THE NEW SCIENCE AND PROSE 155 



reproofs take no effect unless he suppose a vacuum. There have 

 been good sermons, no question ! made in the days of Materia Prima 

 and Occult Qualities; and there are, doubtless, still good dis 

 courses now, under the reign of Atoms". But the new science, he 

 declares, has made the young students pedantic. "And, for the 

 most part, ah ordinary cheesemonger or plumseller, that scarce (ly) 

 ever heard of a university ; shall write much better sense, and more 

 to the purpose than these young philosophers, who injudiciously 

 hunting only for great words, make themselves learnedly ridicul 

 ous". 22 And lastly, he asserts, the young preacher who has filled 

 his commonplace book with similitudes from "the old philosophy, 

 and Ptolemy's system of the world," would best "go a-gleaning 

 for new ones ; it being, nowadays, much more gentle and warrant 

 able to take similitudes from the Man in the Moon than from solid 

 orbs ; for though few people do absolutely believe there is any such 

 Eminent Person there; yet the thing is possible, whereas the 

 other is not". 23 Eachard's criticism was no doubt justified by 

 facts, for many students must have left the university like "the 

 pert young Soph", with his memory filled with the canting terms 

 of the new philosophy and his mind devoid of any clear ideas. 

 Of such were the pedants, who lacked the humility of the true 

 scientist and professed boldly a knowledge which they never pos 

 sessed. 



The irrepressible William King wrote numerous satires on the 

 new science. His Transactioneer, "a burlesque satire of some 

 merit", 24 has already been mentioned. Dr. Johnson thought the 

 attack was aimed at Sir Hans Sloane, who. was then Secretary of 

 the Royal Society. 25 The character of King's attack may be de 

 termined from his Miscellanies. In the first essay, Animadver 

 sions on the Pretended Account of Denmark, he ridicules the Dan 

 ish university. There are, he says, splendid buildings and numer 

 ous students, the two prime necessities for a great school. But of 

 scholarship, of great teachers and sound learning he has nothing to 



^Arber's Reprints, vol. Ill, p. 262. 

 28 Ibid. p. 263-4. 



84 Swift's WJcs. vol. V, p. 154, note. 

 25 Johnson's Wks. X, p. 32. 



