SCIENCE IN " BONDAGE" 77 



for he and it are really germane to the question 

 with which we are dealing. The Inquisition has 

 really nothing to do with the matter. The Index 

 we also reserve for a later part of this essay. With 

 the imprimatur we may now deal, since there is no 

 doubt that there is a genuine misunderstanding on 

 this subject on the part of some people who are 

 misled perhaps through ignorance of Latin and 

 quite certainly through ignorance of what the 

 whole matter amounts to. Let us begin by 

 reminding ourselves that, though the unchanging 

 Church is now, so far as I am aware, the only body 

 which issues an imprimatur, there were other 

 instances of the exercise of such a privilege even 

 in recent or comparatively recent days. There 

 were Royal licences to print with which we need 

 not concern ourselves. But, what is important, 

 there was a time when the scientific authority 

 of the day assumed the right of issuing an im- 

 primatur. I take the first book which occurs to 

 me, Tyson's Anatomie of a Pygmie, and for the 

 sake of those who are not acquainted with it, I 

 may add that this book is not only the foundation- 

 stone of Comparative Anatomy, but also, through 

 its appendix A Philological Essay Concerning the 

 Pygmies, the Cynocephali, the Satyrs, and Sphinges 

 of the Ancients, the foundation-stone of all folk- 

 lore study. On the page fronting the title of this 

 work the following appears : 



17 Die Maij, 1699. 



Imprimatur Liber cui Titulus, Orang-Outang sive Homo 

 Sylvestris, etc. Authore Edvardo Tyson, M.D., R.S.S. 



John Hoskins, 7.P.R.S. 



