I860.] Science, Politics, and Religion. 189 



perusal of which has no doubt, in other respects, proved very beneficial 

 to him in his literary career. But he should know that our savans 

 no longer seclude themselves as formerly in the turrets of deserted 

 castles, there to pursue their vocation by the flickering lamp of mid- 

 night, and exercising no further influence on society than the terror 

 which their mysterious operations inspired in the surrounding pea- 

 santry. As a rule, their habits of observation enable them to reason 

 with more accuracy than other men, and to arrive at more correct con- 

 clusions on those subjects to which their attention is earnestly directed. 

 They will be apt to compare Mr. Disraeli's address with that delivered 

 shortly afterwards by our aged Premier, when he treated of the pro- 

 gress of agriculture and the application of steam to tillage, and they 

 will have no difficulty in perceiving in the one an abuse of intelligence 

 and a bid for office at the expense of progress ; and in the other, a 

 laudable effort, during the tenure of power, to keep pace with the 

 progressive spirit of the age. If Mr. Disraeli had shown some better 

 cause for "going with the angels" than the desire to catch a few 

 additional votes, by currying favour with extreme churchmen at the 

 expense of charity and progress, he would have been listened to with 

 respect ; but as the matter now stands, it would appear that political 

 instinct, rather than reflecting reason, was the motive force, and this 

 new manifestation of " vis conservatrix naturae " will afford, if anything, 

 a fresh piece of evidence to Mr. Darwin and his school of the truth of 

 the doctrine of natural selection ! Mr. Disraeli's sneer at the attempts 

 of our modern naturalists (many of whom, by the way, are ministers of 

 the Established Church) to account scientifically for the differences of 

 species, will be remembered by them at some future time ; and if, as 

 on a former occasion, he should propose to confer a special fran- 

 chise upon them for their intelligence, his extra-parliamentary utter- 

 ances on this occasion may serve them as a standard whereby to mea- 

 sure the sincerity of his professions and the value of the proffered boon. 



We shall have occasion hereafter to refer more fully to the ques- 

 tion treated with such levity by Mr. Disraeli, and will now pass on to 

 the last occurrence, which we cannot say affected Science, but bore 

 some relation to its progress : that was the promulgation of the 

 Pope's Encyclical Letter, and its eighty modern errors. 



Whilst the cry is everywhere " Educate, educate, educate ! " — the 

 miner, that his life may be less endangered ; the agriculturist, that he 

 may know better how to wrestle with natural difficulties, and employ 

 more rationally the blessings of Providence ; the merchant, that he may 

 be something beyond a mere bartering creature ; or the soldier, that he 

 may be more intelligent than his rifle — the infallible head of that sect 

 of Christians which claims to be the universal Church, decrees that the 

 " knowledge of philosophical things," and that all " popular schools," 

 must submit to ecclesiastical authority ; that they must, in fact, be 

 controlled by priests, who, little educated excepting in the mysteries 

 of their faith, have assumed, and continue to assume the authority of 

 the Almighty whilst they seek to fetter and restrict the action of that 

 intelligence to which He has given almost unlimited freedom. And 

 yet we really have no great fault to find with the eighty " errors," for 



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