History of the inductive sciences, from the earliest to the present time

by William Whewell

INTRODUCTION.

WE have now to consider more especially a long and barren period, which intervened between the scientific activity of ancient Greece and that of modern Europe; and which we may, therefore, call the Stationary Period of Science. It would be to no purpose to enumerate the various forms in which, during these times, men reproduced the discoveries of the inventive ages; or to trace in them the small successes of Art, void of any principle of genuine Philosophy. Our object requires rather that we should point out the general and distinguishing features of the intellect and habits of those times. We must endeavor to delineate the character of the Stationary Period, and, as far as possible, to analyze its defects and errors; and thus obtain some knowledge of the causes of its barrenness and darkness.

We have already stated, that real scientific progress requires distinct general Ideas, applied to many special and certain Facts. In the period of which we now have to speak, men’s Ideas were obscured; their disposition to bring their general views into accordance with Facts was enfeebled. They were thus led to employ themselves unprofitably, among indistinct and unreal notions. And the evil of these tendencies was further inflamed by moral peculiarities in the character of those times;—by an abjectness of thought on the one hand, which could not help looking towards some intellectual superior, and by an impatience of dissent on the other. To this must be added an enthusiastic temper, which, when introduced into speculation, tends to subject the mind’s operations to ideas altogether distorted and delusive.

These characteristics of the stationary period, its obscurity of thought, its servility, its intolerant disposition, and its enthusiastic temper, will be treated of in the four following chapters, on the Indistinctness of Ideas, the Commentatorial Spirit, the Dogmatism, and the Mysticism of the Middle Ages. ~Additional material in the [3rd edition].~ [186]

CHAPTER I.
On the Indistinctness of Ideas of the Middle Ages.

THAT firm and entire possession of certain clear and distinct general ideas which is necessary to sound science, was the character of the minds of those among the ancients who created the several sciences which arose among them. It was indispensable that such inventors should have a luminous and steadfast apprehension of certain general relations, such as those of space and number, order and cause; and should be able to apply these notions with perfect readiness and precision to special facts and cases. It is necessary that such scientific notions should be more definite and precise than those which common language conveys; and in this state of unusual clearness, they must be so familiar to the philosopher, that they are the language in which he thinks. The discoverer is thus led to doctrines which other men adopt and follow out, in proportion as they seize the fundamental ideas, and become acquainted with the leading facts. Thus Hipparchus, conceiving clearly the motions and combinations of motion which enter into his theory, saw that the relative lengths of the seasons were sufficient data for determining the form of the sun’s orbit; thus Archimedes, possessing a steady notion of mechanical pressure, was able, not only to deduce the properties of the lever and of the centre of gravity, but also to see the truth of those principles respecting the distribution of pressure in fluids, on which the science of hydrostatics depends.

With the progress of such distinct ideas, the inductive sciences rise and flourish; with the decay and loss of such distinct ideas, these sciences become stationary, languid, and retrograde. When men merely repeat the terms of science, without attaching to them any clear conceptions;—when their apprehensions become vague and dim;—when they assent to scientific doctrines as a matter of tradition, rather than of conviction, on trust rather than on sight;—when science is considered as a collection of opinions, rather than a record of laws by which the universe is really governed;—it must inevitably happen, that men will lose their hold on the knowledge which the great discoverers who preceded them have brought to light. They are not able to push forwards the truths on which they lay so [187] feeble and irresolute a hand; probably they cannot even prevent their sliding back towards the obscurity from which they had been drawn, or from being lost altogether. Such indistinctness and vacillation of thought appear to have prevailed in the stationary period, and to be, in fact, intimately connected with its stationary character. I shall point out some indications of the intellectual peculiarity of which I speak.

