Tenses for First Semester

INTERCHANGE OF VERBS IN TENSES

Tenses	Positive verb	Negative verb
Simple present tense	write / writes	do / does not write
Present continuous tense	am / is / are writing	am / is / are not writing
Present perfect tense	have / has written	have / has not written
Present perfect continuous tense	have / has been writing	Have / has not been writing
Simple past tense	wrote	did not write
Past continuous tense	was / were writing	was / were not writing
Past perfect tense	had written	had not written
Past perfect continuous tense	had been writing	had not been writing
Simple future tense	will / shall write	will / shall not write
Future continuous tense	will / shall be writing	will / shall not be writing
Future perfect tense	will / shall have written	will / shall have not written
Future perfect continuous tense	will / shall have been writing	Will / shall have not been writing

SUBJECT AND VERB AGREEMENT (present tense)

First person singular	present	continuous	perfect	perfect continuous
I	write	am writing	have written	have been writing
First person plural
We	write	are writing	have written	have been writing
Second person
You	write	are writing	have written	have been writing
Third person singular
He, she, it, any name of a person	writes	is writing	has written	has been writing
Third person plural
They	write	are writing	have written	have been writing

SUBJECT AND VERB AGREEMENT (past tense)

First person singular	past	continuous	perfect	Perfect continuous
I	wrote	was writing	had written	had been writing
First person plural
We	wrote	were writing	had written	had been writing
Second person
You	wrote	were writing	have written	had been writing
Third person singular
He, she, it, any name of a person	wrote	was writing	had written	had been writing
Third person plural
They	wrote	were writing	had written	had been writing

SUBJECT AND VERB AGREEMENT (future tense)

First person singular	past	continuous	perfect	Perfect continuous
I	shall / will write	will / shall be writing	will / shall have written	will / shall have been writing
First person plural
We	shall / will write	will / shall writing	will / shall have written	will / shall have been writing
Second person
You	will write	will be writing	will have written	will have been writing
Third person singular
He, she, it, any name of a person	will write	will be writing	will have written	will have been writing
Third person plural
They	will write	will be writing	will have written	will have have been writing

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Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle - Sir Arthur Canon Doyle

Sherlock Holmes: The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle - Sir Arthur Canon Doyle

In four novels and fifty-six short stories Sir Arthur Canon Doyle developed the characters Mr. Sherlock Holmes and his trusted friend Dr. John Watson. The creation of brilliant sleuth and his partner, who, although not possessing genius, stimulated it in his friend, was a masterstroke. The adventures, memories, return, last bow, and case book of Sherlock Holmes, as well as the four famous novels, are stories of sheer delight. Readers of English literature may not have everlasting charm of Holmesian characters and adventures, or even a famous resident of Baker Street, but there is much in his methodological approach to the solving of criminal cases that is of relevance to applied econometric modeling. Holmesian detection may be interpreted as accommodating the relationship of theories, specification and re-specification of theories, re-evaluation and reformulation of theories, and finally reaching a solution to the problems at hand. With this mind, one can apply reason to learn from the master of detection. This provides an outline of Holmesian deduction through the various stages of deduction through the various stages of accommodation, namely problem solving, theorizing before data, examining the quality of data, the meaning of truth, reconciliation with data, and testing of theories, Testing procedures, especially the use of diagnostic, are the most common in research method used in common in research method used in examining a number of specifications within a modeling cycle of specification, estimation and evaluation. A diagnostic approach to the evaluation or empirical approach models is outlined through testing the key assumption, which defines the parameter space for purposes of inference.

Summery:

At about 4 o’clock on Christmas morning a row broke out between the stranger, who was carrying a white goose slung over his shoulder and a little knot of roughs. The stranger raised his stick to defend himself and smashed the shop window behind him. On hearing the broken sound Mr. Peterson, the honest police officer rushed to spot in order to save the stranger from his assailants, but seeing an official-looking person in uniform, dropped and white goose and his felt hat the stranger and his assailants vanished amid the labyrinth of small streets of the town.

