PARACELSUS 



L THE LIFE OF PARACELSUS 



The dawn of the sixteenth century called into existence 

 a new era of thought, and was the beginning of the most 

 stupendous and important accomplishments of those 

 times — the reformation of the Church. The world 

 awoke again from its long sleep in mental torpitude 

 during the Middle Ages, and shaking off the incubus of 

 Papal suppression, it breathed freely once more. As the 

 shadows of night fly at the approach of the day, so clerical 

 fanaticism, superstition, and bigotry began to fade away, 

 because Luther, in the name of the Supreme Power of 

 the Universe, spoke again the Divine command : " Let 

 there be light ! " The sun of truth began again to rise 

 in the East, and although his light may afterwards have 

 been obscured by the mists and vapours rising from fields 

 on which dogmas and superstitions were undergoing the 

 process of putrefaction, nevertheless it was penetrating 

 enough to extend its beneficial influence over the subse- 

 quent hours of that day. It shone through the murky 

 atmosphere of sectarian bigotry, and sent its rays into 

 doubting minds. Free thought and free investigation, 

 having shaken off the chains with which they were bound 

 down for centuries by the enemies of religious liberty, 

 broke the door of their dungeon, and rose again to 

 heaven to drink from the fountain of truth. Free in- 

 quiry took the place of blind credulity ; reason rose vic- 

 torious out of its struggle with blind belief in clerical 



