Robert Grimshaw

“ The gamut of odor has been discovered, and harmonies of perfumes are made just like those of colors, or of musical tones. Concerts are given at which, the great perfume-masters of the day produce chords and pleasing successions of odors, which draw great crowds of the most refined, fully appreciative of the delights there offered.
Flower-culture is a national pastime. Where [68] there are no large gardens, small patches are devoted to floriculture; and in the most crowded city, window-boxes hold the latest new hybrid plants and make the most frequented thoroughfares a garden of beauty. ”

“ But that the scientific seer may surely venture on the task of piercing the fogs which screen the past from our curious eyes, or of lifting the veils which hide the future from our anxious gaze, the simple squares and lines of the engineer must be so developed and supplemented as to represent more than two sets of conditions at once. ”

“ A newly-discovered process transmits from the scene of any great event, as a conflagration, convention, or battle, an accurate photograph in colors, which is reproduced in one or a hundred cities, there to be printed in the local journals, which latter have become, in fact, hourly bulletins of the on-goings of the neighborhood and of the world at large.
Telegraphic and telephonic communication with moving railway trains has been for forty years an accomplished fact, so that the business man, desiring to keep up his correspondence from and with his office, while travelling, can readily do so ”

“ Temple and town have gone to the ground, but it has endured. It was the precursor of the great symbolic Temple of Solomon, built by the descendants of those shepherd builders, students of the heaven’s wide pathless way, and which although destroyed, could be reconstructed by the measures and dimensions familiar to our mystic craft, and recorded in that great book of symbols, the Bible. ”

“ The other evening you heard the comments of our brethren as to the great money value of a knowledge of the near future; but not one word was said as to what an incalculable boon to the human race would be the revelation of the general condition of men, morals, law, liberty, and all things great and small, at each decade yet to come. ”

“ To be sole heir and executor of a property so valuable as this arduous life-work must be, should elate any struggling youth of twenty-two; but to be the mouthpiece of prophecies more wonderful, more far-reaching, more detailed, yet more universal, than any ever before given to the world, be they inspired or uninspired, was enough to turn his head completely. ”

“ A striking landscape feature is the great number of windmills, stately, picturesque and beautiful, which lazily flap their sails or merrily spin with the brisk breeze, generating and storing up power for the houses upon which they are perched. ”

“ The street paving is monolithic (that is, all in one piece) , of an artificial stone as hard as good limestone; giving a surface sufficiently gritty to ensure good hold for the feet of the few horses which are employed, and yet leaving the surface smooth, in order that it may be kept clean and give good traction for the short space of time in which vehicles (which ordinarily take the tracks on the plate-ways) are running over it.
In New York City, Arcade railways, with various ramifications, extend along the main arteries of travel, and give rapid transit to citizens and visitors alike. ”

“ New varieties of food-plants have been developed from wild plants, while fertilizers are employed to dissolve the rocks that are in the soil and render them at once absorbable by the plant roots.
In metallurgy, surprising progress has been made. Several new noble metals have been discovered in the Ural Mountains and in Africa, giving scientists and jewellers a variety in color, [54] hardness and weight, as surprising as pleasing. The manufacture of steel direct from the ore has become un fait accompli. Iron is used for few purposes, steel being cheaper and better. ”

“ The chemist is even more ingenious and more of a benefactor than his predecessor of the nineteenth century. He has produced from coal oil, in paying quantities, both sugar and vinegar; and has also solved the problem of making sugar from starch.
The majority of fabrics are rendered, by chemical processes, proof against fire and mildew; and the law renders the use of such fireproof substances compulsory where wood, cloth or paper is used in building construction.
Medical and chemical science has so far advanced that special foods are devised for particular parts of the body. ”

“ The hardening of copper has been rediscovered, and for twenty-five or more years this [61] metal has been tempered and worked just as steel was in the century preceding.
The manufacture of anti-friction metals has been so far advanced that the use of lubricants is rendered unnecessary.
Transportation of the person and of goods, large and small, is as greatly advanced as that of ideas and images.
Steam is a crudity of the past century. Pneumatic and electric railways carry people and freight with swiftness and safety, in all directions and at trifling rates. ”

“ The public buildings of this country, no longer laughing-stocks for foreigners, are at once spacious, beautiful, substantial and convenient. In them the new American style of architecture, [67] in which proportions are of more value than arrangement, finds fitting types on every hand. ”

“ In mechanics an entirely new principle has been applied; the cold of winter, as well as the heat of summer, being harnessed to do man’s work. The scientific engineers of 1925 recognized the fact that in any motor it was the difference between the initial and final temperatures of the steam, gas, or other medium employed, that did the work; this work being the utilizable percentage of that difference in temperature ”

“ Iron and steel may be cast into the thinnest sections and the most complicated forms.
Flour-making is accomplished by air blasts to perform the disintegration of the wheat grains, with electrical separation of the various useful by and waste products. But the new-process bread is made directly from the decorticated wheat berry, without ever grinding it into flour; the baker taking the wheat and doughing it up directly without ferment.
Timber is dyed of any desired color before felling, and bent into any shape by steaming, so that the most complex outlines may be given it without weakening it. ”

“ The portions to the left indicate early periods, those in the centre, present time; those at the right, time to come; each decade being represented by one-half inch of length of the chart. The various strips are devoted to different geographical divisions; that given to [32] our own country being sub-divided into strips corresponding to its various States and Territories. The depth of red tint shows the degree of respect or disrespect for woman; blue tints correspond to enactments rendering marriage more sacred, divorce more difficult, the rights of women more general and acknowledged. ”

