We are
glad that we live in it.''
At that moment, the Middle Ages came to an end and a new
world began.
THE RENAISSANCE
PEOPLE ONCE MORE DARED TO BE HAPPY
JUST BECAUSE THEY WERE ALIVE. THEY
TRIED TO SAVE THE REMAINS OF THE
OLDER AND MORE AGREEABLE CIVILISATION
OF ROME AND GREECE AND THEY
WERE SO PROUD OF THEIR ACHIEVEMENTS
THAT THEY SPOKE OF A RENAISSANCE
OR RE-BIRTH OF CIVILISATION
THE Renaissance was not a political or religious movement.
It was a state of mind.
The men of the Renaissance continued to be the obedient
sons of the mother church. They were subjects of kings and
emperors and dukes and murmured not.
But their outlook upon life was changed. They began to
wear different clothes--to speak a different language--to live
different lives in different houses.
They no longer concentrated all their thoughts and their
efforts upon the blessed existence that awaited them in Heaven.
They tried to establish their Paradise upon this planet, and,
truth to tell, they succeeded in a remarkable degree.
I have quite often warned you against the danger that
lies in historical dates. People take them too literally. They
think of the Middle Ages as a period of darkness and ignor-
ance. ``Click,'' says the clock, and the Renaissance begins and
cities and palaces are flooded with the bright sunlight of an
eager intellectual curiosity.
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