Page:Epochs of Civilization.djvu/10

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

FREF.kCL VL]

partial and imperfect view of the [acts of civilized life must vitiate sociological interpretations and inferences.

There are some cultured Asiatics, especially among the "Celestials," who look upon civilized Europeans as not much better than barbarians1 On the other hand one sometimes meets with passages like the following in't]xe works of eminent Western authors:—

"Theancients had no conception of progress; they did not so mueh as reject the idea they did not even entertain the idea Or[ental nations RTC just the same now. Since history began they have always been. what they are Only a few nations, and those of European oiigin advance and yet these think-'—seem irresistibly compelled to think—such advance to be inevEtable, natural, and eternaL"*

Even a philosophic and erudite scientist like the late Professor Huxley, viewed the attempts of the ancient sages to attain tranquillity and salvation which ended flight from the battle-field 'as the 'youtbfnIdiscouragement of nonageYt He wou1 have the Europeans of the present age, as "grownmen,' "playthe man,'

Strong fri will To strive, to seek1 to find, and not to yield."

The statement that the Occidental of the present day is "grownman" as compared to civilized man two

—Waltcr Bigehot, "Phy&cs and Polities," pp, 4-42.. t vcNic and Ethics tad other Essays," p. 86.