In the same way the Renaissance and the Reformation, which are usually considered to be the first great manifestations of the modern mentality, completed the breach with tradition rather than provoked it; for us, the beginning of this breach is to be found in the fourteenth century, and it is at this date, and not a century or two later, that the beginning of modern times should be fixed. This breach with tradition calls for further comment, for it is precisely this that produced the modern world, whose characteristics could all be summed up under one single heading, namely opposition to the
...more
