e must judge our predecessors by the rules by which we
hope posterity will judge us, making a generous allowance for the
imperfections of reason, the infirmities of character, and especially
for the prejudices of the times. To have devoutly believed in the
existence of a human soul, to have looked forward to its continuing
after the death of the body, to have expected a future state of rewards
and punishments, and to have drawn therefrom, as a philosophical
conclusion, the necessity of leading a virtuous life--these, though
they may be enveloped in a cloud of errors, are noble results of the
intellect of man.

[Footnote 52: Distinguished as an author in chemistry
and physiology, and as a philosophical historian: a native of England,
but long a professor in New York University.]

* * * * *

From "Thoughts on the Future Civil Policy of America."

=_216._= PROSPECTIVE INFLUENCES OF THE REPUBLIC.

Now, when, we consider the position of the American continent,--its
Atlantic front looking upon Europe, its Pacific front looking upon
Asia,--when we reflect how much Nature has done for it in the wonderful
river system she has bestowed, and how varied are the mineral and
agricultural products it yields, it would seem as if we should be
constrained by circumstances to carry out spontaneously in practical
life the abstract suggestions of policy.... Great undertakings, such
as the construction of the Pacific Railroad, pressed into existence by
commercial motives and fostered for military reasons, will indirectly
accomplish political objects not yielding in importance to those that
are obvious and avowed.

A few years more, and the influence of the great republic will
resistlessly extend in a direction that will lead to surprising
results.... The stream of Chinese emigration already setting into
California is but the precursor of the flood that is to come. Here are
the fields, there are the men. The dominant power on the Pacific Ocean
must necessarily exert a controlling influence in the affairs of Asia.

The Roman empire is regarded, perhaps not unjustly, as the most imposing
of all human political creations. Italy extended her rule across the
eastern and western basins of the Mediterranean Sea, from the confines
of Parthia to Spain. A similar central, but far grander, position is
occupied by the American continent. The partitions of an interior and
narrow sea are replaced by the two great ocea