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/79

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FIFTY YEARS HENCE.
75

I read this prophecy through without stopping; then gave myself up to the idea of the great possibilities about to present themselves tome. 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. I drew mental pictures, far into the night, limning myself as famous and rich; and incidentally, the husband of Estelle; the father of her children; the founder of a family which should be known throughout the world as that of him who unlocked the gates of time to come; who pierced the depths of futurity; who controlled that knowledge for the right to purchase which the kings of finance jostled each other.

I am ashamed to say that gratitude to Brathwaite, and thorough appreciation of the fact that he was the first to conceive and the first to carry out, even in part, the idea of scientific prophecy through graphical construction, took