Mr. Peterson collected both goose and the felt-hat on the spot and handed them to Mr. Sherlock Holmes and asked him to find out any clue about the owner of the lost property to restore. The old and patched hat did not produce any clue except the letters H.B. indicates Henry Baker. But it is very difficult to establish the real owner of the hat and the goose among several Henry Bakers of the town. Finally Holmes decided to give an advertisement in the local newspapers about the lost property thinking that if anybody may come to contact him and claim the property.

On 26^th morning Mr. Peterson came to Mr. Sherlock Holmes and showed him a small scintillating blue diamond with the size of a small bean that was found in the crop of the goose. Immediately, Sherlock Holmes recollected about the news published on 22^nd of December telling about the theft that had taken place in Hotel Cosmopolitan and John Horner, the plumber, was accused in that connection.  Further the news says that the blue carbuncle belonged to the Countess of Morcar.

The next day when Dr. Watson approached to Sherlock Holmes flat a person was waiting to meet Mr. Holmes in order to recover his lost property, the goose and the hat advertised in the newspapers. He did not show any particular interest in goose though he was told that the goose was fried for the supper. Even he did not give any importance to the leftovers of the goose like crop, feathers and legs etc. Holmes came to a decision that the person who came to him in the name of Henry Baker is proved his innocence in smuggling of the diamond.  Later, the stranger told that he had bought the goose in Alpha goose club.   

Sherlock Holmes learnt that Alpha goose Club was supplied the same geese by Mr. Breckinridge. When he went to Breckinridge, Holmes came to know the geese actually supplied by Mrs.Oakshott, 117 Brixton Road.  As he is approaching Mrs.Oakshott  to find out  the secret how the blue stone had come into the crop of a goose James Ryder met Holmes on the way and asked about the white goose advertised in the news paper. He told every thing about the blue gem how it was stolen by Catherine Cusack, the maid servant to the Countess Morcar, and handed over him to convert it into money. He went to his sister’s farm and put the stone into the gullet of the white goose with cross-barred tail. He requested his sister, Maggie to sell one fat goose for the Christmas but he had chosen another bird with same plumage. After knowing that he had chosen a wrong bird he ran to his sister’s farm and learnt that all the geese have been sold to Mrs. Oakshott. As he ran to Oakshott she sold them Breckinridge and Breckinridge to Alpha Club. From Alpha Club, Henry Baker had bought the goose with out knowledge of the gem within its crop.  Finally Holmes decided that John Horner, the plumber, is innocent in this connection of the theft that had occurred in the Hotel Cosmopolitan. Plainly James Ryder was asked to get out of the Holmes’ place because it was the season of excuse.  

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MENDING WALL - Robert Frost

 MENDING WALL - Robert Frost

Mending wall, is one of the most widely quoted poems of Robert frost, published in 1914. It is a lyric in the form of dramatic monologue. The speaker in the poem is a young man, presumably the poet himself. The lyric is an expression of his views and attitudes. The other character in the poem is the poet's neighbour, an old farmer. He does not speak even a single word, but we know of his views and attitudes, of his conservation and orthodoxy, from what speaker says about him.

The poet and his neighbour get together every spring to repair the stone wall between their respective properties. The neighbour, an old New England farmer, seems to have a deep-seated faith in the value of walls and fences. He declines to explain his belief and only reiterates his father's saying "Good fences make good neighbours". But the speaker is of the opposite opinion. As he points out:

                                There where it is we do not need the wall;

                                He is all pine and I am apple orchard.

To him the neighbour's adherence to his father's saying suggests the narrowness and ignorance of the primitive:

                                He moves in darkness as it seems to me,

                                Not of woods only and shade of trees.

Yet the speaker's own attitude is also enigmatic and in some respects primitive. He seems to be in sympathy with some elemental spirit in nature, which denies all boundaries. It is suggested that there is some supernatural power at work in Nature that is always against all fences and walls,

                                Something three is that doesn't love the wall,

                                That sends the frozen ground swell under it,

                                And spills the upper boulders in the sun;

                                And makes gaps even two can pass abreast….

                                It might be some mysterious fairy:

                                Something there is that doesn't love a wall

        That wants it down. I could say Elves to him,

        But it's not elves exactly, and I'd rather

        He said it for himself.

