Читать книгу Revisiting the Earth - James Langdon Hill - Страница 4

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To revisit the earth after one's departure from it has always been a common wish among men. The frequency with which this desire is expressed in biographies and in literature, keeps the project alive, and works it to the front in one's plans. Benjamin Franklin presents the thought in such attractive dress that we incline to adopt it for a programme. There is one item in his proposition that calls for argument at the bar of public opinion. It touches the length of the interval that should be suffered to elapse before the visit is made. So rapid is the growth, so radical are the changes, that if one's reappearance is too long delayed he would recognize nothing in the new conditions. He might as well set himself down in some other unfamiliar place. The postponement should not exceed a third of a century. It is his world that a man wants to see, and each one has his own. His antecedents and experiences have given to it a distinctive character.