292 PHYSICAL SCIENCE IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 



men, the emperor Leo, surnamed the Philosopher, 

 and Photius the patriarch, who exerted themselves 

 to restore the study of literature at Constantinople. 

 We still possess the Collection of Extracts of Pho- 

 tius, which, like that of Stobseus and others, shows 

 the tendency of the age to compilations, abstracts, 

 and epitomes, the extinction of philosophical vi- 

 tality. 



4. Arabian Commentators of Aristotle. The 

 reader might perhaps have expected, that when the 

 philosophy of the Greeks was carried among a new 

 race of intellects, of a different national character 

 and ' condition, the chain of this servile tradition 

 would have been broken ; that some new thoughts 

 would have started forth ; that some new direction, 

 some new impulse, would have been given to the 

 search for truth. It might have been anticipated 

 that we should have had schools among the Arabians 

 which should rival the Peripatetic, Academic and 

 Stoic among the Greeks; that they would pre- 

 occupy the ground on which Copernicus and Galileo, 

 Lavoisier and Linnaeus, won their fame ; that they 

 would make the next great steps in the progressive 

 sciences. Nothing of this, however, happened. The 

 Arabians cannot claim, in science or philosophy, 

 any really great names ; they produced no men and 

 no discoveries which have materially influenced the 

 course and destinies of human knowledge; they 

 tamely adopted the intellectual servitude of the 

 nation which they conquered by their arms; they 