The poem portrays a clash between these two points of view, and it may, therefore, seem that its meaning Is the solution. Frost offers to the conflict. The poem leads one to ask, which of the two is right. The speaker or his Yankee neighbour? Should man tear down the barriers which isolate individuals from one another., or should he recognise the distinction and limits are necessary for human life? "Frost does not provide an answer, and the attempt to wrest one from his casual details and enigmatic comments would falsify us a lesson in human relations." Though the poem presents the speaker's attitude more sympathetically than the neighbour's, it does not offer this as the total meaning. Frost's intention is to portray a problem and explore the many different and paradoxical issues it involves. He pictures it within an incident from rural life, and in order to reveal its complex nature he develops it thorough the conflict of two opposed points of view.

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Hard Times - Charles Dickens

Hard Times - Charles Dickens 

Examine Hard Times as a social novel. / Discuss Dickens as social reformer with special reference to Hard Times.

J.W. Beach points out, Dickens's Hard Times, attacks the very basic assumptions and the characteristic ideology of industrial England. This novel, says Beach, is a dramatization of what Carlyle took to be the meaning of utilitarianism and of the orthodox liberal system of Laissez-faire. This novel clearly shows the role of Dickens as a critic of social structures and as a social reformer.

“Utilitarianism” owes its full theoretical development to Jeremy Bentham, who said that society should aim at the greatest happiness of the greatest number. Bentham held that the aim of life was happiness; and this happiness-philosophy made an immediate appeal to the superficial kind of thinking which is known as “utilitarianism” because this philosophy emphasized the importance of material goods and seemed to ignore completely the moral and spiritual needs of human beings. According to this philosophy, if the amount of happiness secured was equal, then gambling was as good as poetry. It also meant that the happiness of thoroughly selfish life was equal to or even grater than the happiness of greatest number, Bentham added a second principle namely that every man was the best judge of his own interests. This second principle led to the formulation of a policy that came to be called Laissez-faire, meaning that ‘people should be left free to act for themselves’.

The theory of utilitarianism was severely criticized by philosophers like Carlyle who were believers in the moral and spiritual values of life. The principle of Laissez-faire became in course of time during the Victorian Age, a term of abuse in the vocabulary of socialism because it stood for governmental refusal to intervene in the cause of social justice, to protect the weak against the strong, and to allow individuals to pursue their own selfish interests. Hard Times shows Dickens’s antagonism to both utilitarianism and laissez-faire. Dickens attacks the Victorian Society which has characteristic of the greed for money that he regarded as the root of all evils.

The utilitarian principle finds its exponents and champions in the two leading characters of Hard Times, Thomas Gradgrind and Josiah Bounderby. Grandgrind’s theory of education is evidently an offshoot of his utilitarian attitude to life. This man emphasizes the importance of facts, and fails to attach any importance of feelings and emotions. He wants to develop the reasoning faculty of the pupils in his school and, to that end; he exhorts the new schoolmaster to teach the boys and the girls in his model school facts, and facts alone, and to root out everything else. Gradgrind is man of realities, man of facts and calculations. He always proceeds upon the principle that two and two are four and nothing more. This “eminently practical man” goes about with rule, a pair of scales and the multiplication table always in his pocket, because life and human beings are matters of facts and figures for him.   

Bounderby, banker and industrialist, is another embodiment of the utilitarian principle; he illustrates the principle of Laissez-faire. Bounderby is described as a “man perfectly devoid of sentiment”: while Gradgrind does show signs of human feeling by taking the abandoned sissy under his protection and he certainly changes his outlook upon life by the time the story ends, Bounderby shows no signs of any human feeling and remains till the end what he is at the beginning. Bounderby is a man “made out of a coarse material”. He constantly boasts of his being a self-made man; he looks upon his workmen as tools by using which in the proper manner he can enrich himself. He is frankly contemptuous of the needs, requirements, and demands of his workmen; because he thinks that these people would not be satisfied with anything less than turtle soup and venison, with gold spoon. He shamelessly regards industrial smoke as “meat and drink” for the workers and for the factory-owners; this smoke is in his opinion the healthiest thing in the world in all respects, and particularly for the lungs. Dickens’s portrayal of Bounderby is as severe a condemnation of utilitarianism as could be imagined from the pen of a great satirist.

