104 SCIENCE AND THE HUMAN MIND 



came the man and the hour. Columbus, born at 

 Cogoletto, on the Ligurian coast of North Italy, landed 

 on the Bahamas on October I2th, 1492, and claimed 

 the lands he had discovered for the crown of Spain. 

 Twenty-four years later Magalhags' vessel returned 

 after a three years' voyage, having demonstrated the 

 spherical nature of the earth by the convincing proof 

 of circumnavigation. 



The wider mental outlook produced by these great 

 voyages of discovery, though the most direct, was not 

 their only effect on the human mind. As the trade 

 with the new lands expanded, the material resources of 

 Europe increased, and the stimulating stream of gold 

 produced an economic development unprecedented 

 in former ages. Wealth, and the leisure for intellectual 

 pursuits which wealth gives, thus spread into far wider 

 circles than were possible with the slender resources 

 of mediaeval times. It is worthy of note in the history 

 of mankind that the two periods in which the most 

 surprising intellectual developments are found the 

 crowning age of Greece and the century of the Renais- 

 sance are each times of expansion geographically and 

 of increased opportunities for a leisured life in Greece 

 founded on a basis of slavery, and in Europe produced 

 by the wealth of the Indies. In Greece, the age of 

 intellectual triumph was followed all too soon by 

 political disintegration, while the numbers of the nation 

 were always comparatively small. In modern times 

 the Renaissance ushered in a period of four hundred 

 years during which the power of the nations of Europe 

 increased enormously on the whole, while the great 

 growth in population steadily put more and more able 

 men at the service of learning, till the enquirers 