1. Collections of Opinions.—The fact, that mere Collections of the opinions of physical philosophers came to hold a prominent place in literature, already indicated a tendency to an indistinct and wandering apprehension of such opinions. I speak of such works as Plutarch’s five Books “on the Opinions of Philosophers,” or the physical opinions which Diogenes Laërtius gives in his “Lives of the Philosophers.” At an earlier period still, books of this kind appear; as for instance, a large portion of Pliny’s Natural History, a work which has very appropriately been called the Encyclopædia of Antiquity; even Aristotle himself is much in the habit of enumerating the opinions of those who had preceded him. To present such statements as an important part of physical philosophy, shows an erroneous and loose apprehension of its nature. For the only proof of which its doctrines admit, is the possibility of applying the general theory to each particular case; the authority of great men, which in moral and practical matters may or must have its weight, is here of no force; and the technical precision of ideas which the terms of a sound physical theory usually demand, renders a mere statement of the doctrines very imperfectly intelligible to readers familiar with common notions only. To dwell upon such collections of opinions, therefore, both implies, and produces, in writers and readers, an obscure and inadequate apprehension of the full meaning of the doctrines thus collected; supposing there be among them any which really possess such a clearness, solidity, and reality, as to make them important in the history of science. Such diversities of opinion convey no truth; such a multiplicity of statements of what has been said, in no degree teaches us what is; such accumulations of indistinct notions, however vast and varied, do not make up one distinct idea. On the contrary, the habit of dwelling upon the verbal expressions of the views of other persons, and of being content with such an apprehension of doctrines as a transient notice can give us, is fatal to firm and clear thought: it indicates wavering and feeble conceptions, which are inconsistent with speculation. [188]

We may, therefore, consider the prevalence of Collections of the kind just referred to, as indicating a deficiency of philosophical talent in the ages now under review. As evidence of the same character, we may add the long train of publishers of Abstracts, Epitomes, Bibliographical Notices, and similar writers. All such writers are worthless for all purposes of science, and their labors may be considered as dead works; they have in them no principle of philosophical vitality; they draw their origin and nutriment from the death of true physical knowledge; and resemble the swarms of insects that are born from the perishing carcass of some noble animal.

2. Indistinctness of Ideas in Mechanics.—But the indistinctness of thought which is so fatal a feature in the intellect of the stationary period, may be traced more directly in the works, even of the best authors, of those times. We find that they did not retain steadily the ideas on which the scientific success of the previous period had depended. For instance, it is a remarkable circumstance in the history of the science of Mechanics, that it did not make any advance from the time of Archimedes to that of Stevinus and Galileo. Archimedes had established the doctrine of the lever; several persons tried, in the intermediate time, to prove the property of the inclined plane, and none of them succeeded. But let us look to the attempts; for example, that of Pappus, in the eighth Book of his Mathematical Collections, and we may see the reason of the failure. His Problem shows, in the very terms in which it is propounded, the want of a clear apprehension of the subject. “Having given the power which will draw a given weight along the horizontal plane, to find the additional power which will draw the same weight along a given inclined plane.” This is proposed without previously defining how Powers, producing such effects, are to be measured; and as if the speed with which the body were drawn, and the nature of the surface of the plane, were of no consequence. The proper elementary Problem is, To find the force which will support a body on a smooth inclined plane; and no doubt the solution of Pappus has more reference to this problem than to his own. His reasoning is, however, totally at variance with mechanical ideas on any view of the problem. He supposes the weight to be formed into a sphere; and this sphere being placed in contact with the inclined plane, he assumes that the effect will be the same as if the weight were supported on a horizontal lever, the fulcrum being the point of contact of the sphere with the plane, and the power acting at the circumference of the sphere. Such an assumption implies an entire [189] absence of those distinct ideas of force and mechanical pressure, on which our perception of the identity or difference of different modes of action must depend;—of those ideas by the help of which Archimedes had been able to demonstrate the properties of the lever, and Stevinus afterwards discovered the true solution of the problem of the inclined plane. The motive to Pappus’s assumption was probably no more than this;—he perceived that the additional power, which he thus obtained, vanished when the plane became horizontal, and increased as the inclination became greater. Thus his views were vague; he had no clear conception of mechanical action, and he tried a geometrical conjecture. This is not the way to real knowledge.

