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235
The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft
·
George Gissing
146
XI.
Yet
that,
perhaps,
will
be
the
mind
of
coming
man;
if
not
the
final
attainment
of
his
intellectual
progress,
at
all
events
a
long
period
of
self-satisfaction,
assumed
as
finality.
We
talk
of
the
"ever
aspiring
soul";
we
take
for
granted
that
if
one
religion
passes
away,
another
must
arise.
But
what
if
man
presently
find
himself
without
spiritual
needs?
Such
modification
of
his
being
cannot
be
deemed
impossible;
many
signs
of
our
life
to-day
seem
to
point
towards
it.
If
the
habits
of
thought
favoured
by
physical
science
do
but
sink
deep
enough,
and
no
vast
calamity
come
to
check
mankind
in
its
advance
to
material
contentment,
the
age
of
true
positivism
may
arise.
Then
it
will
be
the
common
privilege,
"rerum
cognoscere
causas";
the
word
supernatural
will
have
no
sense;
superstition
will
be
a
dimly
understood
trait
of
the
early
race;
and
where
now
we
perceive
an
appalling
Mystery,
everything
will
be
lucid
and
serene
as
a
geometric
demonstration.
Such
an
epoch
of
Reason
might
be
the
happiest
the
world
could
know.
Indeed,
it
would
either
be
that,
or
it
would
never
come
about
at
all.
For
suffering
and
sorrow
are
the
great
Doctors
of
Metaphysic;
and,
remembering
this,
one
cannot
count
very
surely
upon
the
rationalist
millennium.
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