It was affirmed that an angel brought it from heaven and gave it to the priest called Cyril, who it was said delivered it to the Abbot Joachim, by whom the book was published. Cyril {72} had been dead about fifty years when the work first made its appearance. According to the admissions of Catholic historians, "The work displayed an enlarged and masterly conception of the historical progress of humanity." It claimed that Romanism had done its work and must now make way for a new order of ideas. It proceeded to show that there are epochs, or ages in the divine government of the world. During the Jewish dispensation, it had been under the immediate influence of God the Father. For the next twelve hundred years, it had been under the control of God the Son, but the time has now arrived when the world would be under the special control of the Holy Spirit. That man need no longer treasure up the relics of antiquity, search after the sayings of the early fathers or even solely and implicitly rely on the letter of the ancient scriptures, for the Holy Spirit would manifest itself in visions, dreams and revelations to the children of men. One of the grand principles which it taught was, "the divine right of private judgment." It asserted that genius should not be considered an individual possession, but rather "the gift of God--the visible manifestation of the secret workings of the Holy Spirit for the elevation of the race." In short, it taught that "every invention and discovery was only, in some degree, a revelation of God to man," an unfolding of the secret laws of nature to man's finite understanding. It considered, "those heroes as inspired, who, springing from society at appointed epochs, displayed a mental or moral power beyond the ordinary limits of humanity, and around whom, as around a superior and mysterious power, nations and individuals unhesitatingly gather." It recognized the hand of God in those grand revolutions, those great men, those mighty nations, which, arising from obscurity, communicate a fresh impulse, new vigor and advanced ideas to the human race. It was without doubt the most powerful written work which had appeared since the days of the apostles. No wonder the pope, Alexander IV., took immediate measures for its destruction. So far from being suppressed, its copies were multiplied rapidly, though printing was as yet unknown.