NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 437 



The direct influence of the Reformation was at first unfavorable 

 to scientific progress. Nothing could be more at variance with any- 

 scientific theory of the development of the universe than the ideas of 

 the Protestant leaders. The strict adherence to the text of Scripture 

 which made Luther and Melanchthon denounce the idea that the 

 planets revolve about the sun, would naturally be extended to every 

 other scientific statement apparently at variance with the sacred text. 

 There is much reason to believe that the fetters upon scientific thought 

 were closer under the strict interpretation of Scripture made by the 

 early Protestants than they had been under the older Church. The 

 dominant spirit among the reformers is shown by the declaration of 

 Peter Martyr to the effect that, if a wrong opinion should obtain re- 

 garding the creation as described in Genesis, "all the promises of 

 Christ fall into nothing, and all the life of our religion would be 

 lost." * Zwingli, broad as his views on other subjects generally were, 

 was closely bound down in this matter, and held to the opinion of the 

 Fathers, that a great floor separated the heavens from the earth, that 

 above it were the waters and angels, and below it the earth and men. 

 The only scope given to independent thought among the reformers 

 was in a few minor speculations regarding the rivers which encom- 

 passed the paradise of Adam and Eve, the exact character of the con- 

 versation of the serpent with Eve, and the like, f And in the times 

 immediately succeeding the Reformation matters went from bad to 

 to worse. Under Luther and Melanchthon there was some little free- 

 dom of speculation, but under their, successors there was none ; to 

 question any interpretation of Luther came to be thought almost as 

 wicked as to question the literal interpretation of the Scriptures them- 

 selves. Exaraf>les of this are seen in the struggles between those who 

 held that birds were created entirely from water and those who held 

 that they were created out of water and mud. The accepted belief 

 being that the "waters above the heavens" were contained in a vast 

 receptacle upheld by a solid vault, when Calixt ventured, in interpret- 

 ing the Psalms, to question this interpretation, be was bitterly de- 

 nounced as heretical. J 



Musoeus, in the latter part of the sixteenth century, interpreted the 

 account of Genesis to mean that " first God made the heavens for the 

 roof or vault, and left it there on high swinging until three days later 

 he put the earth under it. " * In the city of Lubeck, the ancient center 

 of the great Hanseatic League, close at the beginning of the seven- 

 other scholar found as much trouble from Mohammedan as his contemporaries found 

 from Christian religion. 



* See his commentary on Genesis, cited by Zockler, " Geschichte der Beziehangen 

 zwischen Theologie und Naturwissenschaft," vol. i, p. 690. 



•(• See citations in Zockler, vol. i, p. 693. 

 X See Zockler, vol. i, p. 6Y9. 



* See Musaeus, " Auslegung des ersten Buchs Mosy," Magdeburg, 1576, cited by Zock- 

 ler, vol. ii, pp. 673-677, 761. 



