1. Importance of Tradition.—Since the Palætiological Sciences have it for their business to study the train of past events produced by natural causes down to the present time, the knowledge concerning such events which is supplied by the remembrance and records of man, in whatever form, must have an important bearing upon these sciences. All changes in the condition and extent of land and sea, which have taken place within man’s observation, all effects of deluges, sea-waves, rivers, springs, volcanoes, earthquakes, and the like, which come within the reach of human history, have a strong interest for the palætiologist. Nor is he less concerned in all recorded instances of the modification of the forms and habits of plants and animals, by the operations of man, or by transfer from one land to another. And when we come to the Palætiology of Language, of Art, of Civilization, we find our subject still more closely connected with history; for in truth these are historical, no less than palætiological investigations. But, confining ourselves at present to the material sciences, we may observe that though the importance of the information which tradition gives us, in the sciences now under our consideration, as, for instance, geology, has long been tacitly recognised; yet it is only recently that geologists have employed themselves in collecting their historical facts upon such a scale and with such comprehensive views as are required by the interest and use of collections of this kind. The Essay of Von 298 Hoff19, On the Natural Alterations in the Surface of the Earth which are proved by Tradition, was the work which first opened the eyes of geologists to the extent and importance of this kind of investigation. Since that time the same path of research has been pursued with great perseverance by others, especially by Sir C. Lyell; and is now justly considered as an essential portion of Geology.

2. Connexion of Tradition and Science.—Events which we might naturally expect to have some bearing on geology, are narrated in the historical writings which, even on mere human grounds, have the strongest claim to our respect as records of the early history of the world, and are confirmed by the traditions of various nations all over the globe; namely, the formation of the earth and of its population, and a subsequent deluge. It has been made a matter of controversy how the narrative of these events is to be understood, so as to make it agree with the facts which an examination of the earth’s surface and of its vegetable and animal population discloses to us. Such controversies, when they are considered as merely archæological, may occur in any of the palætiological sciences. We may have to compare and to reconcile the evidence of existing phenomena with that of historical tradition. But under some circumstances this process of conciliation may assume an interest of another kind, on which we will make a few remarks.

3. Natural and Providential History of the World.—We may contemplate the existence of man upon the earth, his origin and his progress, in the same manner as we contemplate the existence of any other race of animals; namely, in a purely palætiological view. We may consider how far our knowledge of laws of causation enables us to explain his diffusion and migration, his differences and resemblances, his actions and works. And this is the view of man as a member of the Natural Course of Things. 299

But man, at the same time the contemplator and the subject of his own contemplation, endowed with faculties and powers which make him a being of a different nature from other animals, cannot help regarding his own actions and enjoyments, his recollections and his hopes, under an aspect quite different from any that we have yet had presented to us. We have been endeavouring to place in a clear light the Fundamental Ideas, such as that of Cause, on which depends our knowledge of the natural course of things. But there are other Ideas to which man necessarily refers his actions; he is led by his nature, not only to consider his own actions, and those of his fellow-men, as springing out of this or that cause, leading to this or that material result; but also as good or bad, as what they ought or ought not to be. He has Ideas of moral relations as well as those Ideas of material relations with which we have hitherto been occupied. He is a moral as well as a natural agent.

Contemplating himself and the world around him by the light of his Moral Ideas, man is led to the conviction that his moral faculties were bestowed upon him by design and for a purpose; that he is the subject of a Moral Government; that the course of the world is directed by the Power which governs it, to the unfolding and perfecting of man’s moral nature; that this guidance may be traced in the career of individuals and of the world; that there is a Providential as well as a Natural Course of Things.

