428 JOHN WILLIAM DRAPER. 



cesses, inasmuch as it was " the highest testimonial of approbation that 

 American science has to bestow on those who have devoted themselves 

 to the enlargement of knowledge." 



For ten years (I860- 1870) Dr. Draper relaxed in his experimental 

 work, and soon became a conspicuous author in the republic of letters, 

 addressing a much larger body of readers than are reached by purely 

 scientific works. The moral and intellectual condition of man is so 

 intimately associated with his material organization that physiology, 

 while dealing with the latter, cannot wholly overlook the former. By 

 easy journeys the scientific spirit travels from man as an individual to 

 man in his relation to different countries, races, and epochs. In 18G3 

 Dr. Draper published " A History of the Intellectual Development of 

 Europe." The argument of the book is that man has risen from 

 barbarism to the highest civilization, not by accident, but by a law of 

 growth or evolution, equally applicable to nations and individuals. 

 This book has been translated into many European languages and 

 Arabic, and has passed through various editions. In 1864 Dr. Draper 

 delivered four lectures before the Historical Society of New York, 

 which were afterwards expanded and published in 1865 under the title 

 of " Thoughts on the Future Civil Policy of America." This book 

 has had a large circle of readers, either in the original or in transla- 

 tions. It suggested a more elaborate work, viz. his '' History of the 

 American Civil War," which appeared in 1867 - 70, in three vol- 

 umes. Posterity alone, it is said, can pronounce an impartial verdict 

 on great national issues. Posterity has the advantage of knowing the 

 results, remote as well as immediate, of important events. But it 

 must depend for the facts on the witnesses to those events as they 

 gradually come to light. Dr. Draper said, " More depends on the 

 impartiality of the writer than on the deadening lapse of time." En- 

 joying the confidence of the Secretary of War, admitted to an inspec- 

 tion of the public documents on both sides, trusted by many who took 

 a conspicuous part in the military and civil crises of the period, Dr. 

 Draper had great advantages for writing a faithful narrative. Pos- 

 terity must decide whether he has recorded the dispassionate judg- 

 ments of a cool, scientific observer, or has written as a heated partisan. 

 The last work from the pen of Dr. Draper appeared in 1874, a " His- 

 tory of the Conflict of Religion and Science." There is no conflict 

 between religion and science. If he had called his subject a " History 

 of the Conflict between Theology and Science," it would have been 

 more intelligible, and would have disarmed much of the criticism upon 

 it. This work has had a irrcat circulation, havinir been translated into 