Pappus (who lived about a. d. 400) was one of the best mathematicians of the Alexandrian school; and, on subjects where his ideas were so indistinct, it is not likely that any much clearer were to be found in the minds of his contemporaries. Accordingly, on all subjects of speculative mechanics, there appears to have been an entire confusion and obscurity of thought till modern times. Men’s minds were busy in endeavoring to systematize the distinctions and subtleties of the Aristotelian school, concerning Motion and Power; and, being thus employed among doctrines in which there was involved no definite meaning capable of real exemplification, they, of course, could not acquire sound physical knowledge. We have already seen that the physical opinions of Aristotle, even as they came from him, had no proper scientific precision. His followers, in their endeavors to perfect and develop his statements, never attempted to introduce clearer ideas than those of their master; and as they never referred, in any steady manner, to facts, the vagueness of their notions was not corrected by any collision with observation. The physical doctrines which they extracted from Aristotle were, in the course of time, built up into a regular system; and though these doctrines could not be followed into a practical application without introducing distinctions and changes, such as deprived the terms of all steady signification, the dogmas continued to be repeated, till the world was persuaded that they were self-evident; and when, at a later period, experimental philosophers, such as Galileo and Boyle, ventured to contradict these current maxims, their new principles sounded in men’s ears as strange as they now sound familiar. Thus Boyle promulgated his opinions on the mechanics of fluids, as “Hydrostatical Paradoxes, proved and illustrated by experiments.” And the opinions which he there opposes, are those which the Aristotelian philosophers habitually propounded as certain [190] and indisputable; such, for instance, as that “in fluids the upper parts do not gravitate on the lower;” that “a lighter fluid will not gravitate on a heavier;” that “levity is a positive quality of bodies as well as gravity.” So long as these assertions were left uncontested and untried, men heard and repeated them, without perceiving the incongruities which they involved: and thus they long evaded refutation, amid the vague notions and undoubting habits of the stationary period. But when the controversies of Galileo’s time had made men think with more acuteness and steadiness, it was discovered that many of these doctrines were inconsistent with themselves, as well as with experiment. We have an example of the confusion of thought to which the Aristotelians were liable, in their doctrine concerning falling bodies. “Heavy bodies,” said they, “must fall quicker than light ones; for weight is the cause of their fall, and the weight of the greater bodies is greater.” They did not perceive that, if they considered the weight of the body as a power acting to produce motion, they must consider the body itself as offering a resistance to motion; and that the effect must depend on the proportion of the power to the resistance; in short, they had no clear idea of accelerating force. This defect runs through all their mechanical speculations, and renders them entirely valueless.

We may exemplify the same confusion of thought on mechanical subjects in writers of a less technical character. Thus, if men had any distinct idea of mechanical action, they could not have accepted for a moment the fable of the Echineis or Remora, a little fish which was said to be able to stop a large ship merely by sticking to it.[1] Lucan refers to this legend in a poetical manner, and notices this creature only in bringing together a collection of monstrosities; but Pliny relates the tale gravely, and moralizes upon it after his manner. “What,” he cries,[2] “is more violent than the sea and the winds? what a greater work of art than a ship? Yet one little fish (the Echineis) can hold back all these when they all strain the same way. The winds may [191] blow, the waves may rage; but this small creature controls their fury, and stops a vessel, when chains and anchors would not hold it: and this it does, not by hard labor, but merely by adhering to it. Alas, for human vanity! when the turreted ships which man has built, that he may fight from castle-walls, at sea as well as at land, are held captive and motionless by a fish a foot and a half long! Such a fish is said to have stopped the admiral’s ship at the battle of Actium, and compelled Antony to go into another. And in our own memory, one of these animals held fast the ship of Caius, the emperor, when he was sailing from Astura to Antium. The stopping of this ship, when all the rest of the fleet went on, caused surprise; but this did not last long, for some of the men jumped into the water to look for the fish, and found it sticking to the rudder; they showed it to Caius, who was indignant that this animal should interpose its prohibition to his progress, when impelled by four hundred rowers. It was like a slug; and had no power, after it was taken into the ship.”

