Project Gutenberg's The Unseen World and Other Essays, by John Fiske

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Title: The Unseen World and Other Essays

Author: John Fiske

Posting Date: August 26, 2008 [EBook #1486]
Release Date: October, 1998

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE UNSEEN WORLD AND OTHER ESSAYS ***

Produced by Charles Keller

THE UNSEEN WORLD AND OTHER ESSAYS

By John Fiske

Transcriber's Note: This reviews Draper's Science and Religion and
contrasts two Dante translations.

TO
JAMES SIME.

MY DEAR SIME:

Life has now and then some supreme moments of pure happiness,
which in reminiscence give to single days the value of months
or years. Two or three such moments it has been my good fortune
to enjoy with you, in talking over the mysteries which forever
fascinate while they forever baffle us. It was our midnight talks
in Great Russell Street and the Addison Road, and our bright May
holiday on the Thames, that led me to write this scanty essay on
the "Unseen World," and to whom could I so heartily dedicate it
as to you? I only wish it were more worthy of its origin. As for
the dozen papers which I have appended to it, by way of clearing
out my workshop, I hope you will read them indulgently, and
believe
me

Ever faithfully yours,
JOHN
FISKE.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY, February 3, 1876.

CONTENTS.

I. THE UNSEEN WORLD
II. "THE TO-MORROW OF DEATH"
III. THE JESUS OF HISTORY
IV. THE CHRIST OF DOGMA
V. A WORD ABOUT MIRACLES
VI. DRAPER ON SCIENCE AND RELIGION
VII. NATHAN THE WISE
VIII. HISTORICAL DIFFICULTIES
IX. THE FAMINE OF 1770 IN BENGAL
X. SPAIN AND THE NETHERLANDS
XI. LONGFELLOW'S DANTE
XII. PAINE'S "ST. PETER"
XIII. A PHILOSOPHY OF ART
XIV. ATHENIAN AND AMERICAN LIFE

ESSAYS.

I. THE UNSEEN WORLD.

PART FIRST.

"What are you, where did you come from, and whither are you bound?"--the
question which from Homer's days has been put to the wayfarer in strange
lands--is likewise the all-absorbing question which man is ever asking
of the universe of