IX 



PHILOSOPHER. SCIENTISTS AND NEW INSTITU- 

 TIONS OF LEARNING 



WE saw that in the old Greek days there was 

 no sharp line of demarcation between the field 

 of the philosopher and that of the scientist. In the 

 Hellenistic epoch, however, knowledge became more 

 specialized, and our recent chapters have shown us 

 scientific investigators whose efforts were far enough 

 removed from the intangibilities of the philosopher. 

 It must not be overlooked, however, that even in the 

 present epoch there were men whose intellectual 

 efforts were primarily directed towards the subtleties 

 of philosophy, yet who had also a penchant for strictly 

 scientific imaginings, if not indeed for practical scien- 

 tific experiments. At least three of these men were 

 of sufficient importance in the history of the develop- 

 ment of science to demand more than passing notice. 

 These three are the Englishman Francis Bacon (1561- 

 1626), the Frenchman Rene Descartes (1596-1650); 

 and the German Gottfried Leibnitz (1646-1716). 

 Bacon, as the earliest path-breaker, showed the way, 

 theoretically at least, in which the sciences should 

 be studied; Descartes, pursuing the methods pointed 

 out by Bacon, carried the same line of abstract reason 

 into practice as well ; while Leibnitz, coming some years 

 later, and having the advantage of the wisdom of his 



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