THE PATH OF EVOLUTION 



of men are not wise and good enough to avoid deceiv- 

 ing themselves as to the life and character of a man. 

 The obscurity that surrounded his life's history does 

 not permit his formal justification. In his doctrines 

 at least Bruno was not unsettled, obscure, confused or 

 fanatic." * 



Bruno, however, had not escaped the delusions of 

 his age. He was a firm believer in the fantastic doc- 

 trines of Raymond Lully, by whose combination of 

 logic, numerals and symbols it was thought the truths 

 of Philosophy could be demonstrated. Bruno shared 

 this belief with many of the Schoolmen of his age. 

 He used it mainly as a system of Mnemonics. It was 

 to instruct in this so-called Science that the patrician, 

 Mocenigo, lured him into Venice with the already 

 formed intention, it is said, of betraying him to the 

 Inquisition. 



The life and history of the career of the Cardinal, 

 Nicholas of Cusa, born 1401, died 1464, had prob- 

 ably much influence on the doctrines of Bruno. The 

 former, born of very humble origin, the son of a poor 

 fisherman, rose to high dignity in the Church, and 

 applied himself passionately to science. He adopted 

 the Pythagorean System of the solar planetary bodies 

 nearly one hundred years before Copernicus. Cusa 

 proposed many doctrines at variance with the ortho- 



* J. Meyer. Grosses Kons. Lex. 



