The epoch of which I speak rested upon the confines of two civilizations, the old and the new. It was a transition period from the dim twilight of the dark age to the brightness of modern thought; from an age of unquestioning faith to one of curiosity and scepticism. It was a period of concretions and crystallizations, following one of many rarefactions; religion was embracing science; astrology was merging into astronomy; magic into physics; alchemy into chemistry. Saltpetre was superseding steel in warfare; feudalism having fulfilled its purpose was being displaced by monarchical power; intercourse was springing up between nations, and international laws were being made. Even the material universe and the realms of space were enlarging with the enlargement of mind. Two worlds were about that time unveiled to Spain, an oriental and an occidental; by the capture of Constantinople ancient Greek and Latin learning was emancipated, and the Christian religion became settled as the faith of Europe; while toward the west, the mists of the ages lifted from the ocean, and, as if emerging from primeval waters, a fair new continent ripe for a thousand industries stood revealed. This was progress indeed, and the mind, bursting its mediæval fetters, stood forth and took a new survey. With the dawn of the sixteenth century there appeared a universal awakening throughout Christendom. Slumbering civilization, roused by the heavy tread of marching events, turned from royal prison-houses of learning, and beheld with wonder and delight the unfolding of these new mysteries. The dust and cobwebs of the past, which had so long dimmed the imagination, were disturbed by an aggressive spirit of inquiry. The report of exploding fallacies reverberated throughout Europe; and as the smoke cleared away, and light broke in through the obscurity, there fell as it were scales from the eyes of the learned, and man gazed upon his fellow-man with new and strange emotions. For centuries men's minds had been chained to the traditions of the past; thought had traveled as in a treadmill; philosophy had advanced with the face turned backward; knight-errantry had been the highest type of manhood, and Christianity, like its founder, had been made to bear the sins of the many. While its friends claimed for it all the virtues of mankind, its enemies charged it with all the vices. The first efforts of scholastics in their exposition of these new appearances was to square the accumulative information of the day with the subtleties of the schools and the doctrines and dogmas of the past. The source of all knowledge and the foundation of all science were claimed to be in the holy scriptures and in the tenets of the church. Any conception, or invention, or discovery that might pass unscathed these two touchstones was denominated truth, though human reason could not grasp it. Likewise, any stray fact which by these tests failed satisfactorily to account for itself, was pronounced false,