Yet this view is beset by no small difficulties. The full development of man’s moral faculties;—the perfection of his nature up to the measure of his own ideas;—the adaptation of his moral being to an ultimate destination, by its transit through a world full of moral evil, in which evil each person has his share;—are effects for which the economy of the world appears to contain no adequate provision. Man, though aware of his moral nature, and ready to believe in an ultimate destination of purity and blessedness, is too feeble to resist the temptation of evil, and too helpless to restore his purity when once lost. He cannot but look for 300 some confirmation of that providential order which he has begun to believe; some provision for those deficiencies in his moral condition which he has begun to feel.

He looks at the history of the world, and he finds that at a certain period it offers to him the promise of what he seeks. When the natural powers of man had been developed to their full extent, and were beginning to exhibit symptoms of decay;—when the intellectual progress of the world appeared to have reached its limit, without supplying man’s moral needs;—we find the great Epoch in the Providential History of the world. We find the announcement of a Dispensation by which man’s deficiencies shall be supplied and his aspirations fulfilled: we find a provision for the purification, the support, and the ultimate beatification of those who use the provided means. And thus the providential course of the world becomes consistent and intelligible.

4. The Sacred Narrative.—But with the new Dispensation, we receive, not only an account of its own scheme and history, but also a written narrative of the providential course of the world from the earliest times, and even from its first creation. This narrative is recognized and authorized by the new dispensation, and accredited by some of the same evidences as the dispensation itself. That the existence of such a sacred narrative should be a part of the providential order of things, cannot but appear natural; but, naturally also, the study of it leads to some difficulties.

The Sacred Narrative in some of its earliest portions speaks of natural objects and occurrences respecting them. In the very beginning of the course of the world, we may readily believe (indeed, as we have seen in the last chapter, our scientific researches lead us to believe) that such occurrences were very different from anything which now takes place;—different to an extent and in a manner which we cannot estimate. Now the narrative must speak of objects and occurrences in the words and phrases which have derived their meaning from their application to the existing natural state of things. When applied to an initial 301 supernatural state therefore, these words and phrases cannot help being to us obscure and mysterious, perhaps ambiguous and seemingly contradictory.

5. Difficulties in interpreting the Sacred Narrative.—The moral and providential relations of man’s condition are so much more important to him than mere natural relations, that at first we may well suppose he will accept the Sacred Narrative, as not only unquestionable in its true import, but also as a guide in his views even of mere natural things. He will try to modify the conceptions which he entertains of objects and their properties, so that the Sacred Narrative of the supernatural condition shall retain the first meaning which he had put upon it in virtue of his own habits in the usage of language.

But man is so constituted that he cannot persist in this procedure. The powers and tendencies of his intellect are such that he cannot help trying to attain true conceptions of objects and their properties by the study of things themselves. For instance, when he at first read of a firmament dividing the waters above from the waters below, he perhaps conceived a transparent floor in the skies, on which the superior waters rested, which descend in rain; but as his observations and his reasonings satisfied him that such a floor could not exist, he became willing to allow (as St. Augustine allowed) that the waters above the firmament are in a state of vapour. And in like manner in other subjects, men, as their views of nature became more distinct and precise, modified, so far as it was necessary for consistency’s sake, their first rude interpretations of the Sacred Narrative; so that, without in any degree losing its import as a view of the providential course of the world, it should be so conceived as not to contradict what they knew of the natural order of things.

But this accommodation was not always made without painful struggles and angry controversies. When men had conceived the occurrences of the Sacred Narrative in a particular manner, they could not readily and willingly adopt a new mode of conception; and all attempts to recommend to them such novelties, they 302 resisted as attacks upon the sacredness of the Narrative. They had clothed their belief of the workings of Providence in certain images; and they clung to those images with the persuasion that, without them, their belief could not subsist. Thus they imagined to themselves that the earth was a flat floor, solidly and broadly laid for the convenience of man; and they felt as if the kindness of Providence was disparaged, when it was maintained that the earth was a globe held together only by the mutual attraction of its parts.

The most memorable instance of a struggle of this kind is to be found in the circumstances which attended the introduction of the Heliocentric Theory of Copernicus to general acceptance. On this controversy I have already made some remarks in the History of Science20, and have attempted to draw from it some lessons which may be useful to us when any similar conflict of opinions may occur. I will here add a few reflections with a similar view.

