The Wisdom of this World 45 these are the drifts still floating on the current of human his tory as it moves on its majestic course tc that eternity where time is not measured by days and nights, and weeks and years; and to that infinity where space is not measured by islands, continents and seas. There were walls seventy feet high, on which war-chariots might be driven four abreast; there were hanging gardens filled with flowers and birds; there were temples of polished marble, overlaid with ivory and gold; there were statues so lifelike as almost to speak; there were highways, firm and hard, stretching from imperial Rome to all the ends of the known world; there were arches and aqueducts, fountains and baths, painting and poetry. But, alas! upon that civilization might have been written the inscription upon the altar at Mars Hill, “To the Unknown God”. It was all of this world, and of this world only; it was outward, material, transient; it was earthly, sensual, devilish. Dr. Garbett, in his “Dogmatic Faith”, says: “With the sole exception of the knowledge of the true God, this old world carried human advancement to its highest pitch. For lustre of genius, brilliancy of wit, fertility of imagination, depth of thought, artistic taste and skill, aesthetic sensibilities, and keen relish for pleasure, the latest period of heathen civi lization has never yet been excelled, perhaps never equaled”. And yet, in the midst of all this, vice and immorality were well-nigh universal; chastity was almost unknown; thousands of virgins were annually devoted to prostitution in the tem ples of the gods; the life of a man was esteemed of less value than the life of a dog; slavery was universal, and slaves were put to death for the most trivial causes; men fought with each other and with wild beasts in amphitheatres, where dainty Roman matrons gazed with eager delight upon the agonies of dying men, and turned their thumbs down over the polished marble in token of their desire for more blood. This old world with all its wisdom knew not God. In its
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