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called for it, broadsides, as they were termed were added. In addition, newsletters were written by enterprising individuals in the metropolis, and sent to rich persons who subscribed for them; they then circulated from family to family, and doubtless enjoyed a privilege which has not descended to their printed contemporary, the newspaper, of never becoming stale. Their authors compiled them from materials picked up in the gossip of the coffee-houses. The coffee-houses, in a non-reading community, were quite an important political as well as social institution. They were of every kind, prelatical, popish, Puritan, scientific, literary, Whig, Tory. Whatever a man's notions might be, he could find in London, in a double sense, a coffeehouse to his taste. In towns of considerable importance the literary demand was insignificant; thus it is said that the father of Dr. Johnson, the lexicographer, peddled books from town to town, and was accustomed to open a stall in Birmingham on market-days, and it is added that this supply of literature was equal to the demand.

The liberty of the press has been of slow growth. Liberty of the Scarcely had printing been invented when it was found necessary everywhere to place it secured. under some restraint, as was, for instance, done by Rome in her "Index Expurgatorius" of prohibited books, and the putting of printers who had offended under the ban; the action of the University of Paris, alluded to in this volume, p. 198, was essentially of the same kind. In England, at first, the press was subjected to the common law; the crown judges themselves determined the offence, and could punish the offender with fine, imprisonment, or even death. Within the last century this power of determination has been taken from them, and a jury must decide, not only on the fact, but also on the character of the pubIts present lication, whether libellous, seditious, or otherwise offensive. The press thus came to be a reflector of public opinion, casting light back upon the public; yet as with other reflectors, a portion of the illuminating power is lost. The restraints under which it is laid are due, not so much to the fear that liberty will degenerate into license, for public opinion would soon correct that; they

condition.

are rather connected with the necessities of the social state.

Contrast

between progress in the ages of Faith and Reason.

Whoever will-examine the condition of England at successive periods during her passage through the Age of Faith will see how slow was her progress, and will, perhaps,.be surprised to find at its close how small was her advance. The ideas that had served her for so many centuries as a guide had rather obstructed than facilitated her way. But whoever will consider what she has done since she fairly entered on her Age of Reason will remark a wonderful contrast. There has not been a progress in physical conditions only -a securing of better food, better clothing, better shelter, swifter locomotion, the procurement of individual happiness, an extension of the term of life. There has been a great moral advancement. Such atrocities as those mentioned in the foregoing paragraphs are now impossible, and so unlike our own manners that doubtless we read of them at first with incredulity, and with difficulty are brought to believe that these are the things our ancestors did. What a difference between the dilatoriness of the past, its objectless exertions, its unsatisfactory end, and the energy, and well-directed intentions of the present age, which have already yielded results like the prodigies of romance.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE EUROPEAN AGE OF REASON.

REJECTION OF AUTHORITY AND TRADITION, AND ADOPTION OF SCIENTIFIC TRUTH.-DISCOVERY OF THE TRUE POSITION OF THE EARTH IN THE

UNIVERSE.

Ecelesiastical Attempt to enforce the GEOCENTRIC DOCTRINE that the Earth is the Centre of the Universe, and the most important Body in it.

The HELIOCENTRIC DOCTRINE that the Sun is the Centre of the Solar System, and the Earth a small Planet, comes gradually into Prominence.

Struggle between the Ecclesiastical and Astronomical Parties.-Activity of the Inquisition.-Burning of BRUNO.-Imprisonment of GALILEO. INVENTION OF THE TELESCOPE.-Complete Overthrow of the Ecclesiastical Idea.-Rise of Physical Astronomy.-NEWTON.-Rapid and resistless Development of all Branches of Natural Philosophy.

Final Establishment of the Doctrine that the Universe is under the Dominion of mathematical, and, therefore, necessary Laws.

Progress of Man from the Anthropocentric Ideas to the Discovery of his true Position and Insignificance in the Universe.

THE Age of Reason in Europe was ushered in by an astronomical controversy.

