the schoolmen, commonly called realism, partly adopted by Comte. "Society" is not in itself an entity separable from the units of society; a progress of society is only possible as the result of human volition progressively exercised. What we have to look for is a steady enlightenment of public ideals, issuing in the triumph of wisdom over folly, of virtue over laxity, of progress over reaction and inertia. Always there will be differences of opinion, exercising a salutary check upon hasty public action, and giving time for the establishment of harmony between the spirit of the age and the new institutions which mark its progress.

Naturally there will have been many changes in the material of daily life which, either because they did not fit in with any one of the divisions into which a forecast of the future naturally fell, or because the consideration of them would have obscured the exposition of matters more immediately connected with each other, it has not been possible to mention. For example, we have had occasion to debate the methods by which men and women will transact the business of trade and commerce with the aid of certain foreseen conveniences; and we have glanced at the probable future aspect of dwellings, conveyances and similar conveniences; but nothing has been said as to the clothes in which our descendants are likely to attire themselves or the enjoyment of these advantages. The latter and a few other minor subjects may perhaps be considered now, without very much mutual connection.

The clothing of men and women happens to illustrate rather appropriately the very same tendency of civilised institutions to develop by gradual, rather than violent, changes which has just been referred to. For, while a good deal is heard about the "vagaries" of fashion, technical writers on the subject always seem to be able to predict some time in advance the movements of modish costume; and they sometimes even condescend to explain the processes of thought and observation by which their apparently inspired predictions are arrived at. Moreover, admitting, and allowing for, the extremest variations in detail, costume in civilised countries can hardly be said to have materially and intrinsically altered--cannot, that is to say, be said to have altered its fundamental characteristics--during a century, in the case of men, nor during a great many centuries in the case of women. Since the age of knee-breeches succeeded the age of doublet and hose, men have always protected their legs with "bifurcated integuments"--some sort of double tube secured to a copious bag enclosing the middle of the body--and the upper part of the trunk with a coat and waistcoat; while women have always worn bodices and petticoats of one shape or another. Neither has the loudest outcry against the irrationality of costume as a whole, nor even the ridicule showered upon single elements of it, ever had the least effect in producing revolutionary modification. Punch laughed in vain at crinolines; Lord Ronald Gower protests in vain against the silk "chimney-pot" hat. Will a more scientific and a more logical age replace absurd or otherwise objectionable garments by others more reasonably designed, to such an extent as to produce an entire change in the sartorial aspect of civilised peoples?

It is impossible to doubt that in some respects it will. Already sensible women decline to injure themselves and risk the injury of their possible offspring at the command of fashion. Tight-lacing and the wearing of such corsets as unnaturally compress the internal organs of the body are evidently near the end of their long reign. In a comparatively short time it is hardly possible to doubt that at least these, the most evidently injurious articles of clothing still surviving, will have joined the farthingale and the ruff in the lumber-room of the obsolete, and when what is really the more reasonable moiety of mankind is thus within easy reach of sacrificing to hygiene what was dedicated to a wholly mistaken conception of æsthetics, can we question that reforms in male dress founded upon convenience and reason will follow, even to the abandonment of the silk hat? If one were asked to suggest the various steps by which the ultimate costume of the century, whether male or female, will be arrived at, few would not boggle at the task. But the general nature of the more-or-less-perfected dress of a hundred years hence may perhaps be not unsuccessfully imagined, having in mind the considerations likely to determine it.

