--The expectation of the End of the World a corollary of
this belief.--Views of various nations.
Could the reason rest content with the belief that the universe always
was as it now is, it would save much beating of brains. Such is the
comfortable condition of the Eskimos, the Rootdiggers of California, the
most brutish specimens of humanity everywhere. Vain to inquire their
story of creation, for, like the knife-grinder of anti-Jacobin renown,
they have no story to tell. It never occurred to them that the earth had
a beginning, or underwent any greater changes than those of the
seasons.[193-1] But no sooner does the mind begin to reflect, the
intellect to employ itself on higher themes than the needs of the body,
than the law of causality exerts its power, and the man, out of such
materials as he has at hand, manufactures for himself a Theory of
Things.
What these materials were has been shown in the last few chapters. A
simple primitive substance, a divinity to mould it--these are the
requirements of every cosmogony.
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