The following was quoted in the front of a book of reviews of television, 'Glued to the Box' by Clive James, which was published before the age of the internet. The quote itself was written well before the telephone had taken off, and long before the classic age of three channels of analogue television in Britain, which is the period that Clive James collected television reviews cover. But it expresses clearly how little we travel for all that we change the means of transmitting information.
'Humanity will surpass the first dirigibles as it has surpassed the first locomotives. It will surpass M. Santos-Dumont as it has surpassed Stephenson. After telephotography it will continually invent graphies and scopes and phones all of which will be able to go round the earth in less than no time. But it will always be only the temporal earth. And it will be possible to burrow inside the earth and pierce it through as I do this ball of clay. But it will always only be the carnal earth.'
-Charles Peguy (1873-1914), written in 1907.
'Humanity will surpass the first dirigibles as it has surpassed the first locomotives. It will surpass M. Santos-Dumont as it has surpassed Stephenson. After telephotography it will continually invent graphies and scopes and phones all of which will be able to go round the earth in less than no time. But it will always be only the temporal earth. And it will be possible to burrow inside the earth and pierce it through as I do this ball of clay. But it will always only be the carnal earth.'
-Charles Peguy (1873-1914), written in 1907.
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