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  (tbz Etatc Qlollege Gaect.
  VoL. G. LEXINGTON, KY., APRIL, 1896. .No. 8.
. EVOLUTION OETHE REPUBLIC.
  J. T. GEARY.
  Our republic is the 1·esult of a long process of evolution. Step
I by step, this slow unfolding process has continued through all the I
fl ages, each revolving century drawing nearer the perfect plan. The
it biologist places before us the t1·ee of life,`tracing thereon the succes-
I sive stages of its progress, from the simple unit cell, until man
up stands revealed, crowning the summit of the structure. The high-
l est types of life are preserved by the rejection of the less developed
I L ones. In like nianner the sociologist, in reviewing the growth and
decay of societies, sees that the fall of one institution but makes way
for other associations of men of greater social efliciency. The death
of one institution records the birth of conditions favorable for the
further development of the new. Our civilization is then the result
ofthe ceaseless changes of the centuries, of the countless nations that
have perished in the struggle for existence.
Is it not then interesting and instructive to gaze back through the
mists of antiquity, and behold man as he starts on his long and pain-
_ ful journey of progress`? But little better than the brutes, he wan-
ders over the earth in vast hordes. Thousands of years pass over
. him, years of ignorance, degradation, and illusion, that have never
been recorded in the annals of human history. A great change
I has taken place. llis social capacities have been developed. He
forms clans, tribes—and at length great civilizations spring up,
._... LE