PERSECUTION OF SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERERS. 269 



ceive it." ' ' To him succeeded Gralileo, whose Character as 

 a man of science is almost eclipsed by that of the martyr. 

 Denounced by the priests from the pulpit, because of the 

 views he taught as to .the motion of the earth, he was 

 summoned to Rome, in his seventieth year, to answer for 

 his heterodoxy. And he was imprisoned in the Inquisi- 

 tion, if he was not actually put to the torture there. He 

 was pursued by persecution even when dead, the Pope 

 refusing a tomb for his body.' ' Roger Bacon, the Fran- 

 ciscan monk, was persecuted on account of his studies 

 in natural philosophy, and he was charged with dealing in 

 magic, because of his investigations in chemistry. His 

 writings were condemned, and he was thrown into prison, 

 where he lay for ten years, during the lives of four suc- 

 cessive Popes. It is even averred that he died in prison.' 

 ' When the " Novum Organon " appeared, a hue-and cry 

 was raised against it, because of its alleged tendency to 

 produce " dangerous revolutions," to " subvert govern- 

 ments," and to " overturn the authority of religion ; " and 

 one Dr. Henry Stubbe (whose name would otherwise have 

 been forgotten) wrote a book against the new philosophy, 

 denouncing the whole tribe of experimentalists as "a 

 Bacon-faced generation." Even the establishment of the 

 Royal Society was opposed, on the ground that " ex- 

 perimental philosophy is subversive of the Christian 

 faith."' 1 



A scientific discoverer is a pioneer of truth ; and it is 

 the pioneers of truth who have always had to bear the 

 brunt of the battle against ignorance, superstition, and 

 prejudice, because they are always in the front ranks of 

 advancing knowledge. Ignorance has never understood 

 scientific research, and it is vain to suppose that it could ; 



1 Character, by S. Smiles. 



