The habit which I have contracted of living in the society of our ancestors of prehistoric times, would, it might be thought, naturally cause me to notice the dissimilarities between us and them rather than the likenesses; this often happens, but not always. Our fathers, for instance, did not know the thousandth part of our vocabulary, which is very copious; this would seem to indicate that our knowledge has considerably increased in the course of thirty or forty centuries. Words of deep import are familiar to us; who amongst us does not know and use such as these--Law, Necessity, Liberty, Spirit, Matter, Conscience, Belief, Nature, Providence, Revelation, Inspiration, the Soul, Religion, Infinite, Immortality, and many others, which are either of recent origin, or have become new because their meaning has changed? Here the difference between our fathers and ourselves springs into sight. But the points of resemblance are still more striking. Long before our present era, certain philosophers asserted that their world was full of gods, we may say with equal truth that God fills our world; His name is in every mouth, and our little children know it well. Moreover the complete identity between certain mental acts of our fathers and our own is easily recognised. Our fathers were satisfied not to enquire concerning the nature of their gods, they knew their names, and that sufficed. We too have become accustomed to hear God’s name repeated frequently, without always questioning ourselves as to its meaning, and in what way He has made the earth His habitation. To talk of what we do not grasp must be essentially human, since we find the practice in two social conditions, separated from each other by thousands of years. It is incredible to what a point we of the nineteenth century carry our lack of enquiry. If one day we were to count on our fingers the number of interesting subjects we had allowed to pass by us without any interrogations concerning them, fifty hands would not suffice us for the tale; our ignorance would then become apparent. Should we feel humiliated? In all probability no, for before arriving at this much to be desired consummation, we should have been carried away by many thoughts in no way bearing on the subject, and the one thought which would come prominently to the front and hinder us from passing our conduct in review would be, “I see no necessity to apply myself to them.” In fact, nothing is easier and nothing so reposeful to our mind as acquiescence in the popular opinion, which we allow to guide us in our estimation of words and phrases; as so frequently happens with ourselves (by “ourselves” I mean that very considerable portion of society which separates the working classes from the savants and philosophers).