[1] Lucan is describing one of the poetical compounds produced in incantations.

Huc quicquid fœtu genuit Natura sinistro
Miscetur: non spuma canum quibus unda timori est,
Viscera non lyncis, non duræ nodus hyænæ
Defuit, et cervi pasti serpente medullæ;
Non puppes retinens, Euro tendente rudentes
In mediis Echineis aquis, oculique draconum.
Etc.            Pharsalia, vi. 670.

[2] Plin. Hist. N. xxxii. 5.

A very little advance in the power of thinking clearly on the force which it exerted in pulling, would have enabled the Romans to see that the ship and its rowers must pull the adhering fish by the hold the oars had upon the water; and that, except the fish had a hold equally strong on some external body, it could not resist this force.

3. Indistinctness of Ideas shown in Architecture.—Perhaps it may serve to illustrate still further the extent to which, under the Roman empire, men’s notions of mechanical relations became faint, wavered, and disappeared, if we observe the change which took place in architecture. All architecture, to possess genuine beauty, must be mechanically consistent. The decorative members must represent a structure which has in it a principle of support and stability. Thus the Grecian colonnade was a straight horizontal beam, resting on vertical props; and the pediment imitated a frame like a roof, where oppositely inclined beams support each other. These forms of building were, therefore, proper models of art, because they implied supporting forces. But to be content with colonnades and pediments, which, though they imitated the forms of the Grecian ones, were destitute of their mechanical truth, belonged to the decline of art; and showed that men had lost the idea of force, and retained only that of shape. Yet this was what the architects of the Roman empire did. Under their hands, the pediment was severed at its vertex, and divided into separate halves, so that it was no longer a mechanical possibility. The entablature no longer lay straight from pillar to pillar, but, projecting over each [192] column, turned back to the wall, and adhered to it in the intervening space. The splendid remains of Palmyra, Balbec, Petra, exhibit endless examples of this kind of perverse inventiveness; and show us, very instructively, how the decay of art and of science alike accompany this indistinctness of ideas which we are now endeavoring to illustrate.

4. Indistinctness of Ideas in Astronomy.—Returning to the sciences, it may be supposed, at first sight, that, with regard to astronomy, we have not the same ground for charging the stationary period with indistinctness of ideas on that subject, since they were able to acquire and verify, and, in some measure, to apply, the doctrines previously established. And, undoubtedly, it must be confessed that men’s notions of the relations of space and number are never very indistinct. It appears to be impossible for these chains of elementary perception ever to be much entangled. The later Greeks, the Arabians, and the earliest modern astronomers, must have conceived the hypotheses of the Ptolemaic system with tolerable completeness. And yet, we may assert, that during the stationary period, men did not possess the notions, even of space and number, in that vivid and vigorous manner which enables them to discover new truths. If they had perceived distinctly that the astronomical theorist had merely to do with relative motions, they must have been led to see the possibility, at least, of the Copernican system; as the Greeks, at an earlier period, had already perceived it. We find no trace of this. Indeed, the mode in which the Arabian mathematicians present the solutions of their problems, does not indicate that clear apprehension of the relations of space, and that delight in the contemplation of them, which the Greek geometrical speculations imply. The Arabs are in the habit of giving conclusions without demonstrations, precepts without the investigations by which they are obtained; as if their main object were practical rather than speculative,—the calculation of results rather than the exposition of theory. Delambre[3] has been obliged to exercise great ingenuity, in order to discover the method by which Ibn Iounis proved his solution of certain difficult problems.

[3] Delamb. M. A. p. 125–8.

