When the scene is past we think we know
it, though there is so much to see, and so little time to see it, that
our conceit of knowledge as regards the past is for the most part poorly
founded; neither do we care about it greatly, save in so far as it may
affect the future, wherein our interest mainly lies.
The Erewhonians say it was by chance only that the earth and stars and
all the heavenly worlds began to roll from east to west, and not from
west to east, and in like manner they say it is by chance that man is
drawn through life with his face to the past instead of to the future.
For the future is there as much as the past, only that we may not see it.
Is it not in the loins of the past, and must not the past alter before
the future can do so?
Sometimes, again, they say that there was a race of men tried upon the
earth once, who knew the future better than the past, but that they died
in a twelvemonth from the misery which their knowledge caused them; and
if any were to be born too prescient now, he would be culled out by
natural selection, before he had time to transmit so peace-destroying a
faculty to his descendants.
Strange fate for man! He must perish if he get that, which he must
perish if he strive not after.
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