The men of the 19th century, living now in the period that may be termed
the Upper Status of civilization, saw such changes effected in the
practical affairs of their everyday lives as had not been wrought before
during the entire historical period. Their fathers had travelled in
vehicles drawn by horses, quite as their remoter ancestors had done
since the time of higher barbarism. It may be doubted whether there
existed in the world in the year 1800 a postal service that could
compare in speed and efficiency with the express service of the Romans
of the time of Caesar; far less was there a telegraph service that could
compare with that of the ancient Persians. Nor was there a ship sailing
the seas that a Phoenician trireme might not have overhauled. But now
within the lifetime of a single man the world was covered with a network
of steel rails on which locomotives drew gigantic vehicles, laden with
passengers at an hourly speed almost equalling Caesar's best journey of
a day; over the land and under the seas were stretched wires along which
messages coursed from continent to continent literally with the speed of
lightning; and the waters of the earth were made to teem with gigantic
craft propelled without sail or oar at a speed which the Phoenician
captain of three thousand years ago and the English captain of the 18th
century would alike have held incredible.

Social and political organization.

There is no need to give further details here of the industrial
revolutions that have been achieved in this newest period of
civilization, since in their broader outlines at least they are familiar
to every one. Nor need we dwell upon the revolution in thought whereby
man has for the first time been given a clear inkling as to his origin
and destiny. It suffices to point out that such periods of fermentation
of ideas as this suggests have probably always been concomitant with
those outbursts of creative genius that gave the world the practical
inventions upon which human progress has been conditioned. The same
attitude of receptivity to new ideas is pre-requisite to one form of
discovery as to the other. Nor, it may be added, can either form of idea
become effective for the progress of civilization except in proportion
as a large body of any given generation are prepared to receive it.
Doubtless here and there a dreamer played with fire, in a literal sense,
for generations before the utility of fire as a practical aid to h