Dkcemukk M, 1902.J 



SCIENCli 



1017 



kind. For example, the discovery of 

 America, the propounding of the Coper- 

 nican system of astronomy, the invention 

 of printing, the reformation, and the first 

 glimmerings of observational methods of 

 induction in the inductive sciences in the 

 worlds of Paracelsus, Bruno and others of 

 their contemporaries all appeared in the 

 world about the same time, and may be 

 considered to be but different manifesta- 

 tions of some one impulse which was act- 

 ing at that time upon the composite mind 

 of humanity. The point may be made 

 clearer by considering the state of the 

 European mind before these events. One 

 of the most characteristic factors in the 

 development of the mind of mankind dur- 

 ing the middle ages was the gradual growth 

 of the spirit of rationalism. As this spirit 

 gained in influence the power of the church 

 declined. This was due to the fact that 

 many of the dogmas of the church, like 

 that of exclusive salvation and infant 

 damnation, became repulsive to reasoning 

 men. In order to retain -its hold upon 

 mankind and prevent that worst of sins, 

 heresy, the church had recourse to pious 

 frauds. Miracles were invented, sanctified 

 relics became numerous, and the church 

 tried diligently to support its creed by im- 

 posture and falsehood. Thus a spirit of 

 lying became prevalent and was even made 

 systematic and raised to the dignity of a 

 regular doctrine. This habit of continual 

 falsehood became so powerful that the sense 

 of truth and the love of it— both essentials 

 of the scientific spirit— became almost ex- 

 tinct in the human mind. It is not, there- 

 fore, strange that science could not thrive 

 in such an atmosphere, and that when this 

 love of truth was revived, the reformation 

 and the other events mentioned above fol- 

 lowed as a necessity. This example is 

 mentioned to illustrate what seems to be a 

 general fact, namely, that the fundamental 



concepts of science at a given epoch are 

 o:^ the same nature as the general concepts 

 which are characteristic of that age. 



Now how is physics to be studied in this 

 way ? Evidently by a study of its history, 

 provided, of course, that the history be of 

 the right sort. In the light of what has 

 been said above, it appeal's that a history 

 of physics is of the right sort if it brings 

 out clearly the life of physics, i. e., if it 

 shows what the fundamental concepts of 

 the science at any epoch are, if it shows 

 how those concepts change from time to 

 time and how they grow, and if it brings 

 out clearly the relations which exist at any 

 epoch between the particular ideas of 

 physics and the general ideas which are at 

 the basis of the civilization of that epoch, 

 and points out how those particular ideas 

 have develoi^ed in a certain way because the 

 more general ones have done so. 



Having established this ideal of a his- 

 tory of physics, we may well ask whether 

 any of the existing histories of the subject 

 fulfill the requirements. Have any such 

 works been written by an artist rather than 

 by an artisan 1 For it has been written:* 

 ' ' The artist in history may be distinguished 

 from the artisan in history; for here, as 

 in all provinces, there are artists and 

 artisans; men who labor mechanically in 

 a department without eye for the whole, 

 nor feeling that there is a whole ; and men 

 who inform and ennoble the humblest de- 

 partment with an idea of the whole, and 

 who know that only in the whole is the 

 partial to be truly discerned. The pro- 

 ceedings and duties of these two, in regard 

 to history, must be altogether different. 

 Not, indeed, that each has not a real worth, 

 in his several degree. The simple husband- 

 man can till his field, and, by knowledge 

 he has gained of its soil, sow it with fit 

 grain, though the deep rocks and central 



* Carlyle, ' Essay on Histoiy,' 1830. 



