w turn, agreeably to the plan laid down, to an
examination of that of all Europe. The movement in that single nation is
typical of the movement of the entire continent.

[Sidenote: European age of Inquiry.]

The first European intellectual age--that of Credulity--has already, in
part, been considered in Chapter II., more especially so far as Greece
is concerned. I propose now, after some necessary remarks in conclusion
of that topic, to enter on the description of the second European
age--that of Inquiry.

For these remarks, what has already been said of Greece prepares the
way. Mediterranean Europe was philosophically and socially in advance of
the central and northern countries. The wave of civilization passed from
the south to the north; in truth, it has hardly yet reached its extreme
limit. The adventurous emigrants who in remote times had come from Asia
left to the successive generations of their descendants a legacy of
hardship. In the struggle for life, all memory of an Oriental parentage
was lost; knowledge died away; religious ideas became debased; and the
diverse populations sank into the same intellectual condition that they
would have presented had they been proper autochthons of the soil.

[Sidenote: Religion of the old Europeans.]

The religion of the barbarian Europeans was in many respects like that
of the American Indians. They recognized a Great Spirit--omniscient,
omnipotent, omnipresent. In the earliest times they made no
representation of him under the human form, nor had they temples; but
they propitiated him by sacrifices, offering animals, as the horse, and
even men, upon rude altars. Though it was believed that this Great
Spirit might sometimes be heard in the sounds of the forests at night,
yet, for the most part, he was too far removed from human supplication,
and hence arose, from the mere sorcerous ideas of a terrified fancy, as
has been the case in so many other countries, star worship--the second
stage of comparative theology. The gloom and shade of dense forests, a
solitude that offers an air of sanctity, and seems a fitting resort for
mysterious spirits, suggested the establishment of sacred groves and
holy trees. Throughout Europe there was a confused idea that the soul
exists after the death of the body; as to its particular state there was
a diversity of belief. As among other people, also, the offices of
religion were not only directed to the present benefit of individuals,
but