Page:Palæolithic Man and Terramara Settlements in Europe.djvu/326

240 will doubtless be admiration of the skill and assiduity with which anthropologists have resurrected, from the merest waifs and strays, an old-world phase of humanity of which, half a century ago, the civilised world was as ignorant as they are now of the inhabitants of the planet Mars. The intense desire of knowing something of the past history of mankind a desire which is growing and unquenchable in the breasts of a large section of the more thoughtful races in the world of to-day has led to the exploration, in comparatively recent times, of the bygone civilisations of the old-world empires of the Assyrians, Hittites, Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans. Among the remains thus brought to light you will find much to illustrate the progressive march of mankind to higher ideals. But the lines of advance are very similar to those on which the world is still governed so much so that after perusal of the results one is apt to exclaim, "There is nothing new under the sun." If you want to go to the root of human civilisation you must go back to Palæolithic times, where its earliest germs and rootlets are to be found. The system of human economy founded in these early days was the outcome of the free play of natural laws little affected by the principles of religion or ethics for the mysteries of the supernatural had not yet developed into the concrete ideas of gods or demons. Neither gloomy foreboding nor qualms of conscience had much influence on the actions of these people. Their philosophical and sentimental reflections centred on the habits of the animals they hunted, and the strategic means by which they could be waylaid and captured. Of agriculture, the rearing of domestic animals, the arts of spinning and weaving, and the manufacture of pottery they appear to have been absolutely ignorant. But, yet, in an environment of such primitive resources arid limited culture associations, these wild hunters developed a genuine taste for art, and cultivated its principles so effectually that they have bequeathed to us an art gallery of some four or five hundred specimens of engravings, sculptures, and even paintings in colour, many of them being so true to their models that they bear a favourable comparison with analogous works of the present day.