Still, the greater part of this faulty guidance may, in itself, be but another outcome of the erroneous and rooted beliefs which lie even deeper in the heart of life than Art itself, and for these beliefs we must seek deep down in the foundations of European thought for the last two or three hundred years. In fact, we must ask ourselves what our heritage from by-gone ages has been. Since Art is the subject of our inquiry, and "Art is the only task of life,"[12] it seems moderately clear that everything that has tended to reduce the dignity of Art must, in the first place, have reduced the dignity of man. Is our heritage of thought of a kind that exalts man, or is it of a kind that debases him? What are, in fact, its chief characteristics? [11] _W. P._, Vol. II, p. 256. [12] Ibid., p. 292. 3. Our Heritage.--A. Christianity. We shall find that the one definite and unswerving tendency of the traditional thought of Europe has been, first, to establish on earth that equality between men which from the outset Christianity had promised them in Heaven; secondly, to assail the prestige of man by proving that other tenet of the Faith which maintains the general depravity of human nature; and thirdly, to insist upon truth in the Christian sense; that is, as an absolute thing which can be, and must be, made common to all. At the root of all our science, all our philosophy, and all our literature, the three fundamental doctrines of Christianity: the equality of all souls, the insuperable depravity of human nature, and the insistence upon Truth, are the ruling influences. By means of the first and third doctrines equality was established in the spirit, and by means of the second it was established in the flesh.[13] By means of the first, each individual, great or small, was granted an importance[14] undreamt of theretofore,[15] while the lowest were raised to the highest power; by means of the second, in which the pride of mankind received a snub at once severe and merciless, the highest were reduced to the level of the low, while the low were by implication materially raised; and by means of the third, no truth or point of view which could not be made general could be considered as a truth or a point of view at all. Practically it amounted to this, that in one breath mankind was told, first, "Thy Lord for thee the Cross endured To save thy soul from Death and Hell;"[16] secondly, "Thou shalt have no other God before Me;" and thirdly, "From Greenland's icy mountains To India's coral strand, ... every prospect pleases, And only man is vile."[17]