We may be quite certain that two characteristics will be demanded of all costume--that it shall give to all movements of the body the greatest possible freedom consistent with warmth, and that it shall be as easy as possible to put on and take off. The highly intellectual life of the next century will certainly be impatient of anything which detains it with occupations so uninteresting as the putting on and taking off of clothes from pursuits more attractive. Hence there will doubtless be a great deal of simplification of details, the greatest practical diminution in the number of single objects worn. The essentials of a satisfactory outfit will be, first, an inner garment next the skin, worn merely for cleanliness; next a middle garment for warmth, and finally an outer suit for protection. The innermost garment will no doubt be made of some fabric not much unlike the soft silky papers now made in Japan, so that it can be destroyed as soon as it is taken off. It is not in the least likely that so insanitary and degrading an occupation as that of the washerwoman can survive in a civilisation really advanced. The middle garment, completely cleansable by vacuum action and oxygenation, will of course have to be made of some vegetable fibre like cotton or flax. It will most likely be some developed form of "combination," easy to put on and take off, fastening by means of a single knot or button, and will be just tight enough to give freedom to the movements. Its warmth will be dependent upon contained air, and it, like everything else we wear, will be highly porous; for the importance of properly ventilating the skin, perfectly well understood even now, will by that time be also acted upon. Thus far male costume and female costume will be practically identical. There is no reason to expect, however, that this identity will be carried so far as the externals of dress, because realising (as we shall of course realise) the tendency of the sexes to become less divergent in their natural and moral characteristics, we shall instinctively seek to maintain all the salutary and romantic contrast that we can. But it is not to be believed that woman, already long since emancipated from the corset, will have continued a slave to the skirt, the petticoat and other restraining garments. With underclothes practically identical with the sensible garments of men, our female descendants will no doubt wear a costume much like what Miss Rehan wore as Rosalind--a tunic and knee-skirt (probably in one) with gaiters made of some elastic material.

Deprived as we shall be of animal products, the leather boot will naturally be unavailable, and a totally different kind of foot covering will be used. But it is not the absence of leather which will determine this change. Perfectly satisfactory boots of the present form are worn by some extreme vegetarians already, carrying consistency to its limit. With the disappearance of the horse from the streets, however--a disappearance which will doubtless be at least seventy years old by this time next century (for the motor car is fast pushing out the horse already)--the chief need for an entirely impervious foot-covering will have been obviated. Towns will be sanitary underfoot--they are disgusting now--and free from mud; while the drying appliances mentioned in an earlier chapter will clear away rain as fast as it falls. Consequently it will no longer be necessary to wear uncomfortable, unhealthy and deforming boots; the human foot will cease to be the source of discomfort it now more or less acutely is to nine people out of every ten, and we shall be much better walkers and athletes. For health will be the consideration dominating all our actions, health being a subject of careful tuition in every school: and as men and women will rarely need to use muscular strength in their work, they will gratify the natural yearning of healthy animals for exertion, in athletic sports, by no means confined to the male sex.

Whether fashion as an institution will continue to exist is doubtful, but probably it will not exhibit the extravagances, nor the capricious development which now characterise it, and "a general uniformity with infinitesimal differences," which has been defined as one of Nature's uniformities, will be perceptible in the natural development of the race.

Of course one object sought consciously or unconsciously to be attained by the use of fashions is class distinction; and similarly jewellery is probably worn much more because it is a sign of wealth than because of any intrinsic beauty which it is supposed to possess. At one time a man's occupation (and consequently his rank in society) could be ascertained by his dress; and sumptuary laws occasionally made such distinctions obligatory. It is no doubt of some law of his own time that Shakespeare was thinking [34] when he made the tribune in Julius Cæsar reprove the workmen for appearing on a business-day without the leather aprons which marked their trade:--

"What, know you not Being mechanical you ought not walk, Upon a labouring day, without the sign Of your profession?"

Will class distinction survive the democratising influence of a century?

