Excerpt from The Progressive Ages, or the Triumphs of Science, and Treasures of Nature, History and Literature We do live, truly, in an enlightened age. For six thousand years man has existed on the earth, and has continued to progress, so that we have before us the inventions and discoveries of preceding ages; and on this foundation our knowledge is built. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.