6. Such difficulties inevitable.—In the first place, I remark that such modifications of the current interpretation of the words of Scripture appear to be an inevitable consequence of the progressive character of Natural Science. Science is constantly teaching us to describe known facts in new language; but the language of Scripture is always the same. And not only so, but the language of Scripture is necessarily adapted to the common state of man’s intellectual development, in which he is supposed not to be possessed of science. Hence the phrases used by Scripture are precisely those which science soon teaches man to consider as inaccurate. Yet they are not, on that account, the less fitted for their proper purpose: for if any terms had been used, adapted to a more advanced state of knowledge, they must have been unintelligible among those to whom the Scripture was first addressed. If the Jews had been told that water existed in the clouds in small drops, they would have marvelled that it did 303 not constantly descend; and to have explained the reason of this, would have been to teach Atmology in the sacred writings. If they had read in their Scripture that the earth was a sphere, when it appeared to be a plain, they would only have been disturbed in their thoughts or driven to some wild and baseless imaginations, by a declaration to them so strange. If the Divine Speaker, instead of saying that he would set his bow in the clouds, had been made to declare that he would give to water the property of refracting different colours at different angles, how utterly unmeaning to the hearers would the words have been! And in these cases, the expressions, being unintelligible, startling, and bewildering, would have been such as tended to unfit the Sacred Narrative for its place in the providential dispensation of the world.

Accordingly, in the great controversy which took place in Galileo’s time between the defenders of the then customary interpretations of Scripture, and the assertors of the Copernican system of the universe, when the innovators were upbraided with maintaining opinions contrary to Scripture, they replied that Scripture was not intended to teach men astronomy, and that it expressed the acts of divine power in images which were suited to the ideas of unscientific men. To speak of the rising and setting and travelling of the sun, of the fixity and of the foundations of the earth, was to use the only language which would have made the Sacred Narrative intelligible. To extract from these and the like expressions doctrines of science, was, they declared, in the highest degree unjustifiable; and such a course could lead, they held, to no result but a weakening of the authority of Scripture in proportion as its credit was identified with that of these modes of applying it. And this judgment has since been generally assented to by those who most reverence and value the study of the designs of Providence as well as that of the works of nature.

7. Science tells us nothing concerning Creation.—Other apparent difficulties arise from the accounts given in the Scripture of the first origin of the world 304 in which we live: for example, Light is represented as created before the Sun. With regard to difficulties of this kind, it appears that we may derive some instruction from the result to which we were led in the last chapter;—namely, that in the sciences which trace the progress of natural occurrences, we can in no case go back to an origin, but in every instance appear to find ourselves separated from it by a state of things, and an order of events, of a kind altogether different from those which come under our experience. The thread of induction respecting the natural course of the world snaps in our fingers, when we try to ascertain where its beginning is. Since, then, science can teach us nothing positive respecting the beginning of things, she can neither contradict nor confirm what is taught by Scripture on that subject; and thus, as it is unworthy timidity in the lover of Scripture to fear contradiction, so is it ungrounded presumption to look for confirmation, in such cases. The providential history of the world has its own beginning, and its own evidence; and we can only render the system insecure, by making it lean on our material sciences. If any one were to suggest that the nebular hypothesis countenances the Scripture history of the formation of this system, by showing how the luminous matter of the sun might exist previous to the sun itself, we should act wisely in rejecting such an attempt to weave together these two heterogeneous threads;—the one a part of a providential scheme, the other a fragment of a physical speculation.

