NEW CHAPTERS IN THE WARFARE OF SCIENCE. 441 



hand of the Almighty, and that this was done for some mysterious 

 purpose, probably for the trial of human faith. 



Strange as it may at first seem, the theological war upon the true 

 scientific method in geology was waged more fiercely in Protestant 

 countries than in Catholic. The older Church had learned by her 

 earlier wretched mistakes, especially in the cases of Copernicus and 

 Galileo, what dangers to her claim of infallibility lay in meddling with 

 a growing science. In Italy, therefore, comparatively little opposi- 

 tion was made, while England furnished the most bitter opponents to 

 geology so long as the controversy could be maintained and the most 

 active negotiators in patching up a truce on the basis of a sham sci- 

 ence afterward. The Church of England did, indeed, produce some 

 noble men, like Bishop Clayton and John Mitchell, who stood firmly 

 by the scientific method ; but these appear generally to have been 

 overwhelmed by a chorus of churchmen and dissenters, whose mix- 

 tures of theology and science, sometimes tragic in their results and 

 sometimes comic, are among the most instructive things in modern 

 history. * 



We have already noted that there are generally three periods or 

 phases in a theological attack upon any science.f The first of these is 

 marked by the general use of scriptural texts and statements against 

 the new scientific doctrine ; the third by attempts at compromise by 

 means of far-fetched reconciliations of textual statements with ascer- 

 tained fact ; but the second or intermediate period between these two 

 is frequently marked by the pitting against science of some great doc- 

 trine in theology. We saw this in astronomy when Bellarmin and 

 his followers insisted that the scientific doctrine of the earth revolving 

 about the sun is contrary to the theological doctrine of the incarna- 

 tion. So now against geology it was urged that the scientific doctrine 

 that fossils represent animals which died before Adam contradicts the 

 theological doctrine of Adam's fall and the statement that " death en- 

 tered the world by sin." 



In this second stage of the theological struggle with geology, Eng- 



* For a comparison between the conduct of Italian and English ecclesiastics as regards 

 geology, see Lyell, " Principles of Geology," tenth English edition, toI. i, p. 33. For a 

 philosophical statement of reasons why the struggle was more bitter and the attempt at 

 deceptive compromises more absurd in England than elsewhere, see Maury, " L'ancienne 

 Academic des Sciences," second edition, p. 152. For very frank confessions of the rea- 

 sons why the Roman Catholic Church has become more careful in her dealings with sci- 

 ence, see Roberts, " The Pontifical Decrees against the Earth's Movement," London, 1885, 

 especially pp. 94 and 132, 133, and St. George Mivart's article in the "Nineteenth 

 Century" for July, 1885. The first of these gentlemen is a Roman Catholic clergyman, 

 and the second an eminent layman of the same church, and both admit that it was the 

 Pope, speaking ex cathedra, who erred in the Galileo case ; but their explanation is that 

 God allowed the Pope and Church to fall into this grievous error, which has cost so dear, 

 in order to show once and for all that the Church has no right to decide questions in 

 science. 



f See " The Warfare of Science," original edition, for a discussion of this point. 



