NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 471 



A noble line of investigators succeeding Franklin completed his vic- 

 tory. The traveler in remote districts of Europe still hears the 

 church-bells ringing during tempests ; the Polish or Italian peasant is 

 still persuaded to pay fees for sounding bells to keep off hailstorms ; 

 but the universal tendency favors more and more the use of the light- 

 ning-rod, and of the insurance-offices where men can be relieved of the 

 ruinous results of meteorological disturbances in accordance with the 

 scientific laws of average, based upon the ascertained recurrence of 

 storms. So, too, though many a poor seaman trusts to his charm that 

 has been bathed in holy water, or that has touched some relic, the 

 tendency among mariners is to value more and more those warnings 

 which are sent far and wide each day over the earth and under the 

 sea by the electric wires in accordance with laws ascertained by obser- 

 vation. 



Yet, even in our own time, attempts to revive the old theological 

 doctrine of meteorology have not been wanting. Two of these, one 

 in a Roman Catholic and another in a Protestant country, will serve 

 as types of many, to show how completely scientific truth has satu- 

 rated and permeated minds supposed to be entirely surrendered to 

 the theological view. 



The Island of Saint Honorat, just off the southern coast of France, 

 is deservedly one of the places most venerated in Christendom. The 

 monastery of Lerins, founded there in the fourth century, became 

 a mother of similar institutions in Western Europe, and a center of 

 religious teaching for the Christian world. In its atmosphere, legends 

 and myths grew in beauty and luxuriance. Here, as the chroniclers 

 tell us, at the touch of Saint Honorat, burst forth a stream of living 

 water, which a recent historian of the monastery declares a greater 

 miracle than that of Moses ; here he destroyed, with a touch of his 

 staff, the reptiles which infested the island, and then forced the sea to 

 wash away their foul remains. Here, to please his sister, Sainte-Mar- 

 guerite, a cherry-tree burst into full bloom every month ; here he 

 threw his cloak upon the waters and it became a raft, which bore him 

 safely to visit the neighboring island ; here, Saint Patrick received 

 from Saint Just the staff with which he imitated Saint Honorat by 

 driving all reptiles from Ireland. 



Pillaged by Saracens and pirates, the island was made all the 

 more precious by the blood of Christian martyrs. Popes and kings 

 made pilgrimages to it ; saints, confessors, and bishops went forth from 

 it into all Europe ; in one of its cells, Saint Vincent of Lerins wrote 

 that famous definition of pure religion* which, for nearly fifteen hun- 

 dred years, has virtually superseded that of Saint James. Naturally, 

 the monastery became most illustrious, and its seat " the Mediterra- 

 nean Isle of Saints." 



* That " religion is that which is received always, everywhere, and by all " (semper, 

 ulique, ab omnibus). 