We shall best learn those lessons of the true philosophy of science which it is our object to collect, by attending to portions of science which have gone through such crises as we are now considering; nor is it requisite, for this purpose, to bring forwards any subjects which are still under discussion. It may, however, be mentioned that such maxims as we are now endeavouring to establish, and the one before us in particular, bear with a peculiar force upon those Palætiological Sciences of which we have been treating in the present Book. 305

8. Scientific views, when familiar, do not disturb the authority of Scripture.—There is another reflection which may serve to console and encourage us in the painful struggles which thus take place, between those who maintain interpretations of Scripture already prevalent and those who contend for such new ones as the new discoveries of science require. It is this;—that though the new opinion is resisted by one party as something destructive of the credit of Scripture and the reverence which is its due, yet, in fact, when the new interpretation has been generally established and incorporated with men’s current thoughts, it ceases to disturb their views of the authority of the Scripture or of the truth of its teaching. When the language of Scripture, invested with its new meaning, has become familiar to men, it is found that the ideas which it calls up are quite as reconcileable as the former ones were, with the most entire acceptance of the providential dispensation. And when this has been found to be the case, all cultivated persons look back with surprise at the mistake of those who thought that the essence of the revelation was involved in their own arbitrary version of some collateral circumstance in the revealed narrative. At the present day, we can hardly conceive how reasonable men could ever have imagined that religious reflections on the stability of the earth, and the beauty and use of the luminaries which revolve round it, would be interfered with by an acknowledgment that this rest and motion are apparent only21. And thus the authority of revelation is not shaken by any changes introduced by the progress of science in the mode of interpreting expressions which describe physical objects and occurrences; provided the new interpretation is admitted at a proper season, and in a proper spirit; so as to soften, as much as possible, both the public controversies and the private scruples which almost inevitably accompany such an alteration.

9. When should old Interpretations be given up?—But the question then occurs, What is the proper 306 season for a religious and enlightened commentator to make such a change in the current interpretation of sacred Scripture? At what period ought the established exposition of a passage to be given up, and a new mode of understanding the passage, such as is, or seems to be, required by new discoveries respecting the laws of nature, accepted in its place? It is plain, that to introduce such an alteration lightly and hastily would be a procedure fraught with inconvenience; for if the change were made in such a manner, it might be afterwards discovered that it had been adopted without sufficient reason, and that it was necessary to reinstate the old exposition. And the minds of the readers of Scripture, always to a certain extent and for a time disturbed by the subversion of their long-established notions, would be distressed without any need, and might be seriously unsettled. While, on the other hand, a too protracted and obstinate resistance to the innovation, on the part of the scriptural expositors, would tend to identify, at least in the minds of many, the authority of the Scripture with the truth of the exposition; and therefore would bring discredit upon the revealed word, when the established interpretation was finally proved to be untenable.

A rule on this subject, propounded by some of the most enlightened dignitaries of the Roman Catholic church, on the occasion of the great Copernican controversy begun by Galileo, seems well worthy of our attention. The following was the opinion given by Cardinal Bellarmine at the time:—‘When a demonstration shall be found to establish the earth’s motion, it will be proper to interpret the sacred Scriptures otherwise than they have hitherto been interpreted in those passages where mention is made of the stability of the earth and movement of the heavens.’ This appears to be a judicious and reasonable maxim for such cases in general. So long as the supposed scientific discovery is doubtful, the exposition of the meaning of Scripture given by commentators of established credit is not wantonly to be disturbed: but when a scientific theory, irreconcileable with this ancient 307 interpretation, is clearly proved, we must give up the interpretation, and seek some new mode of understanding the passage in question, by means of which it may be consistent with what we know; for if it be not, our conception of the things so described is no longer consistent with itself.

It may be said that this rule is indefinite, for who shall decide when a new theory is completely demonstrated, and the old interpretation become untenable? But to this we may reply, that if the rule be assented to, its application will not be very difficult. For when men have admitted as a general rule, that the current interpretations of scriptural expressions respecting natural objects and events may possibly require, and in some cases certainly will require, to be abandoned, and new ones admitted, they will hardly allow themselves to contend for such interpretations as if they were essential parts of revelation; and will look upon the change of exposition, whether it come sooner or later, without alarm or anger. And when men lend themselves to the progress of truth in this spirit, it is not of any material importance at what period a new and satisfactory interpretation of the scriptural difficulty is found; since a scientific exactness in our apprehension of the meaning of such passages as are now referred to is very far from being essential to our full acceptance of revelation.