The dress of our own time tends to obliterate the evidence of these distinctions; but a development from heterogeneity to homogeneity is a reversal of the usual law of progress, and it can hardly be called a sign of social advancement that artisans of our day generally wear, when at work, the cast-off clothes of the employing classes, bought second-hand, and for "Sunday best" often ape the fashions of the rich. In a hundred years' time assuredly no worker will be ambitious to give himself the aspect of an idler, and one may perpend the dry answer of an American to the remark that in the United States there is no leisure-class. "Oh, yes, there is," said the moralist, "only we don't call them that; we call them tramps." Everyone will take pride in his work, when work is no longer treated with the disgraceful contempt which we are only by degrees becoming ashamed of. Consequently the clothes worn at work will no doubt be, in every trade, specially designed to facilitate the exertions of the worker: and in the copious hours of leisure there will be variety, increased by the wearing of special garments for special amusements. It is difficult to believe that anyone, whatever his work, will dispense with the comfort of a complete change of dress when play-time comes: and the ingenious simplification of fastenings, and the reduced number of garments worn, will facilitate the enjoyment of this luxury. Everyone will dress for dinner--but not (one fancies) in a "swallow-tail" coat and stiff shirt. It is quite certain that all our clothes will be soft, supple, porous, light and warm a hundred years hence, and the clear-starcher will no longer have the opportunity to destroy them.

Some attempt has already been made to suggest the general domestic and architectural conveniences of the next century, but the subject of furniture has not been referred to in detail. Allowing for the fact that animal fabrics, as wool, leather, etc., will be absent, there is no particular reason why chairs, carpets and curtains should be very different from what they are now. No doubt light metallic alloys will often be used in the framework of chairs and tables instead of wood, because the tendency of civilisation is to make things lighter and less cumbersome whenever this is possible. At one time it might have been thought that upholstery, carpets and curtains would have to be dispensed with. But to a thoughtful observer there must always have been a difficulty here. A wooden chair, and even a rattan one, however cunningly shaped, is so extremely discomfortable to sit in without cushions, that it was easier to imagine that invention would correct the unhealthiness of cushions and stuffing, than that an advanced age would consent to dispense with these luxuries. The manner in which the former solution of the difficulty would be attained was actually foreseen by the present writer before the introduction of vacuum cleaning was accomplished, and several passages in an earlier chapter had to be rewritten when what had been somewhat fancifully described as a convenience of the future suddenly became an existing factor of the present: and in one or two places innovations have similarly called for changes in the text--a circumstance which, it is to be hoped, will give pause to critics disposed to condemn certain suggestions in this book as chimerical. [35] Obviously, now that we can thoroughly cleanse and free from every particle of dust by a simple mechanical process any fabric or mass of fabrics, there is no longer any reason to expect that our descendants will, on hygienic grounds, find it necessary to dispense with comforts so essential to restful leisure as easy-chairs, soft carpets and wall hangings.

On the other hand, it is quite certain that numerous inventions will enhance and beautify the luxury of an age where rational luxury will reign universally. One source of frequent discomfort to-day is the necessity of living always in rooms of one size. Whether we sit alone, or entertain a number of friends, the same apartment has to serve our needs: consequently we are crowded on one day and chilly on the next. With combustion abolished as a heating device, there will be no objection against light sliding walls--a convenience long since adopted by our allies the Japanese--which would be rather dangerous nowadays and not particularly desirable, at all events in England, where we have no means of warming most rooms except a fire on one side, and no means of cooling them at all except by letting in draughts and noise through the window. No doubt when matches and fireplaces, about equally causative of conflagration, have vanished, and when we have invented methods of warming the air in houses without the horrible drying of it caused by the American pipe-stove system, houses will be much more lightly built: and it is certainly not going to be impossible to use thin, light walls without being able to hear in each room every sound that occurs in the next. Concurrently, we shall be able to change the size of rooms--a convenience greater than might be supposed by those who have not thought about the matter. In summer we shall just as easily cool our houses as we shall heat them in winter. Very few servants will be required (another great comfort); and lighting arrangements will naturally be free from their present inadequacy.