Thus Hard Times is considered a social novel or of Dickens as a social reformer in this novel. Dickens’s criticism of the hypocrisy and false pride of the upper classes as represented in the portrayal of Mrs. Sparsit, Slackbridge, and Harthouse and his unemotional pursuit of Louisa.   

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Active voice and Passive voice

Tense	Active voice (verb)	Passive voice (verb)
Simple present	write/ writes (any transitive verb)	is/are written
Present continuous	am/is/are writing	is/ are being written
Present prefect	has/have written	has/have been written
Present perfect continuous	has/have been writing	No passive voice
Simple past	wrote	was/ were written
Past continuous	was/ were writing	was/ were being written
Past perfect	had written	had been written
Past perfect continuous	had been writing	No passive voice
Simple future	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/might write	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/might be written
Future continuous	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/might be writing	No passive voice
Future perfect	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/ might have written	will/shall/may/can/would/should/could /might have been written
Future perfect continuous	will/shall/may/can/ought/would/should / could/ might have been writing	No passive voice
Model sentences Rama kills Ravana                             Ravana is killed by Rama I wrote a letter.                                     A letter was written be me He is drawing a picture                       A picture is being drawn by her Do it yourself I have written a letter. I can do it. She hunts a deer. He drove a car. She has read a novel. I bought this book. We have done this job. -----

Springtime - O Henry

Springtime - O Henry

A famous American short story writer William Sydney Porter is known to the literary world as O. Henry. When he was 22, he moved to New York and published over three hundred short stories under the pen name of O. Henry. His short stories are marked with realistic details culminated with effective surprising endings.

“Springtime” is a beautiful romantic love story between Sarah, a typist at a restaurant in New York and Walter Franklin, a farmer in the country. Sarah, a beautiful young lady with fine figure working as a typist in Schulenberg Home Restaurant. It was just next door to the red-brick building where she had a living room. Sarah has to type menu cards and bills of fare every day for 21 tables of Schulenberg Home Restaurant.  

Sarah, an intelligent young lady, chose to work on a typewriter. Though she did not type very quickly yet she did her work skillfully and pleasantly. Mr. Schulenberg was delighted at her work and willingly agreed to send her room three meals a day. Sarah had to prepare menu cards for 21 tables of the restaurant every day.  She listed the dishes so temptingly in each of the menu to catch the eye of the costumer. However, she did not feel quite happy despite her comfortable life.

In the summer of the last year, Sarah had gone into the country and had fallen in love with a young farmer, Walter Franklin. Together they sat and wove a crown of dandelions to her nut brown hair. He praised the effect of those yellow flowers against to her nut brown hair. They decided to marry at the very signs of the next spring.

Sarah returned to New York to hit the typewriter. One afternoon she was shaking with cold in her room. A waiter came to her and handed the list of the menu written in unreadable hand writing. There were many changes in the menu than usual. She classified all dishes properly. When she was typing the list of fruits she reminded the arrival of the spring. Tears welled up in her eyes by remembering her lover, Walter. She had not received any letter from him for more than two weeks. The lonely time proves to be depressing for Sarah. The memories of Walter tormenting her ceaselessly.

One-day, as Sarah began her typing work for the day, one item among the list of menu that read Dandelions with Eggs.  This upset her as she remembered Walter’s offer of the crown made of dandelions. Immediately tears welled up in her eyes by the memory of dandelions. Sarah tried to force back her tears to type the menu cards.

At six O’clock the waiter brought her dinner and carried away the typewritten menu. She ate her food sadly and after a while she sat for reading. As settled down for reading the front-door bell rang. The landlady answered it. Sarah left her book and listened. The farmer Walter Franklin had come there in search of Sarah.  Listening to this Sarah rushed to meet him and cried “Why haven’t you written?”

Franklin had come to New York a week ago and went to her old address. But she had left that house. He searched for her. She told him that she had written to him but that had not reached him. In the course of his search for her he had somehow come to the restaurant that evening. When he saw the typewritten menu-card, he observed certain clues in it and instantly he shouted for the owner and got her address.

The capital letter ‘W’ in the menu card was above the line. In the upper right-hand corner a tear had fallen between two titles of dishes on the list was description: ‘Dearest Walter, with hard-boiled Egg’. It was the surest sign that the lovelorn Sarah had typed it. Through the owner’s help, he lands in Sarah’s room. For Sarah and Walter, it is a God-sent gift.

