Preserved Smith - A History of Modern Culture: Volume I

A HISTORY OF MODERN CULTURE

First published in 1930 by Henry Holt & Co.

This edition first published in 2018 by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN

and by Routledge

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1930 Taylor & Francis

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A Library of Congress record exists under ISBN: 96025849

ISBN 13: 978-1-138-55197-8 (hbk)

ISBN 13: 978-1-315-12159-8 (ebk)

BY

PRESERVED SMITH

HON.LITT.D. AMHERST
PROFESSOR OF HISTORY IN CORNELL
UNIVERSITY

VOLUME I

THE GREAT RENEWAL
15431687

COPYRIGHT, 1930

BY

HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY, INC.

Printed in the United States of America by
J. J. LITTLE AND IVES COMPANY, NEW YORK

TO

CHARLES HOMER HASKINS

IN HONOR AND IN FRIENDSHIP

Though the duties of the professoriate are arduous they allow considerable intervals of leisure which may be devoted to reading and writing. In addition to summer vacations I have been granted, by Cornell University, two longer periods of freedom from academic duties. An appropriation from the fund for the promotion of research given by Mr. August Heckscher, to whom I tender my thanks, allowed me during the spring term of 1926 to transfer the burden of teaching to other shoulders and thus to devote my time to study. A second and longer interval of leisure was granted me in 1928-29, in the sabbatic year which it is the wisdom of our universities to allow professors after six or seven years of academic labor.

For assistance in coping with a task which would otherwise have far exceeded my capacity, I am indebted to kind and able friends. The introductory chapter and those on Laws and on Morals and Manners, have been read and corrected in manuscript by Professor Carl Becker of Cornell University; the chapters on Astronomy, Physics, and Mathematics by Professor Frederick A. Saunders of Harvard; the chapter on Philosophy by Professor Charles H. Toll of Amherst College; the chapter on Political Theory by Professor George E. G. Catlin of Cornell University; the chapters on Religion, Free-thought, Superstition, and Tolerance by Professor George Lincoln Burr of Cornell University; the chapters on Literature and Art by my sister, Professor Winifred Smith of Vassar College. The first and second chapters have been read in proof by Professor Burr, and the fifth and sixth chapters by Dr. W. T. W. Forbes, of Cornell. While the careful criticisms of these eminent scholars have been invaluable to me, I must relieve my >collaborators of all responsibility for the general point of view adopted throughout the book, as well as for the expression of certain opinions with which they might not agree. Their help has enabled me, I hope, to present the various subjects treated with that degree of accuracy and in that perspective suitable to a work on so large a scale as this. My purpose has been to survey the intellectual progress of Western culture as a whole, not to amplify and qualify every detail with the meticulous refinement rightly demanded in the history of a small subject. One rule governs the drawing of a world map, another the drafting of the plan of a city or county.

For making the index, for reading the proof, and for other help, I am indebted to my wife.

P. S.