likeness of Almighty God,--an ancient doctrine, yet one ever young, and
which no discoveries in science will ever abrogate."

Hence the great aim of history should be a dispassionate inquiry into
the genius of past civilizations, especially in a moral point of view.
Wherein were they weak or strong, vital or mechanical, permanent or
transient? We wish to know that we may compare them with our own, and
learn lessons of wisdom. The rise and fall of the Roman Empire is
especially rich in the facts which bear on our own development. Nor can
modern history be comprehended without a survey of the civilization
which has entered into our own, and forms the basis of many of our own
institutions. Rome perished, but not wholly her civilization. So far as
it was founded on the immutable principles of justice, or beauty, or
love, it will never die, but will remain a precious legacy to all
generations. So far as it was founded on pride, injustice, and
selfishness, it ignobly disappeared. _Men_ die, and their trophies
of pride are buried in the dust, but their truths live. All truth is
indestructible, and survives both names and marbles.

Roman history, so grand and so mournful, on the whole suggests cheering
views for humanity, since out of the ruins, amid the storms, aloft above
the conflagration, there came certain indestructible forces, which, when
united with Christianity, developed a new and more glorious condition of
humanity. Creation succeeded destruction. All that was valuable in art,
in science, in literature, in philosophy, in laws, has been preserved.
The useless alone has perished with the worn-out races themselves. The
light which scholars, and artists, and poets, and philosophers, and
lawgivers kindled, illuminated the path of the future guides of mankind.
And especially the great ideas which the persecuted Christians unfolded,
projected themselves into the shadows of mediaeval Europe, and gave a