Excerpt from Democracy and the Church For a long time I have wondered why it is that many intelligent persons who accept the genetic View of the development of life have no open-mindedness for the genetic view of history. They recognize that there are certain periods in the history of life when old environments give way, new forms of life appear showing a fresh summertime, and sustaining heart and hope. This class of persons may recognize that there is a history of art, and if they do not glory in the pre-raphaelite as Beauty's last word or accept the impressionist's school as the final despair of the creative gods, they do see continuity in Art; they do recognize that every time must create its own artistic forms in harmony with the terms and the conditions of its life. Literature in successive periods may flower out in the great secular bibles; the works of Homer, zeschylus, Dante, Shakespeare, Goethe. But even these men are social products as well as social forces, and literature has its continuity, its progress and its invincible relationships. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.