Mr. Buckle s Fallacies. 185 



strong check needful to curb the undisciplined 

 passions of men would have been destroyed, civili 

 zation would have stopped, and society could no 

 longer have existed. It was only after centuries 

 of theocratic and monarchic rule after the pri 

 meval nonmdic mode of life had been long aban 

 doned, and agriculture and commerce had in 

 course of time, by mingling men with each other 

 in peaceful relations, called forth social virtues 

 that scepticism could safely arise. And then it 

 did arise. We find it first showing itself in the 

 states of Greece, where popular despots arose and 

 were overthrown, as at Korinth, Sikyon, and Me- 

 gara ; and where philosophers began to speculate 

 about the first principles of things, as Thales, 

 Xenophanes, and Herakleitos. Thenceforward 

 scepticism increased, until it reached for a time 

 its culmination in the universal doubts of Pyrrho. 

 But it is not in ancient times at all that we are 

 to look for any very prominent manifestation of 

 scepticism. The spirit of doubting and hesitat 

 ing inquiry was of slow growth, and did not at 

 tain to its maturity until monotheism had been 

 established in Europe for more than a thousand 

 years. Not only, therefore, has scepticism not 

 always been essential to progress ; not only have 

 some important changes in human opinion as 



