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and may yet be expected to exert upon the literature and 

 science of the time. For the attempt I bespeak your 

 usual forbearance. Nor can the theme, as I think, be 

 deemed by any one unsuited to the occasion, when we 

 reflect that since the revival of letters such societies have 

 identified themselves with the interests of knowledge and 

 of good; and have been the most effectual instruments 

 in ameliorating the condition of our race, by making prac- 

 tical new branches of industry, and improving all the 

 elder departments of science and the arts. 



The causes which produced these establishments be- 

 gan to operate about the middle of the fifteenth century. 

 Previous to that time, all learning had been in the hands 

 of the clergy. The seclusion of their lives, and the un- 

 disputed authority which they held over the most pow- 

 erful princes of the time, had enabled them to preserve 

 all the relics of ancient knowledge which had escaped 

 the pillage of the barbarians. They had also improved 

 the leisure of their vocation, and become authors them- 

 selves. The monks are our earliest historians— in the 

 monasteries were the first chemical laboratories,* and 

 the sandalled foot, the first trespasser upon the broad, 

 quiet domain of natural science. Nor have their writ- 

 ings, though voluminous, been of little use.f To the 

 Benedictines we are indebted for the treatise on the art 

 of verifying dates, as well as for all we know of the his- 

 tory and language of the northern nations-! The gay 

 Froissart describes himself as " priest, canon and trea- 

 surer," and Copernicus and Gassendi were both eccle- 

 siastics of high standing. § But in process of time a bar- 

 barous patronage on the one hand, and a false philoso- 

 phy on the other, had indurated the mildness and ruined 

 the simplicity of the first faith: while the wealth of reli- 

 gious communities had corrupted the order. 



At the same time the cruelty of the fierce nobles of the 

 period had driven their vassals to question the hitherto po- 

 tentc harterofdivine right. Heresies were in the church, 