“ Campanini, from his beloved Italy, and other celebrated artists, could [53] have delighted those who heard them in New York, by taking part in a concert together; but those great artists are but memories, and have been supplanted by others, with voices improved by surgery and special nurture until their range, delicacy and power have been brought to a degree of perfection of which the nineteenth century never dreamed.
The chemists have not been far behind the electricians in their triumphs and successes. ”

“ The eloquent speaker having held us spell-bound by his masterful presentation of the teachings of symbolic Masonry, in a flight of oratory carried us back to the days and works of Solomon the King, of Hiram Abiff, and of that other Hiram, King of Tyre; and in the first great Temple which those early Master Masons builded twenty-nine centuries previously, traced for us, in form, size and position of timber and metal—in tool, and time, and work, noble lessons [12] of manhood and virtue ”

“ In every city of importance, as well as in the minor towns, the planting of trees on the streets is compulsory; and if a lot-holder does not plant and maintain on his street line the kind and number of trees for which the laws call, they are planted there by the local authorities, at his charge. ”

“ Other private vehicles are supplied with motors deriving their current from overhead wires, not through trollies as once done in electric railways, but by induction.
Storage batteries that are light and compact have been invented and are already in use for driving carriages along roads which have neither plate-ways nor overhead conductors by which the current can be carried by induction to the motors within the vehicles. The motors for such private carriages are no larger than a man’s hat, and are turned out by the thousand [65] just as Waterbury watches were made in 1893. ”

“ In religion, there has been a fusion of the various sects into a vast Church in which Charity in its broadest sense is the leading principle, and the golden rule inscribed upon the mental tablets of all good people. ”

“ In every house, there is a system of piping and wiring by which heating-gas, lighting-gas and oxygen; hot and cold, salt and fresh water, steam and electric lighting and telephone service are laid on; while thorough ventilation is effected by a system of exhaust operated from a central station. ”

“ Each question is asked by itself and answered in full by itself, thus saving the reader the necessity of wading through a whole book when he only wants to know one thing, but wants to know that right away. ”

“ By an ingenious system the great clearing-houses of each country are united in a National Clearing-house which serves weekly for all those in each city the same purpose as the local establishments do daily for the banks which are members thereof. ”

“ Pope says, ‘I never knew any man in my life who could not bear another’s misfortunes like a Christian.’ While I do believe that I should make the best of everything, I do not believe that everything is for the best. ”

“ Welding is accomplished by electricity, on a large scale. Not only are ordinary masses of steel so made one, but the hulls, masts and yards of steel vessels are thus welded together electrically, so that there is no possibility of a seam “giving,” nor of a leak taking place. Steel bridge-members being similarly electrically welded together, the danger from such bridges giving way is reduced to an insignificant minimum.
Primary batteries generate an electric current by chemical action upon coal, without the production of heat or odor ”

“ Faith is like courage; it must be born in one, or be cultivated by contact with danger. When there is no danger to test one’s faith, there is no means of knowing whether or not any has been born with one. ”

“ The enactments concerning marriage and divorce [72] are the same in all civilized nations, and their enforcement most strict.
Only the physically perfect are permitted to marry, and stirpiculture is made a common and honored study. The local government being responsible for the maintenance of cripples and others physically as well as mentally ill, keeps strict watch over health and morals. Surgical and other hospitals are kept up at great expense, and any one meeting with an accident, or becoming ill, is treated at the hospital instead of at home. ”

“ Sculpture and painting, instead of having been thrown into the shade by the wonderful achievements in photography and engraving, have received a great impetus. Leading citizens vie with each other in purchasing (sometimes even in making) statues to adorn their own homes and gardens, and public streets and parks. In the same way painting is taught as a science as well as an art ”

“ Dwarfing and aggrandizing plants, by electric currents passed around their roots, has been practiced for twenty years upon a large scale; so that in the great conservatories, one may find tiny plants grown from the cones of the Yosemite great trees, and may also see what have sprung from tiny fungi but are now as large as the old-fashioned cabbages of the days of President Harrison. The dyeing of plants and of their flowers by substances introduced in solution at their roots, is a fine art most successful and pleasing in its application. ”

“ There are, indeed, some inventors so expert that they can telegraph pictures in natural colors, taking advantage of the great improvements in photography, by which any object [44] can, at one exposure, be photographed permanently in its proper colors.
By the new system of telegraphic printing, news is set up in several cities simultaneously, in column width, all ready to be worked off on the great hourly papers, which with their beautiful colored illustrations, are a marvel as well as a convenience. ”

“ The law, which is the conservator of health as well as of morals and of peace, compels every house to have bathtubs in proportion to the number of people living therein; and bathing is practically made compulsory. Public baths in which, as in the days of the ancient Romans, men meet for social converse and the transaction of business, are maintained in every town of any importance ”

“ Naturally a country so blessed in material and moral wealth, would be the objective point of the oppressed and unhappy from all over the world; but there is in the immigration laws a strict clause, carried out most rigidly, rendering the possession of a certain degree of intelligence and education absolutely a sine qua non for all who wish to set foot upon our shores. ”

“ All new houses are monolithic and must be built from plans approved by the General Council of Architects. The law requires, under heavy penalties, that every building shall have a liberal and specified window-area, and be properly warmed and ventilated. ”

“ Lightning is no longer a source of danger. The electric and other connections of the building render an injurious shock impossible; and where it does strike any building in the protected circuit, the charge is stored to be used for domestic purposes, such as driving the passenger and goods elevators in the house, or furnishing light and heat. ”

“ In the houses of the wealthy, and in the clubs, the opera is “wired on,” just as hot and cold water, warm and cold air, electricity, and other conveniences are in the same way “laid on.” In fact, the celebrated preachers are heard by those who prefer to stay at home; every one may sit in his or her chair and get the utterances of the most distinguished orators as well as of the most celebrated singers and musicians. ”