Except that no one has yet troubled to think about it, there is surely no reason why bathing should be such a tedious operation as it is. Probably the speediest dresser of our own day does not consume less than a quarter of an hour over his morning tub and the operation of drying himself. A hundred years hence, people will be so avid of every moment of life, life will be so full of busy delight, that time-saving inventions will be at a huge premium. It is not because we shall be hurried in nerve-shattering anxiety, as it is often complained that we now are, but because we shall value at its true worth the refining and restful influence of leisure, that we shall be impatient of the minor tasks of every day. The bath of the next century will lave the body speedily with oxygenated water delivered with a force that will render rubbing unnecessary, and beside it will stand the drying cupboard, lined with some quickly-moving arrangement of soft brushes, and fed with highly desiccated air, from which, almost in a moment, the bather will emerge, dried, and with a skin gently stimulated, and perhaps electrified, to clothe himself quickly and pass down the lift to his breakfast, which he will eat to the accompaniment of a summary of the morning's news read out for the benefit of the family, or whispered into his ears by a talking-machine.

Does this manner of beginning the day sound like a nightmare? That is only because the purpose of it has been overlooked. Not because they will be "short" of time will our descendants thus arrange their lives, but because they wish to reserve as much time as possible for culture (physical as well as intellectual) and for thought; which the better distribution of wealth and labour will facilitate; while labour itself, everywhere performed intelligently and with interest, will be no longer irksome. The working man will ply his trade with zest--working for himself and family--instead of seeking every opportunity to shirk and evade it. And, his task accomplished, he will hasten to enjoyments as elevating as labour itself.

Will man then, the critic may ask incredulously, have really been perfected in a century? Decidedly not. But unless we doubt the evidence which shows that improved institutions not only arise out of improved popular character, but also help to promote it, we cannot resist the inference that the removal of many causes of degradation must bring us nearer to perfection, to which the moral evolution of the race is slowly proceeding. There is nothing Utopian in the belief that honesty, truthfulness, respect for the rights of others, will be fostered by the increased intelligence of the new age; and from the moment when this intelligence, disseminated throughout all society, begins to make the moral improvement of the race a prime object in every social reform, in every piece of legislation (emancipating as well as restrictive) we have a right to expect the progress of morality to receive a marked impetus. "Nature, careless of the single life," will be assisted in the perfecting of the moral type, and the dishonest man, the liar, the sensualist, and the man too stupid to be unselfish, will become with every decade less fit for survival, because the same unwisdom which is at the bottom of his faults will handicap him in the battle of life, will hinder him in the competition for the right to perpetuate his characteristics in children born of his loins. It is only those who conceive of the race as capable of remaining stationary, or moving backward, in morals, while in every other respect it moves forward with constantly-increasing momentum, who imagine that cunning and unscrupulousness are likely to be fostered by enlarged civilisation. So long as we allow the world to be exploited for the selfish advantage of a handful of millionaires, no doubt these characteristics will continue at a premium. But it is impossible to believe that the irresistible power of the mass of humanity will submit in perpetuity to be thus made the tools of a minority. If the "ruling" classes wished to maintain that status they should have kept the people from the schoolroom. Numbers must inevitably prevail, and the world will have reorganised itself in ways which, if we could foresee them in their entirety, would suggest an almost unthinkable perfection.

INDEX

A

Actor, the (his art), 61 Agriculture, economies in, 216 ----, scientific development of, 127 Alcohol, abandonment of, 36 ---- and the law, 242 ---- and crime, 244 Alphabet, the, 42 Anæsthetics, 120 Animal food, abandonment of, 34, 126 Antisepsis and asepsis, 10 Arboriculture, 217 Architecture, 194 Argon, 11, 290 Art, A.D. 2000, 196 Atheism, 177

B

Bacillary diseases, destruction of, 123 Ballot, the (its inadequacy), 262 Bathing, A.D. 2000, 305 Bedroom, the, A.D. 2000, 25 Bellamy, Edward, 5 Bible, inspiration of the, 176 Birth-rate, the (its artificial restriction), 14 Bread, wholemeal, 34 Buildings, high, 17