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If You Are True To Your Gift – Irakli Abashidaze

If You Are True to Your Gift - Irakli Abashidaze

Irakli Abashidaze was a Georgian poet, a literary scholar and a politician born in 1909. Most of his poems were patriotic but normally loyal to Soviet Union. In this poem ‘If Your Are True To Your Gift’, the poet expresses his true feelings about life and its importance. The poet says that if a person is true to the gift i.e. ‘life’ given to us by the God and if that gift is true, then such a gift opens the radiant and dazzling gates of the dawn. If a person is true to his life and has some moral values in his life, nothing can harm his life (gift). The three beasts or the three plagues i.e. neither ‘Old Age’, nor ‘Time’ nor ‘Space’ can do anything to the gift of life.

The Poet says that the bells will toll and the old age which is like a bandit (thief) would come creeping. Man will not be known that his worn out face in his own old age when it comes to him.  As time passes old age comes to a person, his knees are bent and crippled but his daily life goes on through ages till the end of his life.

Man has to face the physical changes that are brought about the Time but his ethical (moral) values should be retained as it is till the end. His screen (vision) grows dimmer and greyer. The charm of a person will be faded away by the Time day by day. Man is not the same next day even though he is clad in precious stone from ‘Eklari’; he is unaware of the sudden movement of the swift wings of the bats.

The bells will toll as long as man lives then he says a few sundry words and leads his life after sometime he makes room for the new generation. He is uprooted from this Earth just leaving his outline in this world. Some other person will soon fill his place. They say that the voice of a person leaves a visible phrase of him. Hence the poet says that if we are true to our lives and led a worthy life properly and morally that itself is a gift to us. Each and every person should know – what you are? What is the purpose of life? And use this gift of life in a most perfect way as it is required. Then they wouldn’t have any fear for man about his life because the Time, Old Age and Space will spare him and do not harm.

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WINDHOVER--To Christ our Lord

WINDHOVER--To Christ our Lord

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844 - 1889)

I caught this morning morning's minion, Kingdom

Of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in his riding

Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding:

High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing

In his ecstasy! Then off forth on swing,

As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl and gliding

Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding

Stirred for a bird,--- the achieve of, the mastery of the thing

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here

Buckle! And the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion

Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: sheer plod makes plough down sillion

Shine, and blue --bleak embers, ah my dear,

Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold-vermilion.

Glossary:

The windhover: a kestrel, a small hawk that hovers in the wind

minion : wings of a pet bird

dauphin: heir (figuratively)

rolling level underneath him steady air : this refers to the buoyancy of the air to lift up the bird while flying.

how he rung :  the line brings out the poet's joy and surprise

'rung upon the rein' : checked at the rein's end i.e., the speed of flying.

Buckle: to fasten

chevalier: a knight of the medieval times

sillion: furrow made by ploughing

ah, my dear: refers to Jesus Christ as the subtitle of the poem indicates.

fall …. Vermilion: this is a reference to Christ's bleeding on the crucifix.

Summary:

                           

Gerard Manley Hopkins was the pioneer of the Modern English verse. Like many other poets he too was highly experimental in writing the modern verse. As a poet, he has the originality of thought and style. His poems are capturing at the beauty and splendour of the Nature, which he saw as a manifestation of God's glory. His concepts of inscape, instress and sprung rhythm gave rise to new aesthetic theory and today he is seen as the first of the moderns. But his critics often commented that his poetry was imperfect in many ways.

As a parson G. M. Hopkins glorifies the sacrifice of Jesus Christ in the poem The Windhover. The windhover, the falcon, symbolises the spiritual majesty and the glory of Jesus Christ.

One day, early in the morning Hopkins saw a falcon flying. It seemed the steady air held him up in his flight. The flight of the bird and gliding with its stretched wings was so majestic. He sails smoothly and glided over. It is just a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend.  The majesty of the brute beauty and valorous act appease our eyes and gladden our hearts. The chivalrous heroic deeds are lovely though it sounds dangerous. The furrows made by plough while ploughing reminds us the past activities of Jesus Christ and suffering himself on the Cross.

