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augurafced in the nineteenth century, found all the 

 progressive nations of the world acknowledging some 

 form of Christianity as their faith, and thus were 

 possessed of the essential principles that form the 

 foundation of a progressive civilisation. This century 

 was as the burst of spring after a long winter the 

 awakening of the human mind to an investigation 

 of the forces of Nature, as by degrees the veil which 

 had hitherto concealed them from man's knowledge 

 was withdrawn, and he began to perceive the char- 

 acter and possibilities of his material environment. 

 More and more as the century advanced, man dis- 

 covered his power of utilising the active principles 

 that are termed natural laws in a thousand ways 

 hitherto undreamed of, for the devolopment of the 

 resources of the earth that avail for the support of 

 the human race, and for the material improvement 

 of the conditions of human existence. Passed away 

 were the slow-creeping and slumberous ages, in which 

 whatever principles of development were at work 

 were operating, as it were, underground, or if they 

 showed their head above the surface were unnoted 

 or misunderstood. The former generations of men, 

 with their limitations of knowledge and power, seem 

 to pass before me as but caretakers for posterity, 

 occupying the earth until the advent of civilised man, 

 who as the heir of all the ages should enter into 

 fuller and ever fuller possession of his great and rich 

 estate. The victorious march of our progressive 

 civilisation can never be seriously checked before its 



