A Sketch of Universal Wisdom

[of Ar]ts, and of Faith, to increase the light: so that up to this very day, all things are in progress.

XXII. For the age of the whole human race is like the age of a single Man, taking its growth through its own stages, and advancing itself from infancy through adolescence toward the mature strength of the mind. Observing this, Augustine St. Augustine of Hippo (354–430 AD), a foundational Christian philosopher whose views on history deeply influenced Comenius's own theories of education and progress. wrote thus: “With divine providence beautifully moderating all things, the entire series of generations from Adam until the end of the age is managed just like a single Man, who, from childhood even to the old age of his own time, marks the span of his life by stages of age. And therefore, he who piously applies his mind to divine readings ought to distinguish also the stages of the Virtues in Morals, until he reaches the highest and perfect Virtue of Man.” (Eighty-three Diverse Questions, 53.)

XXIII. And that it is so—that all things have grown along with the human race (the Sciences and Arts, Virtues and Vices, Faith and treachery—that is, impiety and errors: and by the occasion of Errors, new torches have been lit again to better illustrate the truth)—is seen by anyone who [examines] anything in