C

Calculating machines, 45 Canada (its future), 97 Casabianca, 155 Cereals, 35 Climate, artificial manipulation of, 128 Clothes, A.D. 2000, 294 Coal (its utilisation), 7 ----, exhaustion of, 104 Combination, voluntary, as a mode of self-government, 210 Comte, Auguste, 293 Conscience, public, 185 Cooper, E. H. (The Twentieth Century Child), 145, 150, note Co-operation, 51 Cooking, 22 Crime and heredity, 251 ---- and poverty, 244 ---- elimination, 247 Criminal appeals (in law), 257

D

Daily Telegraph, the, 84 Darwin, Charles, 179 Davy, Sir Humphry, 6 Diplomacy, A.D. 2000, 269 Domestic servants, 18, 24 Drainage, 25, note, 127

E

Economy in agriculture, 215 ----, relation of prices to, 205 ---- in use of wood, 215 Edison, T. A., 291 Education, A.D. 2000, apparatus of, 140 ----, art in, 171 ----, books in, 163 ---- by pleasure, 149 ----, corporal punishment in, 144 ----, crime in relation to, 234 ----, history in, 170 ----, rational obedience in, 154 ----, languages in, 164, 166 ----, literature in, 171 ----, mathematics in, 163 ----, mixed (of boys and girls), 146 ----, phonograph in, 141, 303, note ----, physical science in, 161 ----, punishments in, 158 ----, specialised, 162 ----, Spencer on, 151 note Education, Intellectual, Moral and Physical (H. Spencer), 151, note Electricity, the end of its age, 11 ----, wireless transmission of, 114 Eton, punishments at, 144 Euclid, 157, 158 Evolution (the term), 37, note

F

Fashion, A.D. 2000, 299 Flying-machines, 27, 55 Foods, vegetable, 33 Freight transportation, 46 Furniture, A.D. 2000, 302

G

Games in education, 143 Gases, liquefied, as a source of power, 116

H

Handicrafts, revival of, 50 Horse traffic (its abolition), 22 House construction, 20 ---- cleaning, 21 Huxley, Thomas H., 6, 179 Hydrogen, uses of, 9, 102 Hypnotism, 131

I

Idæography, Chinese, 166, note

J

Journalism and literature, 92 Jury, trial by, 257

K

Kelvin, Lord, 108 Kipling, Rudyard, 147 Kitchen, the, A.D. 2000, 22

L

Lamb, Charles, 158 Land tenure, 99, 259 Lang, Andrew, 123, note, 164, note, 168 Language, a "universal," 165 Languages, modern, 19 Literature, A.D. 2000, 193, 198 ---- and journalism, 92 Latey, John, 144 Law, the, A.D. 2000, 233 ---- ----, alcohol and, 241 ---- ----, changes in, necessitated by new conditions, 240 ---- ----, cost of civil suits to be borne by Government, 253 ---- ----, education and, 234 ---- ----, marriage and, 278 ---- ----, methods of legislation, 259 ---- ----, "new offences" and, 234 ---- ----, penology and, 249 ---- ----, poverty and, 244 ---- ----, protective enactments injurious where avoidable, 239 ---- ----, protecting property, 245 ---- ---- ----, the person, 246 ---- ----, trial by jury, 257 Legislation, reform of, 266

M

Macaulay, Lord, 193 Manures (see Agriculture), 127 Marriage, law of, A.D. 2000, 278 Medicine, progress of, 119 Memory (children's), 151 Merchandise Marks Act, 289 Middleman, the, 88 Morality and education, 154 ---- as affected by education, 136, 139, 235. ---- as affected by progress, 64 ----, improving tendency of, 307 ----, progress of, 136 Morris, William, 5 Motor-cars, slot-worked, 31 Music, A.D. 2000, 58, 201 ----, Oriental, 201 Musician, the (his art), 62

N

Napoleon, 4 Newspapers, advertisements in, 83 ----, editorship of, 68 ----, A.D. 2000, how illustrated, 80 ---- ---- ----, language of, 82 ---- ---- ----, how printed, 79