5. Indistinctness of Ideas shown by Skeptics.—The same unsteadiness of ideas which prevents men from obtaining clear views, and steady and just convictions, on special subjects, may lead them to despair of or deny the possibility of acquiring certainty at all, and may thus make them skeptics with regard to all knowledge. Such skeptics [193] are themselves men of indistinct views, for they could not otherwise avoid assenting to the demonstrated truths of science; and, so far as they may be taken as specimens of their contemporaries, they prove that indistinct ideas prevail in the age in which they appear. In the stationary period, moreover, the indefinite speculations and unprofitable subtleties of the schools might further impel a man of bold and acute mind to this universal skepticism, because they offered nothing which could fix or satisfy him. And thus the skeptical spirit may deserve our notice as indicative of the defects of a system of doctrine too feeble in demonstration to control such resistance.

The most remarkable of these philosophical skeptics is Sextus Empiricus; so called, from his belonging to that medical sect which was termed the empirical, in contradistinction to the rational and methodical sects. His works contain a series of treatises, directed against all the divisions of the science of his time. He has chapters against the Geometers, against the Arithmeticians, against the Astrologers, against the Musicians, as well as against Grammarians, Rhetoricians, and Logicians; and, in short, as a modern writer has said, his skepticism is employed as a sort of frame-work which embraces an encyclopedical view of human knowledge. It must be stated, however, that his objections are rather to the metaphysical grounds, than to the details of the sciences; he rather denies the possibility of speculative truth in general, than the experimental truths which had been then obtained. Thus his objections to geometry and arithmetic are founded on abstract cavils concerning the nature of points, letters, unities, &c. And when he comes to speak against astrology, he says, “I am not going to consider that perfect science which rests upon geometry and arithmetic; for I have already shown the weakness of those sciences: nor that faculty of prediction (of the motions of the heavens) which belongs to the pupils of Eudoxus, and Hipparchus, and the rest, which some call Astronomy; for that is an observation of phenomena, like agriculture or navigation: but against the Art of Prediction from the time of birth, which the Chaldeans exercise.” Sextus, therefore, though a skeptic by profession, was not insensible to the difference between experimental knowledge and mystical dogmas, though even the former had nothing which excited his admiration.

The skepticism which denies the evidence of the truths of which the best established physical sciences consist, must necessarily involve a very indistinct apprehension of those truths; for such truths, properly exhibited, contain their own evidence, and are the best antidote [194] to this skepticism. But an incredulity or contempt towards the asserted truths of physical science may arise also from the attention being mainly directed to the certainty and importance of religious truths. A veneration for revealed religion may thus assume the aspect of a skepticism with regard to natural knowledge. Such appears to be the case with Algazel or Algezeli, who is adduced by Degerando[4] as an example of an Arabian skeptic. He was a celebrated teacher at Bagdad in the eleventh century, and he declared himself the enemy, not only of the mixed Peripatetic and Platonic philosophy of the time, but of Aristotle himself. His work entitled The Destructions of the Philosophers, is known to us by the refutation of it which Averrhoes published, under the title of Destruction of Algazel’s Destructions of the Philosophers. It appears that he contested the fundamental principles both of the Platonic and of the Aristotelian schools, and denied the possibility of a known connection between cause and effect; thus making a prelude, says Degerando, to the celebrated argumentation of Hume.

[4] Degerando, Hist. Comp. de Systèmes, iv. 224.

[2d Ed.] Since the publication of my first edition, an account of Algazel or Algazzali and his works has been published under the title of Essai sur les Ecoles Philosophiques chez les Arabes, et notamment sur la Doctrine d’Algazzali, par August Schmölders. Paris. 1842. From this book it appears that Degerando’s account of Algazzali is correct, when he says[5] that “his skepticism seems to have essentially for its object to destroy all systems of merely rational theology, in order to open an indefinite career, not only to faith guided by revelation, but also to the free exaltation of a mystical enthusiasm.” It is remarked by Dr. Schmölders, following M. de Hammer-Purgstall, that the title of the work referred to in the text ought rather to be Mutual Refutation of the Philosophers: and that its object is to show that Philosophy consists of a mass of systems, each of which overturns the others. The work of Algazzali which Dr. Schmölders has published, On the Errors of Sects, &c., contains a kind of autobiographical account of the way in which the author was led to his views. He does not reject the truths of science, but he condemns the mental habits which are caused by laying too much stress upon science. Religious men, he says, are, by such a course, led to reject all science, even what relates to eclipses of the moon and sun; and men of science are led to hate religion.[6]

[5] Hist. Comp. iv. p. 227.

