THALES TO LINNAEUS 19 



Prussian, was hunted through Europe like a 

 wild animal and finally burned at the stake. 



For the same reason, the third person in the 

 trinity of the i6th century's greatest thinkers, 

 Galileo, was harassed and humiliated, and at 

 last died a prisoner in his own house. 



But all through this period, despite its in- 

 tellectual stagnation, economic evolution pro- 

 ceeded, laying the foundation for a new in- 

 tellectual superstructure. That evolution 

 manifested itself chiefly in the rise and growth 

 of a trading class. To the existence of such a 

 class in its society, the Arabians owed their 

 greater liberality, and scientific spirit. When 

 Vasca Da Gama sailed down the west coast of 

 Africa and around the Cape of Good Hope 

 into the Indian Ocean, trusting to chance for 

 the outcome of his voyage, he found the 

 Arabians directing their vessels by a strange 

 instrument which we now call the mariner's 

 compass. 



The merchants of Genoa and of Spain dis- 

 covered that orthodox superstitions did not 

 help but did seriously injure, their commerce. 

 As captains for their ships they preferred for 

 purely economic reasons, men who had become 

 infected with the ideas of navigation of the 

 pagan Arabians, to men who took their ideas 

 of the universe from the city bishop or the 



