216 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



astronomy are virtually those of 1456. He teaches 

 boldly that ( God does not rule by universal law . . . 

 that when God orders a given planet to stand still He 

 does not detract from any law passed by Himself, but 

 orders that planet to move round the sun for such and 

 such a time, then to stand still, and then again to move, 

 as His pleasure may be.' Jesuitism proscribed Froh- 

 schammer for questioning its favourite dogma, that 

 every human soul was created by a direct supernatural 

 act of God, and for asserting that man, body and soul, 

 came from his parents. This is the system that now 

 strives for universal power; it is from it, as Monsignor 

 Capel graciously informs us, that we are to learn what 

 is allowable in science, and what is not! 



In the face of such facts which might be multiplied 

 at will, it requires extraordinary bravery of mind, or a 

 reliance upon public ignorance almost as extraordinary, 

 to make the claims made by Monsignor Capel for his 

 Church. 



Before me is a very remarkable letter addressed in 

 1875 by the Bishop of Montpellier to the Deans and 

 Professors of Faculties of Montpellier, in which the 

 writer very clearly lays down the claims of his Church. 

 He had been startled by an incident occurring in a 

 course of lectures on Physiology given by a professor, 

 of whose scientific capacity there was no doubt, but 

 who, it was alleged, rightly or wrongly, had made his 

 course the vehicle of materialism. ' Je ne me suis 

 point donneY says the Bishop, ' la mission que je rem- 

 plis au milieu de vous. " Personne, au temoignage de 

 saint Paul, ne s'attribue a soi-meme un pareil honneur; 

 il y faut etre appele de Dieu, comme Aaron." Et 

 pourquoi en est-il ainsi? C'est parce que, selon le 

 meme Apotre, nous devons etre les ambassadeurs de 

 Dieu; et il n'est pas dans les usages, pas plus qu'il n'est 



