Page:Fifty years hence, or, What may be in 1943 - a prophecy supposed to be based on scientific deductions by an improved graphical method (IA fiftyyearshenceo00grim).pdf/91

 were what are called philosophical, he never sought to help knowledge overthrow faith, weaken hope, or lessen charity. His youth was chaste and uneventful. That future then dawning and which has become of the silent past, was one of opportunities of many kinds for him, favored as he was in health, in mind, in personal appearance, in social position, and in this world's goods. He could have had a career in which he would have been known and honored of the multitude; bunt he preferred seclusion and mental improvement to publicity and social advancement. Yet at no time was his retirement so complete as to shut out from him a knowledge of the world's on-goings and of the sufferings and needs of his fellow-men; never did his absorbing occupations close his ears to the cry of the fatherless, or his purse against the appeal of the widowed and forsaken. He craved knowledge as the poet, the artist, crave fame; yet the rich storehouses of his mind were ever open to the inquiry of any earnest seeker after truth.

"He loved mystery only that he might throw its portals open to the light of day. 'A gentle man well-bred and of good name,' honor sat