the idea of Progress could germinate, and our history of it origin
definitely begins with the work of two men who belong to this age,
Bodin, who is hardly known except to special students of political
science, and Bacon, who is known to all the world. Both had a more
general grasp of the significance of their own time than any of
their contemporaries, and though neither of them discovered a theory
of Progress, they both made contributions to thought which directly
contributed to its subsequent appearance.

CHAPTER I

SOME INTERPRETATIONS OF UNIVERSAL HISTORY: BODIN AND LE ROY

1.

It is a long descent from the genius of Machiavelli to the French
historian, Jean Bodin, who published his introduction to historical
studies [Footnote: Methodus ad facilem historiarum cognitionem,
1566.] about forty years after Machiavelli's death. His views and
his method differ widely from those of that great pioneer, whom he
attacks. His readers were not arrested by startling novelties or
immoral doctrine; he is safe, and dull.

But Bodin had a much wider range of thought than Machiavelli, whose
mind was entirely concentrated on the theory of politics; and his
importance for us lies not in the political speculations by which he
sought to prove that monarchy is the best form of government
[Footnote: Les six livres de la Republique, 1576.], but in his
attempt to substitute a new theory of universal history for that
which prevailed in the Middle Ages. He rejected the popular