In those days immortal artists shot the world through with a matchless radiance of color and of meaning.

In those days Vasco da Gama and Columbus and Magellan opened the watery ways to new lands beyond the seven seas.

In those days Copernicus established the momentous truth that the earth was but a tiny planet spinning around a vastly greater sun.

In those days was in large part accomplished the economic shift from medieval gild to modern production by capital and wages.

In those days wealth was piled up in the coffers of the merchants, and a new power was {4} given to the life of the individual, of the nation, and of the third estate.