Prophecy may vary between being an intellectual amusement and a seriousoccupation; serious not only in its intentions, but in its consequences.For it is the lot of prophets who frighten or disappoint to be stoned.But for some of us moderns, who have been touched with the spirit ofscience, prophesying is almost a habit of mind.
Science is very largely analysis aimed at forecasting. The test of anyscientific law is our verification of its anticipations. The scientifictraining develops the idea that whatever is going to happen is reallyhere now--if only one could see it. And when one is taken by surprisethe tendency is not to say with the untrained man, "Now, who'd ha'thought it?" but "Now, what was it we overlooked?"
Everything that has ever existed or that will ever exist is here--foranyone who has eyes to see. But some of it demands eyes of superhumanpenetration. Some of it is patent; we are almost as certain of nextChristmas and the tides of the year 1960 and the death before 3000 A.D.of everybody now alive as if these things had already happened. Belowthat level of certainty, but still at a very high level of certainty,there are such things as that men will probably be making aeroplanes ofan improved pattern in 1950, or that there will be a through railwayconnection between Constantinople and Bombay and between Baku and Bombayin the next half-century. From such grades of certainty as this, one maycome down the scale until the most obscure mystery of all is reached:the mystery of the individual. Will England presently produce a militarygenius? or what will Mr. Belloc say the day after to-morrow? The mostaccessible field for the prophet is the heavens; the least is the secretof the jumping cat within the human skull. How will so-and-so behave,and how will the nation take it? For such questions as that we need thesubtlest guesses of all.
Yet, even to such questions as these the sharp, observant man may riskan answer with something rather better than an even chance of beingright.
The present writer is a prophet by use and wont. He is more interestedin to-morrow than he is in to-day, and the past is just material forfuture guessing. "Think of the men who have walked here!" said a