O

Ocean cities, 98 ---- ---- and the anhydrator, 99 ---- ----, urban traffic in, 98 Oersted, 117 Oxygen, uses of, 9, 26, 102 Ozone and ozonators, 27

P

Payn, James, 144 Parliament, reform of, 260 Penology, principles of, in A.D. 2000, 249 Philosophy, A.D. 2000, 109 Phonograph, the, 40 ---- in education, 141, 303, note ----, the printing, 41 Photography, chromatic, 59 Plato, 188 Plumbers (their technical education), 25 Poetry of the future, 193 Post Office, the, 276 ---- in A.D. 2000, 44 Power, economy of, 212 Prayer in A.D. 2000, 190 Press, freedom of the (its possible restriction), 247 Prices, relation of, and economy, 205 ----, significance of, 32 Progress, rate of, 1, 135, 288 Psychical faculties, development of, 65, 130 Punishment, capital, 237, 257 Punishments, violent, will be abandoned, 238 (see Penology)

R

Radiation in therapeutics, 119 Radium, 11, 108, 118 Railway transport, 27 Recent Development of Physical Science (Whetham), 116, note Referendum, 265 Religion, A.D. 2000, 175 ----, education and, 182 ----, high civilisation and, 175 ----, indifference towards, 181 ----, morality and, 186 ----, mysticism and, 186, 188 ----, "natural," 188 ----, philosophy and, 187 Review of Reviews, the, 71 Roadways, moving, 30

S

Sahara, desert of, proposal to flood, 95 Saleeby, Dr. C. W., 108, 123, note Salpetrière Hospital, 130 Scott, Sir Walter, 4 Sculpture, A.D. 2000, 198 Sea air, 26 ----, the, mineral wealth of, 101 ---- ----, utilisation of, 95 Shakespeare, 186 Ships, A.D. 2000, 30 Shorter, Clement K., 144 Siberia (its future), 93 Socialism, 51, 206, 210, 273 Society, gradual progress of, 287 Socrates, 186 Spencer, Herbert, 18, 146, note, 188, 287, 292 Sports, athletic, 54 State, the, usurpation of wrong functions by, 74, 273 (see Socialism) Steam-engine, the (its imperfections), 7 Suburbs, 15

T

Talking-machines (see Phonograph), 61 Teleautoscope, the (an instrument for seeing by electricity), 43 Telephones, recording, 39 Telephony, wireless, 38 Theatre, the, 60 Times, The, 68, 71, 84 Tobacco, 214 Trade, retail (its development and changes), 86 Traill, H. D., 169 Transmutation of matter, 119 Travel, pleasures of, 57 Tyndall, John, 151, note

U

Unemployed, problem of the, 48

V

Vacuum, cleaning by, 21 Vice, effect of progress on, 64

W

Wages, 33 ---- and co-operation, 51 War, abolition of, predicted, 76 ---- correspondence, 74, note, 76, 78, note ----, its supposed advantages discussed, 226 Waste by alcohol, 215 ---- by animal food, 215 ----, illness regarded as a, 214 ----, sewage disposal a, 215 ----, war as a, 219 (see Economy) Water, electrolysis of, 8 Weaklings, perpetuation of, 125 Wealth, limitation of, 49 Wellington, 5 Wells, H. G., 5, 20 Whetham, W. C., 116, note Woman (her political influence), 283 ---- (her political influence in America), 284 ---- (her political influence in New Zealand), 284 ----, position of, A.D. 2000, 283, (see Law and Marriage) Workmen, condition of, 52 ----, trains for, 15

NOTES

[1] Drains, it might be supposed, would disappear altogether from the scheme of things in favour of some kind of destructors. For reasons connected with a more enlightened view than we have yet reached of certain aspects of terrestrial economy, however, I think they will, with modifications, still exist.

[2] The chief difficulty in utilising the useful integument of wheat disappears when the whole grain is finely milled.

