us to appreciate him. If it is an
overstatement to say that his soul reflected in miniature the very
soul of his age, [Footnote: L. Beclard, Sebastien Mercier, sa vie,
son oeuvre, son temps (1903), p. vii.] he was assuredly one of its
characteristic products. He reminds us in some ways of the Abbe de
Saint-Pierre, who was one of his heroes. All his activities were urged
by the dream of a humanity regenerated by reason, all his energy devoted
to bringing about its accomplishment. Saint-Pierre's idea of perpetual
peace inspired an early essay on the scourge of war.

The theories of Rousseau exercised at first an irresistible attraction,
but modern civilisation had too strong a hold on him; he was too
Parisian in temper to acquiesce for long in the doctrine of Arcadianism.
He composed a book on The Savage to illustrate the text that the true
standard of morality is the heart of primitive man, and to prove that
the best thing we could do is to return to the forest; but in the
process of writing it he seems to have come to the conclusion that the
whole doctrine was fallacious. [Footnote: Mercier's early essay: Des
malheurs de la guerre et des avantages de la paix (1766). On the
savage: L'homme sauvage (1767). For the opposite thesis see the Songes
philosophiques (1768). He describes a state of perfect happiness in a
planet where beings live in perpetual contemplation of the infinite.
He appreciates the work of philosophers from Socrates to Leibnitz, and
describes Rousseau as standing before the swelling stream, but cursing
it. It may be suspected that the writings of Leibnitz had much to do
with Mercier's conversion.] The transformation of his opinions was the
work of a few months. He then came forward with the opposite thesis that
all events have been ordered for man's felicity, and he began to work on
an imaginary picture of the state to which man might find his way within
seven hundred years.

L'an 2440 was published anonymously at Amsterdam in 1770. [Footnote: The
author's name first appeared in the 3rd ed., 1799. A German translation,
by C. F. Weisse, was published in London in 1772. The English version,
by Dr. Hooper, appeared in the same year, and a new edition in 1802; the
translator changed the title to Memoirs of the year Two thousand five
hundred.] Its circulation in France was rigorously forbidden, because it
implied a merciless criticism of the administration. It was reprinted in
London and Neuchatel, and trans