CONCENTRATED PROGRESS OF THE WORLD.
FEW phenomena are more remarkable, yet few have been less remarked, than the degree in which material civili- zation,—the progress of mankind in all those contrivances which oil the wheels and promote the comfort of daily life,— has been concentrated into the last half-century. It is not too much to say that in these respects more has been done, richer and more prolific discoveries have been made, grander achieve- ments have been realized, in the course of the fifty years of our own life-time than in all the previous life-time of the race, since states, nations, and politics, such as history makes us acquainted with, have had their being. In some points, no doubt, the opposite of this is true. In speculative philosophy, in poetry, in the arts of sculpture and painting, in the per- fection and niceties of language, we can scarcely be said to have made any advance for upwards of two thousand years. Probably no instrument of thought and expression has been or ever will be more perfect than Greek or Sanscrit ; no poet will surpass Homer or Sophocles ; no thinker dive deeper than Plato or Pythagoras ; no sculptor produce more glorious marble conceptions than Phidias or Praxiteles. It may well be that David, and Confucius, and Pericles were clothed as richly and comfortably as George III. or Louis XVIII, and far more becomingly. There is every reason to believe that the dwellings of the rich and great among the Romans, Greeks, and Babylonians were as luxurious and well appointed as our own, as well as incomparably more gorgeous and enduring. It is certain that the palaces belonging to. the nobles and monarchs of the Middle Ages,—to say nothing of abbeys, minsters, and temples,—were in nearly all respects equal to those erected in the present day, and in some iinportant points far superior. But in bow many other equally significs,nt and valuable particulars has the progress of the world been not only concentrated into these latter days, but singularly spasmodic in its previous march ?
Take two of the most remarkable inventions of all time, both of comparatively modern date,—gunpowder and printing. One is four, the other five, centuries old. How infinitesimal the difference between the firearms of the year 1400 and the year 1800! The "Brown Bess," the field guns, and the carronades with which Nelson and Wellington and Napoleon won their victories when we were young, were superior in little except readiness to the matchlocks and the cannon with which the Barons of the Middle Ages fought out their contests, as soon as they had discarded the bows and arrows which 'had sufficed for mankind from the days of Thermopylae, and earlier, to the days of Agincourt, and later. But now con- trast the progress since 1840 with the progress of the previous five hundred years. Compare the needle gun of Sadowa, or the Chassepot rifle of Mentana, or the Enfield of our own troops, or even the Minie of Inkerman, with the common musket which the veteran pedants of the Doke of Wellington's Army could scarcely be persuaded to discard. Compare the Armstrong, the Blakesley, or the Whitworth ordnance of to-day,—with their almost boundless calibre, their terrible projectiles, their marvellous precision, and their three-mile range,—with the round shot or shell fired from the field pieces which battered Badajoz and St. Sebastian. It is pro- bable that within fifty years from the first application of gun- powder to war, the destructive power of the fire-arms then invented was nearly as great as that of those used in the reign of Napoleon. It is probable that we are now within far less than fifty years of the furthest point to which the condi- tions of matter will permit that destructive power to be carried.
Then as to printing. The books printed within five-and- twenty years after the first use of movable types were as clear, as perfect, as beautiful specimens of typography as any that were produced five-and-twenty years ago. A little more rapidity and a great deal more cheapness make up, perhaps, the sum-total of the improvements in the typographic art between the time of Caxton and the time of Spottiswoode. But within the memory of those still young the wonderful art of rapid stereotyping has been introduced ; and to this alone it is owing that newspapers are able to supply the demands of their hundred thousand readers. It would be of course im- possible to compose more than one set of types within the very few hours allowed for the supply of each day's demand. It would be equally impossible to print off from that one set more than an eighth or a tenth part of the number of copies which the leading papers are required to furnish within three or four hours. But by casting from the first composed types as soon as completed, any number of fac-simile blocks can be produced, and from these, by the help of circular machines, an indefinite number of impressions can be struck off in an almost incredibly short space of time. Twelve thousand copies an hour, and even more, can, we believe, be easily produced by each machine. The multiplication thus rendered feasible is practically almost unlimited.
But it is in the three momentous matters of light, locomo- tion, and communication that the progress effected in this generation contrasts most surprisingly with the aggregate of the progress effected in all previous generations put together since the earliest dawn of authentic history. The lamps and torches which illuminated Belshazzar's feast were probably just as brilliant, and framed out of nearly the same materials, as those which shone upon the splendid fetes of Versailles when Marie Antoinette presided over them, or those of the Tuileries during the Imperial magnificence of the First Napoleon. Pine wood, oil, and perhaps wax, lighted the ban- quet halls of the wealthiest nobles alike in the eighteenth century before Christ and in the eighteenth century after Christ. There was little difference, except in finish of workman- ship and elegance of design—little, if any, advance, we mean, in the illuminating power, or in the source whence that power was drawn—between the lamps used in the days of the Pyramids, the days of the Coliseum, and the days of Kensington Palace. Fifty years ago, that is, we burnt the same articles, and got about the same amount of light from them, as we did five thousand years
ago. Now, we use gas of which each burner is equal to fif- teen or twenty candles ; and when we wish for more can have recourse to the electric light or analogous inventions, which are fifty-fold more brilliant and far-reaching than even the best gas. The streets of cities, which from the days of Pharoah to those of Voltaire were dim and gloomy, even where not wholly
unlighted, now blaze everywhere (except in London) with something of the brilliancy of moonlight. In a word, all the
advance that has been made in these respects has been made since many of us were children. We remember light as it was in the days of Solomon, we see it as Drummond and Fara- day have made it.
The same thing may be said of locomotion. Nimrod and Noah travelled just in the same way, and just at the same rate, as Thomas Assheton Smith and Mr. Coke of Norfolk. The chariots of the Olympic Games went just as fast as the chariots that conveyed our nobles to the Derby, "in our hot youth, when George thithird was King." When Abraham wanted to send a message to Lot he despatched a man on horseback, who galloped twelve miles an hour. When our fathers wanted to send a message to their nephews, they could do no better, and go no quicker. When we were young, if we wished to travel from London to Edinburgh, we thought ourselves lucky if we could average eight miles an hour,—just as Robert Bruce might have done. Now, in our old age, we feel ourselves aggrieved if we do not average forty miles. Everything that has been done in this line since the world began,—everything, perhaps, that the capacities of matter and the conditions of the human frame will ever allow to be done,—has been done since we were boys. The same at sea. Probably, when the wind was favourable, Ulysses, who was a bold and skilful navigator, sailed as fast as a Dutch merchantman of the year 1800, nearly as fast at times as an American yacht or clipper of our fathers' day. Now, we steam twelve and fifteen miles an hour with wonderful regularity, whether wind and tide be favourable or not ;—nor is it likely that we shall ever be able to go much faster. But the progress in the means of commu- nication is the most remarkable of all. In this respect Mr. Pitt was no better off than Pericles or Agamemnon. If Ruth had wished to write to Naomi, or David to send a word of love to Jonathan when he was a hundred miles away, they could not possibly have done it under twelve hours. Nor could we to our own friends thirty years ago. In 1867 the humblest citizen of Great Britain can send such a message, not a hundred miles, but a thousand, in twelve minutes.
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