THE MARTYRDOM OF SCIENCE. 75 



nounced, and held up to public hatred. Scarcely a capital step has 

 been taken in any branch of research but it has been branded as athe- 

 istic. Dean Wren, the father of the celebrated architect, upheld the 

 geocentric theory of the universe and the immovability of the earth in 

 a strain worthy of Caccini or Scioppius. It was objected against the 

 Royal Society that its " members neglected the wiser and more discern- 

 ing ancients and sought the guidance of their own unassisted judg- 

 ments, and that by admitting among them men of all countries and 

 religions they endangered the stability of the English Church." It 

 was urged that experimental philosophy was likely to lead to the over- 

 throw of Christianity, and even to atheism. Among these writers a 

 prominent place belongs to Henry Stubbs, of Warwick, and the Rev. 

 Richard Cross, of Somerset, the latter of whom charged the Fellows 

 of the Royal Society with " undermining the universities, destroying 

 Protestantism, and introducing Popery " ! 



It would have been fortunate for Bruno, Galileo, and not a few 

 of their colleagues, if the Inquisition and the Order of Jesus had 

 taken the same view of the tendency of their researches. The dis- 

 coveries of Sir Isaac Newton excited an outburst of hostility very simi- 

 lar to that which has in our own times greeted the theory of organic 

 evolution. Then geology became the great bugbear ; then followed 

 the nebular hypothesis, till, as we have just hinted, anti-scientific jeal- 

 ousy concentrated itself upon the views of Darwin, Wallace, and their 

 followers. If we read the controversial literature which has issued 

 from the English press within the last half century, and note the mo- 

 tives therein imputed to men of science, we can scarcely doubt what 

 would have been the fate of Buckland, Lyell, Sedgwick, Oken, Carus, 

 Richard Owen, Darwin, had their enemies possessed as much power 

 as malice. It must also be remembered that the practical applications 

 of science and all attempts at its extension among the public have 

 been met with a hostility no less pronounced. Franklin's lightning- 

 conductor and Jenner's discovery of vaccination have been condemned 

 from the pulpit as impious and blasphemous attempts to set aside the 

 decrees of Heaven. A similar condemnation has since been pronounced 

 against the use of anaesthetics, especially in midwifery. 



The late Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, the Lon- 

 don University, and the British Association, have each in turn passed 

 through a tempest of abuse. The last-mentioned body, indeed, is still 

 regularly " preached at " in every town which it visits. 



In France the Chancellor, D'Aguesseau, refused a license to print 

 Voltaire's " Letters on England," because the author therein expound- 

 ed the discoveries of Newton, and disproved the vortex theory of 

 Descartes. For adopting Locke's denial of innate ideas, a lettre de 

 cachet was issued against Voltaire, and he was compelled to seek 

 safety in flight. More recently the freedom of science seems to be 

 recognized in France, Germany, and even in Italy. We must not, 



