The White Pine news. [volume] (Treasure City, Nev.) 1868-1906, 1888-07-21
NO HUMAN BEING APPROACHED


not then exist.
NO HUMAN BEING APPROACHED
Anywhere near to the time when it
could be one of its Inhabitants. Moth
ing, nothing of what exists around US
now. was then in existence. Neverthe-
less, upon those ancient worlds SO
long since vanished, those who were
enlivening them had their current
history, fourishing cities, cultivated
fields, social organizations, wars and
laws. battles, aud tribunals, sciences
and arts, historians, economists. poll
ticians, theologians, and men of letters
who were striving to discern the true
from the false, AMI to write conscien-
ti0usly what they too called "univer-
sal history Fer them, all creation
had been stopped in their time and at
their place; for them. everything was
finished the rest of the universe with
out bounds, the rest of eternity with
out limits was lost in insigniticance,
ecilpsed by their actually. They did
not know that eternity was before
them and would be after they had
passed away.
They lived and learned and ignor-
ant, the illustrations and obscure, the
rich and the poor, the opulent and
misei able, the religious and the skep-
tical, as if their lives were never To
have an end. These. were accnmula-
ting, without forgetting for an instant,
u fortune which their sons were eager
To dlssipate; those, were dreaming
and contemplating, without care OF
the morrow; here some battailions
were inhaming the populace by their
patriotic clamors; yOnder some con-
plies were uniting in mystery their
quiverlng souls. Pressed AS they be-
lleved they were, by affairs of imper-
ious importance. carried away 10y the
allurements of pleasure, or lifted up
on tLe wings of ambition. they of
that time, rs of this, were plunging
in the vortex Of life.
THE HISTORY OF THE ETERNITY
which precedes US. is not only Of peo-
pie, of Kingdoms, and of empires
which have disappeared; 1t is OF entire
worlds, of groups of worlds, of archi-
pelagoes of planets, aud OF universes.
10 eternity there is no beginning.
The forces of nature have never been
inactive. In nature, eur measures of
time, our conceptions Of duration, do
not exist. For II there Is neither past
nor future. only perpetual present.
IL continues Interchangeable through
its incessant transformations and
manifestations. 1t is we who PISS
away; it remains.
| cannot reflect without terror upon
the innumerable beings who have
lived In the worlds that have disap-
peared; upon all the superior intel
lecls which have thought, acted and
guided humanity in the path of pro-
gress, oflight and of liberty. | connot
think OF those Platos. Marcus Aure-
liuses, Pascas and Newtons of the
vanished worlds without asking my
self what has become of them. II Is
very easy To reply that nothing of
them remains; tnat they have died as
they were horn; that all is dust and
returns to dust; the reply is easy but
not very satisfying. '
Ass1redly | have not the simple
pre:ension of resolving the great mys-
terry. 1t seems tn me that in treating
these uufathomable problems of eter-
..te AL Of trsHtasNw
much in the condition of ants endeav-
oring 10 inform themselves of the his
tory of France.
IT WOULD BE WITHOUT DOUBT
As useless as it would be childish
to lose ourselves in the nebulosities of
metaphysics by trying to find a solu-
ton which will probably always es-
cape US, but is it not a subject of con-
temptation worthy of our thoughts, tn
reflect upon that particular aspect of
creation. Time to reflect that through
out eternity other earths Inhabited
like ours, have floated in the light of
their suns, that through all eternity
there have been beings ENJOYING life,
and that during all time, the hour of
the end of their worlds has sounded
on the secular dial of destiny their
doom, shrouding in turn the universe
and beings in the winding sheet of
destruction and of obliviona 1t is
impossible for us to conceive begin
ming which had been preceded by an
M f..w