164 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the actions of men alike animated by a strong and disinterested desire 

 to promote the welfare of their fellows is easily discovered. At that 

 time, in fact, if any one desired knowledge beyond such as could be 

 obtained by his own observation, or by common conversation, his first 

 necessity was to learn the Latin language, inasmuch as all the higher 

 knowledsfe of the Western world was contained in works written in 

 that language. Hence Latin grammar, with logic and rhetoric, studied 

 through Latin, were the fundamentals of education. With respect to 

 the substance of the knowledge imparted through this channel, the 

 Jewish and Christian Scriptures, as interpreted and supplemented by 

 the Romish Church, were held to contain a complete and infallibly true 

 body of information. 



Theological dicta were, to the thinkers of those days, that which 

 the axioms and definitions of Euclid are to the geometers of these. 

 The business of the philosophers of the middle ages was to deduce, 

 from the data furnished by the theologians, conclusions in accordance 

 with ecclesiastical decrees. They were allowed the high privilege of 

 showing, by logical process, how and why that which the Church said 

 was true must be true. And, if their demonstrations fell short of or 

 exceeded this limit, the Church was maternally ready to check their 

 aberrations, if need be, by the help of the secular arm. 



Between the two our ancestors were furnished with a compact and 

 complete criticism of life. They were told how the world began and 

 how it would end ; they learned that all material existence was but a 

 base and insignificant blot upon the fair face of the spiritual world, 

 and that nature was, to all intents and purposes, the playground of the 

 devil ; they learned that the earth is the center of the visible universe, 

 and that man is the cynosure of things terrestrial ; and more especially 

 was it inculcated that the course of nature had no fixed order, but that 

 it could be and constantly was altered by the agency of innumerable 

 spiritual beings, good and bad, according as they were moved by the 

 deeds and prayers of men. The sum and substance of the whole doc- 

 trine was, to produce the conviction that the only thing really worth 

 knowing in this world was how to secure that place in a better which, 

 under certain conditions, the Church promised. Our ancestors had a 

 living belief in this theory of life, and acted upon it in their dealings 

 with education, as in all other matters. Culture meant saintliness 

 after the fashion of the saints of those days ; the education that led to 

 it was, of necessity, theological ; and the way to theology lay through 

 Latin. 



That the study of nature further than was requisite for the satis- 

 faction of every-day wants should have any bearing on human life 

 was far from the thoughts of men thus trained. Indeed, as nature had 

 been cursed for man's sake, it was an obvious conclusion that those 

 who meddled with natm-e were likely to come into pretty close contact 

 with Satan. And if any bom scientific investigator followed his in- 