10. In what Spirit should the Change be accepted?—Still these revolutions in scriptural interpretation must always have in them something which distresses and disturbs religious communities. And such uneasy feelings will take a different shape, according as the community acknowledges or rejects a paramount interpretative authority in its religious leaders. In the case in which the interpretation of the Church is binding upon all its members, the more placid minds rest in peace upon the ancient exposition, till the spiritual authorities announce that the time for the adoption of a new view has arrived; but in these circumstances, the more stirring and inquisitive minds, which cannot refrain from the pursuit of new truths 308 and exact conceptions, are led to opinions which, being contrary to those of the Church, are held to be sinful. On the other hand, if the religious constitution of the community allow and encourage each man to study and interpret for himself the Sacred Writings, we are met by evils of another kind. In this case, although, by the unforced influence of admired commentators, there may prevail a general agreement in the usual interpretation of difficult passages, yet as each reader of the Scripture looks upon the sense which he has adopted as being his own interpretation, he maintains it, not with the tranquil acquiescence of one who has deposited his judgment in the hands of his Church, but with the keenness and strenuousness of self-love. In such a state of things, though no judicial severities can be employed against the innovators, there may arise more angry controversies than in the other case.

It is impossible to overlook the lesson which here offers itself, that it is in the highest degree unwise in the friends of religion, whether individuals or communities, unnecessarily to embark their credit in expositions of Scripture on matters which appertain to natural Science. By delivering physical doctrines as the teaching of revelation, religion may lose much, but cannot gain anything. This maxim of practical wisdom has often been urged by Christian writers. Thus St. Augustine says22: ‘In obscure matters and things far removed from our senses, if we read anything, even in the divine Scripture, which may produce diverse opinions without damaging the faith which we cherish, let us not rush headlong by positive assertion to either the one opinion or the other; lest, when a more thorough discussion has shown the opinion which we had adopted to be false, our faith may fall with it: and we should be found contending, not for the doctrine of the sacred Scriptures, but for our own; endeavouring to make our doctrine to be that of the Scriptures, instead of taking the doctrine of the Scriptures to be ours.’ And in nearly the same spirit, at the 309 time of the Copernican controversy, it was thought proper to append to the work of Copernicus a postil, to say that the work was written to account for the phenomena, and that people must not run on blindly and condemn either of the opposite opinions. Even when the Inquisition, in 1616, thought itself compelled to pronounce a decision upon this subject, the verdict was delivered in very moderate language;—that ‘the doctrine of the earth’s motion appeared to be contrary to Scripture:’ and yet, moderate as this expression is, it has been blamed by judicious members of the Roman church as deciding a point such as religious authorities ought not to pretend to decide; and has brought upon that church no ordinary weight of general condemnation. Kepler pointed out, in his lively manner, the imprudence of employing the force of religious authorities on such subjects: Acies dolabræ in ferrum illisa, postea nec in lignum valet amplius. Capiat hoc cujus interest. ‘If you will try to chop iron, the axe becomes unable to cut even wood. I warn those whom it concerns.’

