> “Last and First Men” is not progressive

strange thing to claim if you have read the book when there's a clear trending line in a specific dimension. what its not is monotonic.

Progress (as in The Pilgrim's Progress) used to mean just moving along in some travel, no positive or negative connotation to it.

It was only after the XVI century (when they still debated if the ancients or moderns were greater) that it acquired its present quasi-religious meaning, because on a short-term scale "historical progress" meant improvements in living conditions.