Jesus Christ suffered the inexplicable pain inflicted on him at the time of crucification was a supreme sacrifice. This indicates the glory and spiritual height he attained. Thus G. M. Hopkins poems are full of religious with pure spiritual experience.

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Channel Firing – Thomas Hardy

Channel Firing – Thomas Hardy

“Channel Firing”; The poem is an illustrative of Thomas Hardy’s view that the pain-inducing flaws in the nature of things are ever present and eternal. This of course is not Hardy’s only view on the war subject. Inconsistently, in some poems, he implies a view that history had degenerated to a condition of endurable suffering and disillusionment, and that time should stop before things get worse.

‘Channel Firing’ is Thomas Hardy’s way of saying that war is pointless. They’ve been around forever, but what was truly been accomplished by it?

The narrator is a dead person awoke from its eternal sleep in its grave by cannons going off out at sea to practise firing just before World War I. At first the narrator believes, it is ‘God’s Judgement Day’. Then Hardy states that the mouse and the worms got scared by the roaring sound of the guns, but the glebe cow, or cow at a church used for keeping the grass short, just drools as if understands too well what is going on thus the guns going off is expected.

Then God tells the narrator that it is not Judgement Day, and that the noises are from gunnery practice at sea. He says the world is just like it used to be. God also tells the dead that those involved in the war do not do anything more than the dead people in their graves as far as forwarding his purposes. He says that most of the living are lucky. It isn’t Judgement Day because they could all being sweeping the floors of Hell for their threats of war. Then one of the dead asks themselves if the world will ever understand what it’s meant for, or if it will always be as confusing as when that dead person was alive. Another one of the dead persons is a preacher who says he wished he would have just smoked and drank instead of preaching. The final stanza mentions avenging, or getting revenge for, at three places Stourton Tower, Camelot and Stonehenge.

The essence of the poem is a criticism of war and of the endless human desire to have war and violence. Hardy points out that though it occurs time and time again, and though it is incredible devastation, people are too crazy to stop, and would always continue to make red war more redder though it displeases and doesn’t honour God(s).

(or)

Channel Firing – Thomas Hardy

Channel Firing, one of the few war poems in the selection, is by far the most savagely critical in its scornful condemnation of man's irredeemable desire for conflict.

The poem is spoken in the first person by one of the dead buried in a church the windows of which have been shattered by the report of guns being fired for "practice" in the English Channel.  So great is the disturbance that the skeletons believe Judgement Day (the resurrection of the dead) has and make all suddenly sitting up in readiness for the great day. Then the poem takes an irreverent turn as Hardy introduces God to the proceedings, reassuring the corpses that it is not time for the Judgement Day but merely "gunnery practice", adding that the world is as it was when the dead men "went below" to their graves.  That is to say, every country is trying to make its methods of destruction more efficient, and shed more blood, making "red war yet redder".  The living are seen as being insane and no more ready to exercise Christian love than are the dead, who are perforce "helpless in such matters".  In other words, they do nothing "for Christ’s sake". 

God continues, observing that those responsible for the "gunnery practice" are fortunate that it is not the day of judgement,  as, if it were, their bellicose threats would be punished by their having to scour the floor of Hell. Hell seems to be the appropriate place for the war-makers.  With a hint of malice God suggests that He will ensure that His judgement day is far hotter, though He concedes that He may not bother as eternal rest seems more suited to the human condition.  The blowing of trumpet signals the end of the world.

God's remarks being at an end, the skeletons voice their own opinions of the gunnery practice, wondering if sanity will ever be achieved by man.  Significantly, while many of the skeletons nod as if to suggest that man will never learn, the parson regrets having spent his life giving sermons which have had no effect on his congregation: "preaching forty year" has made no difference to his hearers.

In the final stanza of the poem Hardy writes of how the threatening sound of the guns, ready "to avenge” resounds far inland, as far as the places he names.  The landmarks to which Hardy refers are not chosen merely to provide authentic local detail. By invoking the dead civilizations of the past, Hardy sets the poem in a far more expansive historical time-scale.  Perhaps he further suggests that civilizations (including his own?) are doomed because man's nature never makes any moral advance.