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Untitled Article
and knowledge andAvisdoni ) beam - ing in full splendour from north to south , and from east to west * shall render this- ourjglobe the abode of perfection and of happiness . Some of our ameliorists even go
so far as to suppose , not only that wickedness of every species will be expelled at the command of sovereign wisdom , but also that disease will be subject to its man' date , -and disappear from amongst our posterity . A perusal of the history of the world gives us different expectations of the future state of mankind . If now were the only time -when knowledge was disseminated in the earth y we might listen with an enthusiastic delight to such pleasing reveries . But a strong presumption arises from a view of ancient tiroes , that the observation of Solomon is true , and that 3 tll the boasted wisdom of the moderns , whether it be the wisdom of arts and sciences ,-of politics , or of religion * , is no other than the revival of that Vhich h&s ldng teen lost : and though it may appear to many of our speculators , that we are improving upon the ¦ w isdom of our ancestors , we are , in fact , returning fr 6 m the devious paths into which our
forefathers had wandered , and are reviving truths which hkd been condemned to a temporary oblivion I may be thought to make a bold assertion , when I declare with Solomon , there is nothing new under the sun ; " butj if I am indulged with a candid reading , per * haps my assertion may be admitted to b 6 feasible .
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The knowledge pf man is at the best limited * He can see over no more than a prescribed space of ground and of time ; and when his visual or his mental organ has extended itself to its horizon , he is unable to look any farther ; and
if he feel inclined to shift the spot of his speculation , he must recede to one less distant . It is not long since the practice of medicine was conducted on
principles widely different from what it is now . Our ancestors were accustomed to cull the simples of their native fields , during the spring and the summer months , and in these they found antidotes
against the diseases of autumn , and the chilling effects of the winter . Our modern physicians cannot , perhaps , produce any proof that in those times the people died more rapidly , or suffered longer
under the sickening sensations of malady , than they do in the present day . But now the favourite articles of our apothecaries' shops , are brought from Asia , from
Africa , and from America . It is said that the qualities of our foreign drugs are the same as those which are to be gathered in England , but that , being raised in warmer climates , their juices are
more pungent , and therefore more efficacious . > And , under the idea that , the njore rapidly the effect is produced the more it will benefit
the patient , our hbme-grown medicines fere despised , and those only in esteem which cortie to us at the greatest expense , and from the greatest distance . But , cjuaere—are not these rapVtt operations often of the most
• From this general observation , I only wish to exclude the knowledge of a future , state , that grind doctrine ! of Christian revelation ; the view of that sfe ^ te tf as changeable as all other lucubrations of the human mind .
Untitled Article
456 On the Revival of Knowledge long lost .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), Sept. 2, 1810, page 436, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2408/page/12/
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