EAST AND WEST 133 



although so much easier to explain, give us a far better conception 

 of the meaning of scientific evolution. To begin with, they are 

 spread over a much longer period. Modern science, as defined 

 above, is after all hardly more than three centuries old, while 

 the previous evolution was a matter of more than four millennia, 

 that is, without counting the innumerable centuries of which we 

 have no definite records. The development of ancient and me- 

 dieval science is not only a much longer stretch, but if I may 

 put it so, a collection of stretches of various lengths interrupted 

 and bent by all kinds of vicissitudes. When we consider the whole 

 of it, we can verify the fact that human evolution is infinitely 

 more complex than the very orderly progress of the last centuries 

 would indicate. Scientific research is now organized with such 

 elaboration and in so many countries that a long and complete 

 interruption of it is hardly conceivable, and we almost expect dis- 

 coveries to follow each other without cease and without end. In 

 the distant past, on the contrary, there was so much discontinuity 

 and hesitation in scientific progress, that the latter seemed to be 

 even more fortuitous than it really was. A discovery was like a 

 gold nugget one might stumble upon or not according to one's 

 luck. By way of contrast much of the scientific work of to-day 

 might be compared to the systematic exploitation of a gold mine, 

 the average output of which can be foretold. 



That comparison is a little exaggerated on both sides, but the 

 fact remains that scientific progress was far more erratic in the 

 past than it is now, and that considerably more energy was 

 wasted in vain efforts and along hopeless paths. As a result, a 

 vision of medieval man groping for the truth is somewhat be- 

 wildering: he seems to be going in too many directions at once 

 and to be turning in circles. There is a general direction, however, 

 but to perceive it one must look from a great distance and be able 

 to disregard all the irrelevant movements, all the stops, lapses, 

 detours and retrogressions. We are now sufficiently distant from 

 ancient or even medieval science to appreciate the meaning of 

 almost every step of it, true or false. On the contrary, we cannot 



