H.G. Wells Time Machine and Evolution

Nobody has imagined the future of fate with greater artistry than H. G. Wells in his fantasy The Time Machine, published in 1895. Wells imagined the human species split in two, the spark of reason dulled and the sense of purpose extinguished. His two species, the degenerate descendants of the upper and lower classes of Victorian England, are caught in an evolutionary dead end without hope of escape. The lower class, living underground like rats, has retained enough manual dexterity to keep the machinery running. The upper class, living aimlessly on the surface, is maintained like cattle in happy ignorance until the night comes when it is taken down to be butchered and eaten by the tunnel-dwellers. This nightmare is indeed a possible future for mankind. Wells held it up as a mirror in which his contemporaries could see reflected the ugliness and the injustice of their own society. It still may serve us as a mirror to reflect the failures of our society today.