322 PHYSICAL SCIENCE IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 



venting diseases, prolonging life, producing bodily 

 strength and beauty : the philosophers' stone was 

 finally invested with every desirable efficacy which 

 the fancy of the " philosophers" could devise. 



It has been usual to say that Alchemy was the 

 mother of Chemistry; and that men would never 

 have made the experiments on which the real sci- 

 ence is founded, if they had not been animated 

 by the hopes and the energy which the delusive 

 art inspired. To judge whether this is truly said, 

 we must be able to estimate the degree of interest 

 which men feel in purely speculative truth, and 

 in the real and substantial improvement of art to 

 which it leads. Since the fall of Alchemy, and 

 the progress of real Chemistry, these motives have 

 been powerful enough to engage in the study of 

 the science, a body far larger than the Alchemists 

 ever were, and no less zealous. There is no ap- 

 parent reason why the result should not have been 

 the same, if the progress of true science had begun 

 sooner. Astronomy was long cultivated without 

 the bribe of Astrology. But, perhaps, we may 

 justly say this; that, in the stationary period, 

 men's minds were so far enfeebled and degraded, 

 that pure speculative truth had not its full effect 

 upon them; and the mystical pursuits in which 

 some dim and disfigured images of truth were 

 sought with avidity, were among the provisions by 

 which the human soul, even when sunk below its 

 best condition, is perpetually directed to something 



