NEW CONCEPTIONS IN SCIENCE 



society was military. Science, like literature and 

 art, was dependent on royal favor, upon the whim 

 of a few men. The greatness of the Alexandrian 

 school was, in large part, due to the enlightened 

 line of Greek kings that ruled in Egypt through 

 three hundred years. The Ptolemies were its 

 source of existence. With the Ptolemaic tradition 

 it died. 



Now the military basis of society, as Spencer 

 and others have pointed out, is disappearing. In 

 its stead, an industrial regime has come, an order 

 of society in which co-operation has, in a measure, 

 replaced autocratic rule. In the new order, wealth 

 has piled as never before ; there is a portion for the 

 non - productive class large enough to support a 

 vast army of investigators spread now throughout 

 the world. 



This is the reason that the conquests of the scien- 

 tific method are no longer checked. It is not that 

 the forces of ignorance have disappeared, not that 

 the Church is less militant ; it is that they have a 

 balancing power to fight. This, and this alone, is 

 the reason that we are not burning Brunos and 

 threatening torture on Galileos now! 



There was another subtle but contributing cause 

 at work in the old days; it lay in the attitude of 

 scientific men themselves. That was a disregard, 

 a contempt, for practical things. Let us slip a page 



28 



