GEOLOGY AND BIOLOGY 57 



supposed opposition between teachers of science and 

 of Christianity. The conflict between science and 

 religion is as old as the younger of the combatants, 

 and this is not the place to attempt even a summary 

 account of it. It must suffice to observe that the 

 battle-ground has shifted periodically, the fight 

 blazing up around a succession of scientific facts as 

 each in turn was demonstrated : in the intervals, 

 there have been periods of quiescence. 



We shall illustrate in the following chapter the 

 powerful influence of the clergy in science at the 

 period of the foundation of the Association. The 

 names of Whewell, Sedgwick, Buckland, and Har- 

 court are accompanied by many others of clergy- 

 men only less eminent in science, in the early annals 

 of our body. And among the lay philosophers of 

 the time there were then (and, for that matter, have 

 always been) many who in their own minds felt no 

 opposition between science and religious faith. We 

 need go no farther for proof than our own presidential 

 addresses, with their often-recurring perorations 

 upon the aim of science toward an understanding 

 of the wisdom of the Creator. Johnston, upon 

 whose account of the first meeting of the Association 

 we have previously drawn, writes thus in regard to 

 the clergy's part in it : 



' Among the friends and patrons of the society 

 at York who paid kind and hospitable attention to 

 those whom the love of science had brought to the 

 meeting, the clergy must not be passed over in 

 silence. They had been the zealous promoters of the 

 meeting ; had done much towards facilitating the 

 preliminary arrangements ; and exerted themselves 

 by their influence and example to secure to the 