[6] Essai, p. 33.

[195] 6. Neglect of Physical Reasoning in Christendom.—If the Arabians, who, during the ages of which we are speaking, were the most eminent cultivators of science, entertained only such comparatively feeble and servile notions of its doctrines, it will easily be supposed, that in the Christendom of that period, where physical knowledge was comparatively neglected, there was still less distinctness and vividness in the prevalent ideas on such subjects. Indeed, during a considerable period of the history of the Christian Church, and by many of its principal authorities, the study of natural philosophy was not only disregarded but discommended. The great practical doctrines which were presented to men’s minds, and the serious tasks, of the regulation of the will and affections, which religion impressed upon them, made inquiries of mere curiosity seem to be a reprehensible misapplication of human powers; and many of the fathers of the Church revived, in a still more peremptory form, the opinion of Socrates, that the only valuable philosophy is that which teaches us our moral duties and religious hopes.[7] Thus Eusebius says,[8] “It is not through ignorance of the things admired by them, but through contempt of their useless labor, that we think little of these matters, turning our souls to the exercise of better things.” When the thoughts were thus intentionally averted from those ideas which natural philosophy involves, the ideas inevitably became very indistinct in their minds; and they could not conceive that any other persons could find, on such subjects, grounds of clear conviction and certainty. They held the whole of their philosophy to be, as Lactantius[9] asserts it to be, “empty and false.” “To search,” says he, “for the causes of natural things; to inquire whether the sun be as large as he seems, whether the moon is convex or concave, whether the stars are fixed in the sky or float freely in the air; of what size and of what material are the heavens; whether they be at rest or in motion; what is the magnitude of the earth; on what foundations it is suspended and balanced;—to dispute and conjecture on such matters, is just as if we chose to discuss what we think of a city in a remote country, of which we never heard but the name.” It is impossible to express more forcibly that absence of any definite notions on physical subjects which led to this tone of thought.

[7] Brucker, iii. 317.

[8] Præp. Ev. xv. 61.

[9] Inst. 1. iii. init.

7. Question of Antipodes.—With such habits of thought, we are not to be surprised if the relations resulting from the best established theories were apprehended in an imperfect and incongruous manner. [196] We have some remarkable examples of this; and a very notable one is the celebrated question of the existence of Antipodes, or persons inhabiting the opposite side of the globe of the earth, and consequently having the soles of their feet directly opposed to ours. The doctrine of the globular form of the earth results, as we have seen, by a geometrical necessity, from a clear conception of the various points of knowledge which we obtain, bearing upon that subject. This doctrine was held distinctly by the Greeks; it was adopted by all astronomers, Arabian and European, who followed them; and was, in fact, an inevitable part of every system of astronomy which gave a consistent and intelligible representation of phenomena. But those who did not call before their minds any distinct representation at all, and who referred the whole question to other relations than those of space, might still deny this doctrine; and they did so. The existence of inhabitants on the opposite side of the terraqueous globe, was a fact of which experience alone could teach the truth or falsehood; but the religious relations, which extend alike to all mankind, were supposed to give the Christian philosopher grounds for deciding against the possibility of such a race of men. Lactantius,[10] in the fourth century, argues this matter in a way very illustrative of that impatience of such speculations, and consequent confusion of thought, which we have mentioned. “Is it possible,” he says, “that men can be so absurd as to believe that the crops and trees on the other side of the earth hang downwards, and that men there have their feet higher than their heads? If you ask of them how they defend these monstrosities—how things do not fall away from the earth on that side—they reply, that the nature of things is such that heavy bodies tend towards the centre, like the spokes of a wheel, while light bodies, as clouds, smoke, fire, tend from the centre towards the heavens on all sides. Now I am really at a loss what to say of those who, when they have once gone wrong, steadily persevere in their folly, and defend one absurd opinion by another.” It is obvious that so long as the writer refused to admit into his thoughts the fundamental conception of their theory, he must needs be at a loss what to say to their arguments without being on that account in any degree convinced of their doctrines.

