220 Contemporary Evolution. 



of the great arch of civil and religious liberty, a decree 

 which Germany now proves to us to have been dictated 

 by a more than mortal prescience. 



As to the characters presented by contemporary reli- 

 gious evolution outside the Church, we have already, in the 

 first chapter, pointed out that the religious disruption of 

 the sixteenth century resulted in two distinct yet inter- 

 mixed processes and tendencies. One of these was sim- 

 ply distinctive and pagan, and has ended in the wide- 

 spread negation of all religion which we see in Germany 

 to-day. The other was the formation of the various sects, 

 such as Lutheranism, Calvinism, Anglicanism, Puritanism, 

 etc., etc. In the present day it is sufficiently obvious 

 that these various religious bodies are undergoing a more 

 or less slow process of disruption and dissolution, and 

 their adherents tending, with greater or less rapidity, 

 either towards anti-theism on the one hand or towards 

 the Church upon the other. 



Closely connected, however, with the evolution of reli- 

 gion is that of aesthetic evolution ; and this essay may 

 perhaps be fitly closed by an endeavour to pourtray some 

 few of the probable effects of the great modern movement 

 of contemporary evolution upon Christian art. 



It is generally admitted that art has been profoundly 

 affected by Christianity. The effect was indeed gradual, and 

 the changes which have taken place from the second and 

 third century have been due to the action of many other 



