#8 Condorcet on the future progress of the human mind

If man can, with almost complete assurance, predict phenomena when he knows their laws, and if, even when he does not, he can with high probability forecast the events of the future on the basis of his experience of the past, why, then, should it be regarded as a fantastic undertaking to sketch, with some pretense to truth, the future destiny of man on the basis of his history? The sole foundation for belief in the natural sciences is this idea, that the general laws directing the phenomena of the universe, known or unknown, are necessary and constant. Why should this principle be any less true for the development of the intellectual and moral faculties of man than for the other operations of nature? Since beliefs founded on past experience of like conditions provide the only rule of conduct for the wisest of men, why should the philosopher be forbidden to base his conjectures on these same foundations, as long as he does not attribute to them a certainty superior to that warranted by…