Publisher's Synopsis
Excerpt from Introductory Lecture Delivered to the Medical Class of the Berkshire Medical Institution: August 5, 1847
It is yet to be seen to what extent free institutions and equality of rights and privileges are to raise our country. Judging from the past, what can be the end of the progress? It is illimitable. What indeed will next come up in the scale of advancement, no mind can tell. The month before the Steam Engine was employed, by the genius of Fulton, in actu al operation in navigation, would have presented a scene of the most intense interest, if it could only have been known to the enterprising part of the world what a mighty instrument was being applied to produce changes and results which have aston ished the world, and the present light of which is only the dawn of the day to come. So of the American Telegraph: if it could only have been foreseen in its operations and present attained consequences, and if it could have been known that Morse waspassing his nights sleepless and agitated as his mind vibrated on the waves of its mighty effort and swelled with the tumult of his own thoughts laboring for action, what an excitement would have shaken the world of mind. Sleep would have fled from the earth, and minds would have groaned together for the stu pendons results to be accomplished. But all was still except in one heart and the world of mind rolled on in its easy course. The thunder soon followed the lightning, and shook the whole country. Yet our cold reason could embrace only a tithe of the consequences, and the wary capitalist doubted whether it would pay three per cent. On the investment. But already have the lines been doubled and tripled to perform the accumulating business, and adequate capital secured, and hundreds on hun dreds of miles been added to the line which is constantly extending. So it ought to be and must be. The world cannot be pre pared for the results till they are seen and felt. This is the noiseless course of that Divine Providence, which sees the end from the beginning, and adapts the whole to the reason and wants of his noblest creation below. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