[3] It is necessary to say here, as an offset to possible misconstruction, that the word "evolution" has been purposely abstained from. The processes of evolution are far slower than the changes here contemplated. The latter are voluntary and purposeful, involving no constructional alteration in the physical frame of man, but only functional modifications, intentionally inaugurated and pursued.

[4] There is a contrivance already in existence which not only weighs what is placed upon it, but can also be made to calculate the value of the goods at any desired rate per ounce, pound or hundredweight.

[5] A practical objection to this principle may be here anticipated and answered. Politicians may say that for any one nation to be the pioneer in the adoption of such a policy would have the effect of driving trade and manufactures into other countries where the restriction did not exist. But there are so many highly necessary reforms open to a similar objection that I think there is no doubt that ultimately the jurists of all nations will agree upon some arrangement for universal legislation, whereby laws not affecting the relations of one country with another will be simultaneously enacted by a comity of nations. We have already one very imperfect example of such a procedure in the Convention against bounty-helped sugar.

[6] Not of course in the artistic sense of the word; nor is the supersession of art by optical process in the least contemplated here. The psychological interest of art will have appreciators more and more numerous in virtue of the diffusion of culture confidently anticipated.

[7] Ante, Chapter I.

[8] Ante, Chapter I.

[9] Kipling: The Five Nations.

[10] It can hardly be disputed that the British generals in the late war in South Africa would have done well to cut the cables altogether, or at all events reserve them exclusively for their own use. There is very good evidence that, in spite of the interdiction of "coded" messages, information passed both ways between the enemy and his agents in Europe. The resolute manner in which the Japanese kept newspaper correspondents away from the scene of action until no action remained for them to correspond about, shows conclusively what will become of the war-reporter during the few remaining decades which separate us from the final disappearance of moribund war itself from the planet.

[11] Ante, Chapter III.

[12] Ante, Chapter IV.

[13] Ante, page 7.

[14] That is to say, the gases which are most difficult to liquefy, and which consequently store up most energy in liquefying, viz., hydrogen, oxygen and nitrogen, as distinguished from ammonia, carbon-dioxide, chlorine, and other gases relatively easy to liquefy.

[15] The Recent Development of Physical Science. By W. C. Whetham, F.R.S., 1904. London: John Murray.

[16] I do not forget that a good deal of what is on record as an account of experiments in transmutation is purely mystical writing, and that when Paracelsus and some of the French alchemists describe what appear to be chemical experiments they are in reality referring to something quite different. But the learned in these matters tell me that one of their chief difficulties arises from the fact that, contemporary with the mystics, there were other investigators who, not having the key to the occult significance of the masters' writings, really devoted themselves to research, some valuable, if accidental, results of which have come down to us and are recorded in all text-books of chemistry.

[17] Ante, page 79.

[18] I might have "boggled" (to use one of Mr Andrew Lang's stately colloquialisms) before this suggestion, but for a remark by Dr C. W. Saleeby, which may here be quoted, to keep me in countenance. "Malaria," he writes in Nova Medica, Nov. 1904, "which causes more illness than any other disease, is already obsolescent. Tuberculosis, which causes more deaths than any other disease, can be disposed of, apparently, whenever the human race, now mightily smitten with internecine strife, decides that this campaign against a common foe is worth while. It takes some seconds to realise--or begin to realise--what the extinction of tuberculosis will signify in private and hospital practice. Yet the extermination of the last tubercle bacillus is an event quite certainly hidden in the womb of time--time pregnant by science."

[19] Ante, page 34.

[20] Ante, Chapter III.

[21] The Twentieth Century Child. Chapter III.

[22] Spencer: Study of Sociology. Chapter XV.

[23] Having properly decided that it is well for children to be fed plainly while at school, parents take the greatest pleasure in alleviating this plainness by "tuck baskets" during term, and the most wicked and immoral palate-tickling during holidays. Indeed an excessive appetite seems to be regarded even by quite sensible people as rather an ornament to the juvenile character. Mr Cooper, whose charming book, The Twentieth Century Child, has already been referred to, describes with what I am afraid is approval the incident of a boy whom he brought away from school for a pleasure-trip just after lunch, and who cheerfully devoured a second lunch in the company of his friend. Assuredly our descendants will make no such mistakes as this.

