of 1812." (A. L. Graebner.)

According to the theory we would expect that in the various departments
of _art,_ perfection would be a late blossom, burgeoning forth only after
ages of feeble experiment and attempt. But what are the facts? As we
study the history of any art,--be it literature or any department of
literature; be it architecture, sculpture, the domestic arts, or even
the art of war,--we find the highest culmination either at points which
specifically exclude the idea of a development or, indeed, perfection
shines forth in the very beginning, all subsequent art being decay and
apostasy from that primal perfection.

In epic poetry, the greatest work does not stand at the end of a long
period of development, but the first and oldest is the greatest. Nothing
has ever been produced to equal the Iliad and Odyssey, written 900 B. C.
We have epics that will always hold a prominent place in literature,
Virgil's Aeneid, Milton's Paradise Lost, but neither these nor the many
flights attempted into epic poetry before or since will be seriously
considered as rivalling the rhapsodies of Homer.

The first novel ever written, Cervantes' Don Quijote, [tr. note: sic]
remains one of the greatest.

The oldest dramatists, Aeschylus, Euripides, Sophocles, have never been
surpassed.

And so in every department of art, the earliest stage of development
seems to be the very most perfect. Pyramid building was a pastime of the
earliest Pharaos; [tr. note: sic] the later did not attempt to rival
these structures with any of their own. No finer jewelry can be produced
to-day than the gold ornaments found in the oldest tombs of Egypt. The
finest examples of East Indian architecture are the oldest. Gothic art
was not a slow development but came to utter perfection in its earliest
examples,--as in the Cathedral of Amiens.

Evolution represents the history of our race as a constant climb, from
brute or near-brute beginnings, to ever higher forms of civilization,
until the heights which our race has reached in the present century were
attained. In reality, the reverse process, a constant and invariable
process of degeneration characterizes the history of nations and peoples.
Where Christianity entered as a factor, as in the history of Western
Europe and in the results of Christian missions in heathen lands, we can
indeed observe a rise out of barbaric or savage conditions to refinement
and culture. But only where the Christian gospel