The mind, elevated by the vastness of its object, is still farther elevated by the difficulty of the conception; and being obliged every moment to renew its efforts in the transition from one part of time to another, feels a more vigorous and sublime disposition, than in a transition through the parts of space, where the ideas flow along with easiness and facility.

In this disposition, the imagination, passing, as is usual, from the consideration of the distance to the view of the distant objects, gives us a proportionable veneration for it; and this is the reason why all the relicts of antiquity are so precious in our eyes, and appear more valuable than what is brought even from the remotest parts of the world.
The third phaenomenon I have remarked will be a full confirmation of this.

It is not every removal in time, which has the effect of producing veneration and esteem.

We are not apt to imagine our posterity will excel us, or equal our ancestors.

This phaenomenon is the more remarkable, because any distance in futurity weakens not our ideas so much as an equal removal in the past.