laws by which science or exact knowledge becomes effective in moulding human opinions and institutions. So long as the artificial organization of society proceeds blindly, its action must be abnormal and wild; but when the intellectual and moral conditions of true order and progress are demonstrated, we may at least foresee, if not actually hasten, the grand issues of the whole human development in its vital connections with all terrestrial and even celestial influences.

The first of these issues may be termed the Ultimate Cyclopedia of the Sciences. All previous organizations of the body of knowledge share in its existing schismatic and fragmentary state. Instead of building the temple of truth after the model of things, they exhibit creation as but a disjointed fabric, wrought out of the crude and composite material of creature fancy. Instead of exactly imaging the outer world of fact into the inner world of thought, they show it only in dim and broken reflection as marred by conceit and error. But when all phenomena are studied in their actual successions and coexistences, and not in mere detached portions, and the sciences are partitioned and cultivated accordingly, as an organic whole, then will the chaos which the universe seems to the human mind be changing to the cosmos which it is to the divine mind, and reason be fairly embarked in her career of ever nearing, though never reaching, that height of infinite knowl

edge from whence, by means of her mechanics, chemistry, and biology, she could review and forecast all material life, whether of atoms or of orbs, and, by means of her psychology, sociology, and theology, she could review and forecast all spiritual life, whether of terrestrial or of celestial races. "Now we see through a glass darkly, but then face to face; now we know in part, but when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away."

In close connection with this issue will also be unfolded the Ultimate Cyclopedia of Arts. At present, anything like a more systematic control of nature, by means of a more systematic knowledge of her connected laws, is scarcely thought of as open to human aspiration. As the sciences, broken and jarring, extend only to detached phenomena, without including their vital relations, so the corresponding arts, or means of modifying those phenomena, are in like manner partial, irregular, and conflicting. The frame of nature is forced to work but in piecemeal for her still unskillful master; and it is only in the electric telegraph that we have any hint of a more cosmical But when the sciences are logically organpower. ized, and the arts begin to flow from them as foregone aims rather than mere incidental. trophies, and with concerted action furthering each other, then will our increasing knowledge be ever yielding increasing control of all surrounding phenomena, and man be rising toward the predicted dominion over creation. The

ology will be giving that art of religion by which Providence predominates over society, and sociology that art of politics by which society predominates over the individual, and psychology that art of ethics by which mind predominates over matter, and biology, chemistry, and mechanics, those arts of terrestrial economy by which the whole material system is wrought anew for human service and divine glory.

And last of all, as the grand aggregate result, there will issue the Ultimate System of Society. Both the sciences and the arts are but functions of society, and by their degree of perfection determine its state and progress. As yet the most advanced civilization, racked and torn by conflicting ideas and interests, only reflects the existing disorder and defectiveness of knowledge and consequent waste and turmoil of skill. The whole modern organization of mankind is crude, forced, and heterogeneous, though already an immense advance upon that of antiquity. But when the seried sciences shall be shedding forth their seried arts, and all human societies be growing together in the knowledge and the mastery of their own phenomena, and of the cosmical phenomena upon which they act, until they are brought into harmony with nature and with God, then will a regenerate race be installed as the living head of the whole terrestrial organism, and the reins of the orb be exultingly gathered in its hands as it careers in the olympic race of worlds.

Then, too, may even the celestial sciences begin to blossom with celestial arts that shall knit together, in spiritual sympathy, all celestial races. Terrene, solar, and stellar influences, wielded by human prowess and prayer, may unfold the commerce of heaven, the telegraph of the skies, and the worship of the one universal Father, until the ripe, scient earth echoes back the anthem that erst hailed her novitiate, when "the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy."

Thus, in the consummation of the ultimate philosophy, will be involved the consummation of all things earthly. Science will then have triumphed over error, and art over nature. Reason will then have unfolded the whole riddle of the world, from its genesis to its apocalypse; and that cosmic ideal toward which the Creator has been moving through mighty epochs of creation, from the primordial planetary germ, by means of successive strata, flora, faunæ, and human nations and races, will at length stand forth revealed in the fullness of its life and glory.

At the height we have now reached, how wide the horizon! how grand the prospect! As from a lone eminence of faith, where the whole past and present and future of our race is spread out at one view, we look down upon that divine system of the world in which the end is known from the beginning. We see long ages rolling onward ere it shall all be fulfilled, vast

literatures and civilizations shed like forest leaves in its fulfilling, and unspeakable glories crowding thick and fast to its fulfillment, until, blinded by the vision, we almost wonder that mortal may gaze and live. But we will not doubt His fatherly goodness, who, having shown unto his human children even the far-off stars in their destined courses and periods, will surely deign not less that they should scan the track of his earthly promises, and give them some Pisgah where they may lie down and die content that other generations shall enter into that for which they have toiled.

And hence it behooves us next to consider, as being our part in this ultimate philosophy, the more practical questions of the time, the scene, and the mode of its inauguration.

For the time of its inauguration, all history points to the present age. An era, so fraught with marvels and rife in great movements, might well be crowned with this last and best birth of time. And we have only to review the past and survey the present in order to see that what could not hitherto, may at last now be hopefully attempted.

It could not have been undertaken at any previous period. The two great reformations, the one theological and the other philosophical, of which Luther and Bacon were the leaders, had first to proceed apart to their extremes, and so develop the existing need of their combination. At their spring and while in their incipiency neither feared or craved the other.