Is the earth the greatest and most noble body in the An astronom- universe, around which, as an immovable centre, ical problem. the sun, and the various planets, and stars revolve, ministering by their light and other qualities to the wants and pleasures of man, or is it an insignificant orba mere point-submissively revolving, among a crowd of compeers and superiors, around a central sun? The former of these views was authoritatively asserted by the Church; the latter, timidly suggested by a few thoughtful and religious men at first, in the end gathered strength and carried the day.

Behind this physical question-a mere scientific problem -lay something of the utmost importance-the Its important position of man in the universe. The conflict consequences. broke out upon an ostensible issue, but every one saw what was the real point in the dispute.

In the history of the Age of Reason in Europe, which is to fill the remaining pages of this book, I am constrained to commence with this astronomical of the Age of Reason. controversy, and have therefore been led by that circumstance to complete the survey of the entire period from the same, that is, the scientific point of view. Many different modes of treating it spontaneously present themselves; but so vast are the subjects to be brought under consideration, so numerous their connexions, and so limited the space at my disposal, that I must give the preference to one which, with sufficient copiousness, offers also precision. Whoever will examine the progress of European intellectual advancement thus far manifested will find that it has concerned itself with three great questions: 1. The ascertainment of the position of the earth in the universe; 2. The history of the earth in time; 3. The position of man among living beings. Under this last is ranged all that he has done in scientific discovery, and all those inventions which are the characteristics of the present industrial age.

What am I? Where am I? we may imagine to have been the first exclamations of the first man awakening to conscious existence. Here, in our Age of Reason, we have been dealing with the same thoughts. They are the same which, as we have seen, occupied Greek intellectual life.

When Halley's comet appeared in 1456, it was described by those who saw it as an object of "unheard- Roman astroof magnitude;" its tail, which shook down nomical ideas. "diseases, pestilence, and war" upon earth, reached over a third part of the heavens. It was considered as connected with the progress of Mohammed II., who had just then taken Constantinople. It struck terror into all people. From his seat, invisible to it, in Italy, the sovereign pontiff, Calixtus III., issued his ecclesiastical fulminations; but the comet in the heavens, like the sultan on

the earth, pursued its course undeterred. In vain were all the bells in Europe ordered to be rung to scare it away; in vain was it anathematized; in vain were prayers put up in all directions to stop it. True to its time, it punctually returns from the abysses of space, uninfluenced by anything save agencies of a material kind. A signal lesson for the meditations of every religious man.

More correct

some of the

clergy.

Among the clergy there were, however, some who had more correct cosmic ideas than those of Calixtus. ideas among A century before Copernicus, Cardinal de Cusa had partially adopted the heliocentric theory, as taught in the old times by Philolaus, Pythagoras, and Archimedes. He ascribed to the earth a globular form, rotation on its axis, and a movement in space; he believed that it moves round the sun, and both together round the pole of the universe.

By geocentric theory is meant that doctrine which asserts the earth to be the immovable centre of The geocentric and heliocen- the universe; by heliocentric theory that which tric theories. demonstrates the sun to be the centre of our planetary system, implying, as a necessary influence, that the earth is a very small and subordinate body revolving round the sun.

The geocen

adopted by the Church.

I have already, in sufficient detail, described how the Roman Church had been constrained by her position to uphold the geocentric doctrine. She had come tric doctrine to regard it as absolutely essential to her system, the intellectual basis of which she held would be sapped if this doctrine should be undermined. Hence it was that such an alarm was shown at the assertion of the globular form of the earth, and hence the surpassing importance of the successful voyage of Magellan's ship. That indisputable demonstration of the globular figure was ever a solid support to the scientific party in the portentous approaching conflict.

Preparations

Preparations had been silently making for a scientific revolution in various directions. The five for the helio- memoirs of Cardinal Alliacus "On the Concordance of Astronomy with Theology," show the turn that thought was taking. His "Imago Mundi” was published in 1460, and is said to have been a

centric doc

trine.

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