Mercier’s early essay:  Des malheurs de la guerre et des avantages de la paix (1766).  On the savage:  L’homme sauvage (1767).  For the opposite thesis see the Songes philosophiques (1768).  He describes a state of perfect happiness in a planet where beings live in perpetual contemplation of the infinite.  He appreciates the work of philosophers from Socrates to Leibnitz, and describes Rousseau as standing before the swelling stream, but cursing it.  It may be suspected that the writings of Leibnitz had much to do with Mercier’s conversion.] The transformation of his opinions was the work of a few months.  He then came forward with the opposite thesis that all events have been ordered for man’s felicity, and he began to work on an imaginary picture of the state to which man might find his way within seven hundred years.

L’an 2440 was published anonymously at Amsterdam in 1770. [Footnote:  The author’s name first appeared in the 3rd ed., 1799.  A German translation, by C. F. Weisse, was published in London in 1772.  The English version, by Dr. Hooper, appeared in the same year, and a new edition in 1802; the translator changed the title to Memoirs of the year Two thousand five hundred.] Its circulation in France was rigorously forbidden, because it implied a merciless criticism of the administration.  It was reprinted in London and Neuchatel, and translated into English and German.

3.

As the motto of his prophetic vision Mercier takes the saying of Leibnitz that “the present is pregnant of the future.”  Thus the phase of civilisation which he imagines is proposed as the outcome of the natural and inevitable march of history.  The world of A.D. 2440 in which a man born in the eighteenth century who has slept an enchanted sleep awakes to find himself, is composed of nations who live in a family concord rarely interrupted by war.  But of the world at large we hear little; the imagination of Mercier is concentrated on France, and particularly Paris.  He is satisfied with knowing that slavery has been abolished; that the rivalry of France and England has been replaced by an indestructible alliance; that the Pope, whose authority is still august, has renounced his errors and returned to the customs of the primitive Church; that French plays are performed in China.  The changes in Paris are a sufficient index of the general transformation.

The constitution of France is still monarchical.  Its population has increased by one half; that of the capital remains about the same.  Paris has been rebuilt on a scientific plan; its sanitary arrangements have been brought to perfection; it is well lit; and every provision has been made for the public safety.  Private hospitality is so large that inns have disappeared, but luxury at table is considered a revolting crime.  Tea, coffee, and tobacco are no longer imported. [Footnote:  In the first edition of the book commerce was abolished.] There is no system of credit; everything is paid for