11. In what Spirit should the Change be urged?—But while we thus endeavour to show in what manner the interpreters of Scripture may most safely and most properly accept the discoveries of science, we must not forget that there may be errours committed on the other side also; and that men of science, in bringing forward views which may for a time disturb the minds of lovers of Scripture, should consider themselves as bound by strict rules of candour, moderation, and prudence. Intentionally to make their supposed discoveries a means of discrediting, contradicting, or slighting the sacred Scriptures, or the authority of religion, is in them unpardonable. As men who make the science of Truth the business of their lives, and are persuaded of her genuine superiority, and certain of her ultimate triumph, they are peculiarly bound to urge her claims in a calm and temperate spirit; not forgetting that there are other kinds of truth besides that which they peculiarly study. They may properly reject authority in matters of science; but they are to leave 310 it its proper office in matters of religion. I may here again quote Kepler’s expressions: ‘In Theology we balance authorities, in Philosophy we weigh reasons. A holy man was Lactantius who denied that the earth was round; a holy man was Augustine, who granted the rotundity, but denied the antipodes; a holy thing to me is the Inquisition, which allows the smallness of the earth, but denies its motion; but more holy to me is Truth; and hence I prove, from philosophy, that the earth is round, and inhabited on every side, of small size, and in motion among the stars,—and this I do with no disrespect to the Doctors.’ I the more willingly quote such a passage from Kepler, because the entire ingenuousness and sincere piety of his character does not allow us to suspect him in anything of hypocrisy or latent irony. That similar professions of respect may be made ironically, we have a noted example in the celebrated Introduction to Galileo’s Dialogue on the Copernican System; probably the part which was most offensive to the authorities. ‘Some years ago,’ he begins, ‘a wholesome edict was promulgated at Rome, which, in order to check the perilous scandals of the present age, imposed silence upon the Pythagorean opinion of the mobility of the earth. There were not wanting,’ he proceeds, ‘persons who rashly asserted that this decree was the result, not of a judicious inquiry, but of passion ill-informed; and complaints were heard that councillors, utterly unacquainted with astronomical observation, ought not to be allowed, with their sudden prohibitions, to clip the wings of speculative intellects. At the hearing of rash lamentations like these, my zeal could not keep silence.’ And he then goes on to say, that he wishes, in his Dialogue, to show that the subject had been fully examined at Rome. Here the irony is quite transparent, and the sarcasm glaringly obvious. I think we may venture to say that this is not the temper in which scientific questions should be treated; although by some, perhaps, the prohibition of public discussion may be considered as justifying any evasion which is likely to pass unpunished. 311

12. Duty of Mutual Forbearance.—We may add, as a further reason for mutual forbearance in such cases, that the true interests of both parties are the same. The man of science is concerned, no less than any other person, in the truth and import of the divine dispensation; the religious man, no less than the man of science, is, by the nature of his intellect, incapable of believing two contradictory declarations. Hence they have both alike a need for understanding the Scripture in some way in which it shall be consistent with their understanding of nature. It is for their common advantage to conciliate, as Kepler says, the finger and the tongue of God, his works and his word. And they may find abundant reason to bear with each other, even if they should adopt for this purpose different interpretations, each finding one satisfactory to himself; or if any one should decline employing his thoughts on such subjects at all. I have elsewhere23 quoted a passage from Kepler24 which appears to me written in a most suitable spirit: ‘I beseech my reader that, not unmindful of the divine goodness bestowed upon man, he do with me praise and celebrate the wisdom of the Creator, which I open to him from a more inward explication of the form of the world, from a searching of causes, from a detection of the errours of vision; and that thus not only in the firmness and stability of the earth may we perceive with gratitude the preservation of all living things in nature as the gift of God: but also that in its motion, so recondite, so admirable, we may acknowledge the wisdom of the Creator. But whoever is too dull to receive this science, or too weak to believe the Copernican system without harm to his piety, him, I say, I advise that, leaving the school of astronomy, and condemning, if so he please, any doctrines of the philosophers, he follow his own path, and desist from this wandering through the universe; and that, lifting up his natural eyes, with which alone he can see, 312 he pour himself out from his own heart in worship of God the Creator, being certain that he gives no less worship to God than the astronomer, to whom God has given to see more clearly with his inward eyes, and who, from what he has himself discovered, both can and will glorify God.’

