ed to new
conditions. It would seem that Europe had sufficient knowledge of life
contributed by the Orient, by Greek, Roman, and barbarian to go
forward; but first must come a period of readjustment of old truth to
new environment and the discovery of new truth. For several centuries,
in the Dark Ages, the intellectual life of man lay dormant. Then must
come a quickening of the spirit before the world could advance.
However, in considering human progress, the day of small things must
"not be despised." For in the days of confusion and low tide of
regression there are being established new modes of life and thought
which through right adaptation will flow on into the full tide of
progress. Revivals come which gather up and utilize the scattered and
confused ideas of life, adapting and utilizing them by setting new
standards and imparting new impulses of progress.

{348}

_The Revival of Progress Throughout Europe_.--Human society, as a world
of ideas, is a continuous quantity, and therefore it is difficult to
mark off any definite period of time to show social causation. Roughly
speaking, the period from the beginning of the eighth century to the
close of the fifteenth is a period of intellectual ferment, the climax
of which extended from the eleventh to the close of the fifteenth
century. It was in this period that the forces were gathering in
preparation for the achievements of the modern era of progress. There
was one general movement, an awakening along the whole line of human
endeavor in the process of transition from the old world to the new.
It was a revival of art, language, literature, philosophy, theology,
politics, law, trade, commerce, and the additions of invention and
discovery. It was the period of establishing schools and laying the
foundation of universities. In this there was a more or less
continuous progress of the freedom of the mind, which permitted
reflective thought, which subsequently led on to the religious
reformation that permitted freedom of belief, and the French
Revolution, which permitted freedom of political action. It was the
rediscovery of the human mind, a quickening of intellectual liberty, a
desire of alert minds for something new. It was a call for humanity to
move forward.

_The Revival of Learning a Central Idea of Progress_.--As previously
stated, the church had taken to itself by force of circumstances the
power in the Western world relinquished by the fallen Rom