It is here and now with us.

The period upon which Italy is now entering more than fulfils in real life the dream of a Golden Age.

A marvellous child is even now coming into the world who will see and inaugurate an era of peace and prosperity: darkness and despair will after a while pass entirely away, and a regenerate Italy,--regenerate in religion and morals as in fertility and wealth,--will lead the world in a new era of happiness and good government."[584] But the Golden Age, so fondly hoped for, so vaguely and poetically conceived, was not to come in the sense in which Virgil, or any other serious thinker of the day, could dream of it.

I may conclude this chapter with a few sentences which express this most truly and eloquently.

"When there is a fervent aspiration after better things, springing from a strong feeling of human brotherhood, and a firm belief in the goodness and righteousness of God, such aspiration carries with it an invincible confidence that some how, some where, some when, it must receive its complete fulfilment, for it is prompted by the Spirit which fills and orders the Universe throughout its whole development.