290 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



observation and experiment in the book of Nature, when the book 

 of Revelation opened such treasures to the ingenious believer? 



So, too, we have ancient mystical theories of number which 

 the theological spirit had made Christian, usurping an enormous 

 place in mediaeval science. The sacred power of the number three 

 was seen in the Trinity ; in the three main divisions of the uni- 

 verse — the empyrean, the heavens, and the earth ; in the three 

 angelic hierarchies; in the three choirs of seraphim, cherubim, 

 and thrones ; in the three of dominions, virtues, and powers ; in 

 the three of principalities, archangels, and angels; in the three 

 orders in the Church — bishops, priests, and deacons ; in the three 

 classes — the baptized, the communicants, and the monks ; in the 

 three degrees of attainment — light, purity, and knowledge ; in the 

 three theological virtues — faith, hope, and charity — and in much 

 else. All this was brought into a theologico-scientific relation, 

 then and afterward, with the three dimensions of space ; with the 

 three divisions of time — past, present, and future ; with the three 

 realms of the visible world — sky, earth, and sea ; with the three 

 constituents of man — body, soul, and spirit ; with the threefold 

 enemies of man — the flesh, the world, and the devil ; with the 

 three kingdoms in Nature — mineral, vegetable, and animal ; with 

 " the three colors " — red, yellow, and blue ; with " the three eyes of 

 the honey-bee " — and with a multitude of other analogues equally 

 precious. The sacred power of the number seven was seen in the 

 seven golden candlesticks and the seven churches in the Apoca- 

 lypse ; in the seven cardinal virtues and the seven deadly sins ; 

 in the seven liberal arts and the seven devilish arts, and, above 

 all, in the seven sacraments. And as this proved in astrology 

 that there could be only seven planets, so it proved in alchemy 

 that there must be exactly seven metals in the electrum niagicum. 

 The twelve apostles were connected with the twelve signs in the 

 zodiac, and with much in physical science. The seventy-two dis- 

 ciples, the seventy-two interpreters of the Old Testament, the 

 seventy-two mystical names of God, were connected with the sup- 

 posed fact in anatomy that there were seventy-two joints in the 

 human frame. 



Then, too, there were revived such theologic and metaphysical 

 substitutes for scientific thought as the declaration that the per- 

 fect line is a circle, and hence that the planets must move in abso- 

 lute circles — a statement which led astronomy astray even when 

 the great truths of the Copernican theory were well in sight ; also, 

 the declaration that Nature abhors a vacuum, a statement which 

 led physics astray until Torricelli made his experiments. 



In chemistry we have the same theologic tendency to magic, 

 and as a result a muddle of science and theology, which from one 

 point of view seems blasphemous, and from another idiotic, but 



