72 PROGRESS OF SCIENCE. 



cipation was the growth of the scientific spirit in all direc- 

 tions throughout Europe. Roger Bacon was undoubtedly 

 the boldest and most original innovator of the mediaeval era; 

 in him the Experimental School had an earnest inquirer and 

 an enthusiastic master; but, had he never existed, the 

 scientific method must nevertheless have resulted, later 

 possibly, from the pursuit for generations of two great 

 series of labours, viz., astrology and alchemy, which, in their 

 higher flight, must not be confounded with the occult 

 sciences, survivals of fetichism more or less, such as magic, 

 necromancy, chiromancy, sorcery, cabalism. 



Astrology and alchemy were immensely beneficial to 

 progress. They afforded for a lengthy period the strongest 

 stimulus to scientific investigation. In the absence of scien- 

 tific analysis, which alone could assign their true position in 

 general physics to astronomical phenomena, " there existed 

 no doctrine, no principle that could restrain the ideal ex- 

 aggeration ascribed to celestial influences " ; astrology was 

 such an exaggeration ; but, it rested upon the subjection of all 

 phenomena to immutable natural laws. Astrology, therefore, 

 was in the highest degree serviceable in sowing and pro- 

 pagating a notion (i.) of the unchangeableness of the laws 

 of nature, and (n.) of the subjection of phenomena to those 

 laws, "by which a rational prevision became possible." 

 Alchemy rendered the very same service in that respect ; so 

 that these two pursuits contributed largely to the develop- 

 ment of human reason on the one hand, and of science on 

 the other: the first (astrology), among other benefits, en- 

 gendering a " high idea of human wisdom from its power of 

 foresight under natural laws"; the second (alchemy) rousing 

 a noble sense of human power, by "inspiring bold hopes 

 from our intervention in those phenomena which were sus- 

 ceptible of modification." Science, thus, was the outcome 

 evolved from simultaneous causes. It was not, mushroom-like, 

 of sudden, unexpected, unsuspected growth ; it was not due 



civilisations superior to their own in many ways, and their intellect was 

 enlarged in proportion. Narrow ideas had died out ; the sphere of 

 activity had ceased to be solely theological it had become political, 

 commercial, industrial, literary, artistic, and scientific. 



