746 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



an indigenous development. In Richard the First's time flour- 

 ished Abbot Neckham, who wrote a scientific treatise in Latin 

 verse, and the Bishop-elect Giraldus Cambrensis, who was a 

 topographer. Under John we have Bishop Grosseteste, a writer 

 on physical science, and in the next reign comes the Franciscan 

 monk Roger Bacon, whose scientific reputation is familiar. The 

 15th century yields us among clerical men of science John Lyd- 

 gate, chiefly known for his poetry. When we turn back to see 

 who were the first to occupy themselves with the science of the 

 sciences philosophy we perceive this same connection. In the 

 old English period lived Scotus Erigena, a philosophical ecclesi- 

 astic whose philosophy was theological in its bearings. After a 

 long interval, the next of this class was prior Henry of Hunting- 

 don, who, as a moralist, brought other incentives than divine 

 commands to bear on conduct. Presently came Bishop John of 

 Salisbury, who, besides being classed as a writer on morality, was 

 more distinctly to be classed as a writer on ancient philosophy. 

 Grosseteste to his physical philosophy added mental philosophy, 

 as also did Roger Bacon. 



Joined with the fact that in mediaeval days scarcely any lay- 

 men are named as devoted to studies of these kinds, the facts 

 above given suffice to show that in Christian Europe, as in the 

 pagan East, the man of science and the philosopher were of 

 priestly origin. Inductive proof seems needless when we remem- 

 ber that during pre-feudal and feudal days, war and the chase 

 were thought by the ruling classes the only honorable occupa- 

 tions. Themselves unable to read and write, they held that learn- 

 ing should be left to the children of mean people. And since 

 learning was inaccessible to the masses, it becomes a necessary 

 implication that the clerical class was the one to which mental 

 culture of all kinds, inclusive of the scientific and philosophical 

 kinds, was limited. 



To trace the stages by which has been gradually effected the 

 differentiation of the scientifico-philosophical class from the cler- 

 ical class is not here requisite. It will suffice to note the leading 

 characters of the change, and the state now reached. 



The first broad fact to be observed is that the great body of 

 doctrine distinguished by being based on reason instead of au- 

 thority, has divided into a concrete part and an abstract part; 

 with the result of generating two different classes of cultivators 

 the man of science and the philosopher. In the ancient East 

 the distinction between the two was vague. Among the Greeks, 

 from T hales onward, the thinker was one who studied physical 

 facts and drew his general conceptions from them. Even on 

 coming to Aristotle we see in the same man the union of 



