THE MAN WITHOUT A FUTURE.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1267, 10 April 1878, Page 3

THE MAN WITHOUT A FUTURE.

[“ London.”] Who does not know him, The Man With' out a Future, whose life is spent on a playground, and who finds sport in all that comes across his path ? His thoughts rarely peer over the boundary of to-day —it is of the same stuff on the other side ; and for the rest he has the philosopher’s instinct that nothing is more certain and less worth looking after than the unforeseen—a Nihilist as sure of his Nirvana as the devoutest follower of the divine Sakya Muni. The man vfho will not look forward, what more js he than a life annuitant —if you like a soul-annuitant P for his hopes are no bigger than a butterfly's. But let him tell you lie is no nonentity yet awhile, and so believe him ; he is not the least important figure in the nineteenth century. Why he is a Representative Man, the exponent of this blase age. Without a Future! He is a present wonder all the more, an evergreen that acknowledges no autumn, that glistens like the holly while the oak drops its leaves with the far-off prospect of another spring. When he sees thp rushing herd of men running a a race with Time, eager to march in the van of the centuries, ho stops, looks on, and laughs. He take a step out of the present ? No, indeed —is there not progress enough within the amble of the hour ? Anjd is it not to him we owe that bear-garden, themar, with its gas-flowering lacquered branches, with its cool fountains of seltzer, and its hat springs of sherry, and th,e billiard-room and cafe in in one,“and ihev latest development of all, the Criterion, and that visit of Paris to staring London, the Cafe Monico ? Then the Skating Rink, where unknowingly he symbolises bis own circle, which, to the best of his belief, has a beginning and an end, while ho go.es round and round. These places, wHcli have sprung up to meet hi 3 warns, are the chief fields of his fiancee he frequents them, enjoys them' all, with an easy, continuous, , diluted ex'stacy. " There are those who shun him, and with a shrug dispose of his destiny, without his ceasing for a moment to be the same happy being. For does the consciousness ever quit him that he is the idol of women ? His sayings and doings, though so little serious, are sacred to them, and will teas long as he remains a single man, for they arc a most sympathetic sex. What they don’t like, ;n him they slur over with'a plenary indulgence. The more credulous of me.q who, believe in to- ' morrow, and consequently in a wet day, are , prone to peglect the easy pastimes of these delectable ones, and to leave time heavy on their hands. Then it is that the Man Without a Future stops in and wins—radiant, with his face full of joy. The contrast is delightful, for all the hopes of the busy are down the vista of time ; Ids are on his smile; and his compliments seem so real that they might bo paraphrased into a promise of Rut the marriage state —no —it kg 4 iCapoiisibilitios—it lias u future.