NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 437 



Noah's Deluge and Geology. Just as in the latter case they had 

 been obliged to stave off a presentation of scientific truth, by the 

 words " For Deluge, see Flood," and " For Flood, see Noah/' so in 

 the former they were obliged to take various provisional meas- 

 ures some of them comical. In 1842 came the seventh edition. 

 In this the first part of the old article on philology which ap- 

 peared in the third, fourth, and fifth editions was printed, but the 

 supernatural part was mainly cut out. Yet we find a curious 

 evidence of the continued reign of chaos in a foot-note inserted 

 by the publishers, disavowing any departure from orthodox views. 

 In 1859 appeared the eighth edition. This abandoned the old 

 article entirely, and in its place was given a history of philology 

 free from admixture of scriptural doctrines ; and, finally, in the 

 year 1885 appeared the ninth edition, in which Professors Whitney 

 of Yale and Sievers of Tubingen give admirably and in short 

 compass what is known of philology, throwing the sacred theory 

 overboard entirely. 



Such was that chaos of thought into which the discovery of 

 Sanskrit suddenly threw its great light. Well does one of the 

 foremost modern philologists say that this " was the electric spark 

 which caused the floating elements to crystallize into regular 

 forms." Among the first to bring the knowledge of Sanskrit to 

 Europe were the Jesuit missionaries, whose services to the mate- 

 rial basis of the science of comparative philology had already 

 been so great, and the importance of the new discovery was soon 

 seen among all scholars, whether orthodox or scientific. In 1784 

 the Asiatic Society at Calcutta was founded, and with it began 

 Sanskrit philology. Scholars strong and earnest, like Sir William 

 Jones, Carey, Wilkins, Foster, Colebrooke, did noble work in the 

 new field. Light had come into the chaos, and a great new orb of 

 science was steadily evolved. 



The little group of scholars who gave themselves up to these 

 researches, though almost without exception reverent Christians, 

 were recognized at once by theologians as mortal foes of the whole 

 old sacred theory of language. Not only was the dogma of the 

 origin of languages at the Tower of Babel swept out of sight by 

 the new discovery, but the still more vital dogma of the divine 

 origin of languages, never before endangered, was felt to be in 

 peril, since the evidence became overwhelming that so large a 

 number of them had been produced by a process of natural 

 growth. 



Heroic efforts were therefore made, in the supposed interest of 

 Scripture, to discredit the new learning. Even such a man as 

 Dugald Stewart declared that the discovery of Sanskrit was alto- 

 gether fraudulent, and endeavored to prove that the Brahmans 

 had made it up from the vocabulary and grammar of Greek and 



