J. B. Bury 
The Idea of Progress [EPUB ebook] 
An Inquiry Into Its Origin And Growth

‘We may believe in the doctrine of Progress or we may not, but in either case it is a matter of interest to examine the origins and trace the history of what is now, even should it ultimately prove to be no more than an idolum saeculi, the animating and controlling idea of western civilisation.’
Contents:
Some Interpretations of Universal History: Bodin and Le Roy
Utility the End of Knowledge: Bacon
Cartesianism
The Doctrine of Degeneration: the Ancients and Moderns
The Progress of Knowledge: Fontenelle
The General Progress of Man: Abbe De Saint-Pierre
New Conceptions of History: Montesquieu, Voltaire, Turgot
The Encyclopaedists and Economists
Was Civilisation a Mistake? Rousseau, Chastellux
The Year 2440
The French Revolution: Condorcet
The Theory of Progress in England
German Speculations on Progress
Currents of Thought in France After the Revolution
The Search for a Law of Progress:
‘Progress’ in the French Revolutionary Movement (1830-1851)
Material Progress: the Exhibition of 1851
Progress in the Light of Evolution

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John Bagnell Bury (1861 – 1927) was an Irish historian, classical scholar, Medieval Roman historian and philologist. He objected to the label ‘Byzantinist’ explicitly in the preface to the 1889 edition of his Later Roman Empire. He held the position of Erasmus Smith’s Professor of Modern History at Trinity College Dublin.