13. Case of Galileo.—I may perhaps venture here to make a remark or two upon this subject with reference to a charge brought against a certain portion of the History of the Inductive Sciences. Complaint has been made25 that the character of the Roman church, as shown in its behaviour towards Galileo, is misrepresented in the account given of it in the History of Astronomy. It is asserted that Galileo provoked the condemnation he incurred; first, by pertinaciously demanding the assent of the ecclesiastical authorities to his opinion of the consistency of the Copernican doctrine with Scripture; and afterwards by contumaciously, and, as we have seen, contumeliously violating the silence which the Church had enjoined upon him. It is further declared that the statement which represents it as the habit of the Roman church to dogmatize on points of natural science is unfounded; as well as the opinion that in consequence of this habit, new scientific truths were promulgated less boldly in Italy than in other countries. I shall reply very briefly on these subjects; for the decision of them is by no means requisite in order to establish the doctrines to which I have been led in the present chapter, nor, I hope, to satisfy my reader that my views have been collected from an impartial consideration of scientific history.

With regard to Galileo, I do not think it can be denied that he obtruded his opinions upon the ecclesiastical authorities in an unnecessary and imprudent manner. He was of an ardent character, strongly convinced himself, and urged on still more by the conviction which he produced among his disciples, and 313 thus he became impatient for the triumph of truth. This judgment of him has recently been delivered by various independent authorities, and has undoubtedly considerable foundation26. As to the question whether authority in matters of natural science were habitually claimed by the authorities of the Church of Rome, I have to allow that I cannot produce instances which establish such a habit. We, who have been accustomed to have daily before our eyes the Monition which the Romish editors of Newton thought it necessary to prefix—Cæterum latis a summo Pontifice contra telluris motum Decretis, nos obsequi profitemur—were not likely to conjecture that this was a solitary instance of the interposition of the Papal authority on such subjects. But although it would be easy to find declarations of heresy delivered by Romish Universities, and writers of great authority, against tenets belonging to the natural sciences, I am not aware that any other case can be adduced in which the Church or the Pope can be shown to have pronounced such a sentence. I am well contented to acknowledge this; for I should be far more gratified by finding myself compelled to hold up the seventeenth century as a model for the nineteenth in this respect, than by having to sow enmity between the admirers of the past and the present through any disparaging contrast27.

314 With respect to the attempt made in my History to characterize the intellectual habits of Italy as produced by her religious condition,—certainly it would ill become any student of the history of science to speak slightingly of that country, always the mother of sciences, always ready to catch the dawn and hail the rising of any new light of knowledge. But I think our admiration of this activity and acuteness of mind is by no means inconsistent with the opinion, that new truths were promulgated more boldly beyond the Alps, and that the subtilty of the Italian intellect loved to insinuate what the rough German bluntly asserted. Of the decent duplicity with which forbidden opinions were handled, the reviewer himself gives us instances, when he boasts of the liberality with which Copernican professors were placed in important stations by the ecclesiastical authorities, soon after the doctrine of the motion of the earth had been declared by the same authorities to be contrary to Scripture. And in the same spirit is the process of demanding from Galileo a public and official recantation of opinions which he had repeatedly been told by his ecclesiastical superiors he might hold as much as he pleased. I think it is easy to believe that among persons so little careful to reconcile public profession with private conviction, official decorum was all that was demanded. When Galileo had made his renunciation of the earth’s motion on his knees, he rose and said, as we are told, E pur si muove—‘and yet it does move.’ This is sometimes represented as the heroic soliloquy of a mind cherishing its conviction of the truth, in spite of persecution; I think we may more naturally conceive it uttered as a playful epigram in the ear of a cardinal’s secretary, with a full knowledge that it would be immediately repeated to his master28.

Besides the Ideas involved in the material sciences, 315 of which we have already examined the principal ones, there is one Idea or Conception which our Sciences do not indeed include, but to which they not obscurely point; and the importance of this Idea will make it proper to speak of it, though this must be done very briefly.