APHORISMS AND REFLECTIONS 37 



have grov7n out of those of Greece and Rome — not 

 by favour of, but in the teeth of, the fundamental 

 teachings of early Christianity, to virhich science, 

 art, and any serious occupation with the things of 

 this world, were alike despicable. 



CXLVII 



All that is best in the ethics of the modern 

 world, in so far as it has not grown out of Greek 

 thought, or Barbarian manhood, is the direct develop- 

 m.ent of the ethics of old Israel. There is no code of 

 legislation, ancient or modern, at once so just and so 

 merciful, so tender to the weak and poor, as the 

 Jewish law ; and, if the Gospels are to be trusted, 

 Jesus of Nazareth himself declared that he taught 

 nothing but that v/hich lay implicitly, or explicitly, 

 in the religious and ethical system of his people. 



CXLVIII 



The first-recorded judicial murder of a scientific 

 thinker was compassed and effected, not by a despot, 

 nor by priests, but w^as brought about by eloquent 

 demagogues, to whom, of all men, thorough search- 

 ings of the intellect are most dangerous and therefore 

 most hateful. 



CXLIX 



Platonic philosophy is probably the grandest 

 example of the unscientific use of the imagination 

 extant ; and it v/ould be hard to estimate the amount 

 of detriment to clear thinking effected, directly and 

 indirectly, by the theory of ideas, on the one hand, 

 and by the unfortunate doctrine of the baseness of 

 matter, on the other. 



