Epitome of the Progress of Natural Science, 1 57 



attention, to whatever bore upon the institutions or manners of 

 their own country. 



It was in the twelfth century, that a state of things arose in 

 Italy which secured to the northern Italians that greatest of all 

 blessings, self-government, and its concomitant advantages. — 

 Grown wise by experience, the inhabitants of the cities of north- 

 ern Italy, renounced their ferocious antipathies, and formed 

 the celebrated league of Lombardy, against which that active 

 monarch the emperor Frederic Barbarossa, could not prevail. 

 After losing several formidable German armies, which he con- 

 ducted into Italy,- he was finally discomfited in the most signal 

 manner, and was compelled to acknowledge their independence 

 at the peace of Constance, in 1183. The new republics which 

 had thus w^on their freedom, became distinct schools, where the 

 ancient examples of Roman virtue and patriotism were taught. 

 The science of government was studied, and every branch of 

 knowledge cultivated. Universities were founded, public teach- 

 ers were honoured, and thus learning, which at the separation 

 of letters from religion, flourished, because it found a liberal home 

 in free Greece; now, when twenty-five hundred years had elap- 

 sed, began to grow up in security, under the shade of the Tree 

 of Italian Liberty. 



In looking back upon the period thus hastily reviewed, of 

 about one thousand years ; we perceive, that natural science, 

 with the exception of the indefatigable labours of Pliny the elder — • 

 labours more curious than learned — had been entirely lost sight 

 of. His death was appropriate enough for a naturalist, being suf- 

 focated, A. D. 79, whilst observing an eruption at Mount Vesuvius. 



However slight this sketch of so important a portion of his- 

 tory is, yet it did not appear proper to the writer of this 

 epitome, to pass over so many ages without observation ; ages 

 too, not the less interesting, because their details are less famili- 

 arly known, by reason of their being less accessible. The writer 

 will have utterly failed in his intention, if he shall not have in- 

 terested some of his readers, and if he shall not have convinced 

 all, that solid advances in natural science, cannot be effected, 

 unless we proceed experimentally from the known to the un- 

 known. If in this long period, no progress was made in natural 

 science, it was because there were no experimentalists, and be- 

 cause the studies of men, for the causes assigned, were based 