[24] Tyndall "On the Importance of the Study of Physics as a Branch of Education," a lecture at the Royal Institution: quoted by Herbert Spencer in his Education, Intellectual, Moral and Physical, a work which, though not very practical, contains a mass of very suggestive matter on a subject which no one else, so far as I am aware, has approached in quite the same spirit. As this book has been reprinted at so low a price as sixpence, there is no excuse for any parent who is unacquainted with its absolutely invaluable teachings.

[25] I think Mr Andrew Lang.

[26] Should we ever have a "universal" language, is it altogether chimerical to imagine that it might be an idæographic one? Provided that some simple code of idæographic writing were invented to denote the very limited number of concrete notions essential to commercial correspondence, no one who has had occasion to study Chinese, even in the most cursory manner, would think it at all a severe effort of the imagination to conceive of an idæographic notation as being used for business correspondence. In Chinese, the unit of expression is an idea. Words which relate to kindred subjects include, in their idæographs, the sign for the connecting link. Thus the idæograph for "agriculture" is made up of the sign for "strength" and for "a field." Consequently, although the Japanese language when spoken sounds so entirely unlike Chinese that a person knowing neither can distinguish one from the other when heard across the width of a street, the Japanese can read Chinese books without difficulty, and one form of printing can be read by the Chinese of the North and those of the South, although the spoken dialects differ so much that "pidgin" English is often used by the two as a means of spoken communication. An idæographic medium of commercial writing (not of course so archaic nor so cumbersome as Chinese, but philosophically devised for the purpose) would release the student from all difficulties of speech and accent; he would always name the signs to himself in his own language.

[27] A method, it may be added, which can very usefully be practised now. Those of us who "rub-up" our French or German a little before a summer holiday by reading a novel or two, would always find the results of this rubbing-up process to be greatly more effective, when presently utilised abroad, if we would read always aloud instead of in silence according to the usual procedure.

[28] Over-civilised, if one please, but I do not admit for an instant that man can be over-civilised.

[29] Ante, Chapter III.

[30] Ante, Chapter II.

[31] Against some methods of securing this object no doubt the unintelligent sentimentality of the present time would rebel; but if any inconsistency be detected in my suggestion that the next century, which is expected to be even milder than this, will accept them, it only needs to be replied that the gentleness of our descendants will be a reasonable and ordered gentleness, not a mere effect of morbid sentimentality. They will not hesitate before an apparent and temporary cruelty which is capable of preventing much greater suffering in a much greater number of persons. The crime of permitting children to be born with brains abnormally predisposed to evil of any sort will more greatly revolt an intelligent age than any conceivable measure adopted for its prevention.

[32] It may, perhaps, be thought that the disuse of trial by jury would be liable to perpetuate a somewhat glaring abuse of our present jurisprudence--the disproportionately severe repression of offences against property as compared with the disproportionately light repression of offences against the person. But the mere fact that the "unlearned" bench is conspicuously inept in this particular is no reason for thinking that "learned" courts would be so: and meantime, as judges, like other men, are children of their epoch, we may suppose that the increased mildness of the new age will be reflected here as elsewhere, and that extenuating circumstances will be allowed more weight in determining a sentence for larceny, and less weight in determining a sentence for assault.

[33] Study of Sociology, Chapter XV.

[34] At least this was the opinion of the editors of the Clarendon Press edition of the Plays.

[35] While actually correcting the proof sheets I read in a London evening newspaper, The Star, that gramophones had been utilised in certain schools for the teaching of foreign languages, a device I had suggested in the chapter on Education as likely to be adopted in the schools of the future.

THE END

COLSTON AND COMPANY, LIMITED, PRINTERS, EDINBURGH

End of Project Gutenberg's A Hundred Years Hence, by T. Baron Russell