16 THE DISCOVERY OF AUSTRALIA 



importance to the Christian. Some admitted that the earth 

 was spherical, and that temperate zones were habitable, 

 but saved their orthodoxy'by the statement that in fact 

 the North alone was inhabited. An antipodal world exists, 

 but antipodal people are a fable. 



And, as the long dark centuries passed, the love of 

 classic literature, and the love of science and of truth, 

 grew ever more fervent, and ever more unashamed. When 

 we open the book which Roger Bacon sent to the Pope 

 in 1267, we are amazed by the modernism of his sentiments. 

 His mistakes are many and obvious. But the spirit of 

 the man of science is in him, the consciousness of ignorance, 

 The the patient search for truth. " Wise men know their 



ofR 6 oger m ig norance an d are ready to learn from anyone"; and 

 Bacon. he urges a " careful scrutiny of received opinions." " All 

 truth is contained in the Scriptures " ; but we need the 

 assistance of philosophy in order that we may understand 

 the Scriptures. For " Reason comes from God, and there- 

 fore Philosophy is divine ; and the wisdom of the Greeks 

 was revealed to them by God Himself, and their high 

 morality should make Christians ashamed. Wherever 

 truth is found it belongs to Christ." 



Once more the spirit that enquires and explores is awake, 

 modest and confident. And for its teachers it looks 

 to the Greeks and to the Romans. Ptolemy remained 

 inaccessible to Christians. But long ago the Arabs had 

 translated his book, absorbed his ideas, and incorporated 

 them in their own geographical treatises. Christian 

 scholars of the thirteenth century, men like Roger Bacon, 

 Scholars of and Albert the Great, were well acquainted with 

 teenth lr " Arabic literature, and, through Arabic literature, with 

 century the knowledge of the ancient world. Once more the old 

 ancient Greek arguments which prove the sphericity of the earth, 

 writers, and the system of zones, the existence of an antipodal world, 

 Anti- V were thought out and re-stated. Once more the impor- 

 podeans. tance of the application of exact mathematical methods 

 to the study of geography was explained and enforced. 

 And once more scientific speculation began as to the con- 

 tents of the unknown world of the South. Bacon quotes 



