THE GENEALOGY OF CHEMISTRY. 535 



criminal procedure against such irresponsibles, especially those in 

 that period of adolescence when most susceptible to suggestion or to 

 nervous excitations, is not less reprehensible than was the delusion 

 regarding witchcraft in a less enlightened period of our history. 



THE GENEALOGY OF CHEMISTRY. 



By M. E. BERTHELOT. 



MODERIST science is the child of ancient science — that is, of 

 Grecian science; for it was the Greeks who constituted sci- 

 ence under the form which we recognize now. Before the Greeks 

 no really rational science existed, free from mystical and priestly 

 attachments. While astronomy was cultivated in Egypt and 

 Chaldea, it was at first with the object of determining the times 

 of the religious festivals and of keeping agriculture correlated with 

 natural phenomena; and next for the discovery of the mysterious 

 connection which astrology predicated between the positions of the 

 stars and public and private events, under the belief that the life 

 of men and the development of phenomena were determined by 

 the fatality of the sidereal influences which presided at their birth 

 or origin. Geometry and mechanics made considerable advance at 

 Babylon, Thebes, and Memphis, being applied to the measurement 

 of the lands and the construction of buildings, as is attested by the 

 study of the indestructible monuments of ancient Egypt; and the 

 equilibrium of the Chaldean structures of brick, now in ruins, 

 required knowledge of the highest quality, yet more developed, per- 

 haps, than that of the Egyptians. But both peoples always accom- 

 panied their work with prayers and magical invocations. The excel- 

 lence of the processes of ancient times in the treatment of metals, 

 pottery ware, colored glasses, and dyed cloths, with which experi- 

 mental science is now very busy, is demonstrated by the relics of 

 ancient civilization which we have collected in our museums. The 

 old alchemical manuscripts tell us that these practices were explained 

 in the Book of the Sanctuary of the Temple. The origin of medi- 

 cine was traced to the temples, and this was not an empty metaphor; 

 for the temples were the repositories of all knowledge in the East, 

 and even to-day all Mussulman instruction gathers round the 

 mosques. But the members of the old priesthood never imagined 

 that it would be possible to separate the double part they were play- 

 ing of priest and scientific student. They combined scientific prac- 

 tices with prayers and religious rites, the performance of which was 

 deemed indispensable to the success of the processes. The idea of a 



