CHILDHOOD OF SCIENCE. 191 



constituents. With the philosopher's stone the contaminating 

 elements were to be separated out, until gold the refined and sub- 

 tle essence of matter remained as the residuum. The grand 

 elixir was to conquer infirmity and confer upon its imbibers the 

 immortal youth. On these lofty but futile abstractions the old 

 enthusiast labored until he was borne from the laboratory to the 

 cemetery from the grave of his genius to the grave of the tomb. 

 So numerous were the votaries who squandered their fortunes 

 and devoted their lives in these absurd vagaries, that the Catholic 

 Church found it necessary to fulminate its bulls, and the State to 

 enact penal statutes against them. 



The few mysterious truths of the universe which the astrolo- 

 gers had discovered, and the few secrets of nature which the 

 alchemists had elaborated, strange, isolated, and inexplicable, 

 made even the learned of the dark ages credulous of almost any- 

 thing. Physical science was magic; and chemistry especially 

 seemed to have an elective attraction for all that was illusory and 

 mystical. It was the ghost-time of philosophy ; and all nature 

 seemed wrapped in a weird portentous shadow. Hence sprung 

 the dreamy tenets of the Cabalists, the arrogant pretensions of 

 the Eosicrusians, and the pantheism of the Theosophers. 



The first feeble light of science that appeared in the gloom of 

 the middle ages was Roger Bacon, who figured during the last 

 half of the thirteenth century. He was acquainted with the 

 composition of gunpowder, and treated of the wonderful pro- 

 perties of lenses. He was however accused of having fabricated 

 a brazen head according to the prescriptions of occult philosophy, 

 which uttered oracles to him when consulted by magical incan- 

 tation. He used his new powder to such noisy purpose and his 

 dark arts with such fearful effect that he became the terror of the 

 community. He worked also in alchemy, and supposed he had 

 discovered the great medicine which was to carry him over the 

 centuries; but at the age of seventy he was poisoned by his 

 brother Gray-friars, and the grand elixir proved to be a failure. 



However, notwithstanding this tinge of folly and superstition, 

 Roger Bacon had many of the elements of the true philosopher. 

 He was learned in the languages and in all the physical know- 



