Far away in olden times, at the close of the fifth century, when the gorgeous splendor of the Roman day was waning and the shades of that long, dark night of the middle ages were closing in upon the earth; just at that period when, as if impelled by some instinct or led by some mysterious hand, there came pouring down from the wilds of Scandinavia hordes of ferocious barbarians who threatened, as they rolled on like a dark flood, to obliterate all traces of civilization in Europe--when the martial spirit of the Roman was rapidly degenerating into the venal valor of the mercenary--when the western empire had fallen, after being the tragic theatre of scenes to which there is no parallel in the history of mankind--when men, aghast at human crime and writhing under the persecutions of those whom history has branded as the "Scourge of God," sought in vain for some shelter against their kind--when human nature, after that struggle between refined corruption and barbarian ruthlessness, lay awaiting the night of troubles which was to fall upon it as a long penance for human crime--just at this critical period in the world's history appeared the man who was destined to rescue from the general destruction of Roman life the elements of a future civilization; to provide an asylum to which art might flee with her choicest treasures, where science might labor in safety, where {151} learning might perpetuate and multiplied its stores, where the oracles of religion might rest secure, and where man might retire from the woe and wickedness of a world given up to destruction, live out his life in quiet, and make his peace with his God.