OUK MONISTIC RELIGION. 341 



ultramontane press, the sworn defenders of supersti- 

 tion, but also by the " liberal " controversialists of 

 evangelical Christianity, who profess to defend both 

 scientific truth and purified faith. In the seven years 

 that have ensued since that time the great struggle 

 between modern science and orthodox Christianity has 

 become more threatening ; it has grown more danger- 

 ous for science in proportion as Christianity has found 

 support in an increasing mental and political reaction. 

 In some countries the Church has made such progress 

 that the freedom of thought and conscience, which is 

 guaranteed by the laws, is in practice gravely menaced 

 (for instance, in Bavaria). The great historic struggle 

 which Draper has so admirably depicted in his 

 Conflict between Religion and Science is to-day more 

 acute and significant than ever. For the last twenty- 

 seven years it has been rightly called the " cnltur- 

 kampf." 



The famous encyclica and syllabus which the 

 militant Pope, Pius IX., sent out into the entire world 

 in 1864 were a declaration of war on the whole of 

 modern science ; they demanded the blind submission 

 of reason to the dogmas of the infallible Pope. The 

 enormity of this crude assault on the highest treasures 

 of civilization even roused many indolent minds from 

 the slumber of belief. Together with the subsequent 

 promulgation of the Papal infallibility (1870), the 

 encyclica provoked a deep wave of irritation and an 

 energetic repulse which held out high hopes. In the 

 new German empire, which had attained its indis- 

 pensable national unity by the heavy sacrifices of the 

 wars of 1866 and 1871, the insolent attacks of the 

 Pope were felt to be particularly offensive. On the 

 one hand, Germany is the cradle of the Reformation 