[10] Inst. 1. iii. 23.

In the sixth century, indeed, in the reign of Justinian, we find a writer (Cosmas Indicopleustes[11]) who does not rest in this obscurity of [197] representation; but in this case, the distinctness of the pictures only serves to show his want of any clear conception as to what suppositions would explain the phenomena. He describes the earth as an oblong floor, surrounded by upright walls, and covered by a vault, below which the heavenly bodies perform their revolutions, going round a certain high mountain, which occupies the northern parts of the earth, and makes night by intercepting the light of the sun. In Augustin[12] (who flourished a. d. 400) the opinion is treated on other grounds; and without denying the globular form of the earth, it is asserted that there are no inhabitants on the opposite side, because no such race is recorded by Scripture among the descendants of Adam.[13] Considerations of the same kind operated in the well-known instance of Virgil, Bishop of Salzburg, in the eighth century. When he was reported to Boniface, Archbishop of Mentz, as holding the existence of Antipodes, the prelate was shocked at the assumption, as it seemed to him, of a world of human beings, out of the reach of the conditions of salvation; and application was made to Pope Zachary for a censure of the holder of this dangerous doctrine. It does not, however, appear that this led to any severity; and the story of the deposition of Virgil from his bishopric, which is circulated by Kepler and by more modern writers, is undoubtedly altogether false. The same scruples continued to prevail among Christian writers to a later period; and Tostatus[14] notes the opinion of the rotundity of the earth as an “unsafe” doctrine, only a few years before Columbus visited the other hemisphere.

[11] Montfaucon, Collectio Nova Patrum, t. ii. p. 113. Cosmas Indicopleustes. Christianorum Opiniones de Mundo, sive Topographia Christiana.

[12] Civ. D. xvi. 9.

[13] It appears, however, that scriptural arguments were found on the other side. St. Jerome says (Comm. in Ezech. i. 6), speaking of the two cherubims with four faces, seen by the prophet, and the interpretation of the vision: “Alii vero qui philosophorum stultam sequuntur sapientiam, duo hemispheria in duobus templi cherubim, nos et antipodes, quasi supinos et cadentes homines suspicantur.”

[14] Montfauc. Patr. t. ii.

8. Intellectual Condition of the Religious Orders.—It must be recollected, however, that though these were the views and tenets of many religious writers, and though they may be taken as indications of the prevalent and characteristic temper of the times of which we speak, they never were universal. Such a confusion of thought affects the minds of many persons, even in the most enlightened times; and in what we call the Dark Ages, though clear views on such subjects might be more rare, those who gave their minds to science, entertained the true opinion of the figure of the earth. Thus Boëthius[15] (in the sixth century) urges the smallness of the globe of the earth, [198] compared with the heavens, as a reason to repress our love of glory. This work, it will be recollected, was translated into the Anglo-Saxon by our own Alfred. It was also commented on by Bede, who, in what he says on this passage, assents to the doctrine, and shows an acquaintance with Ptolemy and his commentators, both Arabian and Greek. Gerbert, in the tenth century, went from France to Spain to study astronomy with the Arabians, and soon surpassed his masters. He is reported to have fabricated clocks, and an astrolabe of peculiar construction. Gerbert afterwards (in the last year of the first thousand from the birth of Christ) became pope, by the name of Sylvester II. Among other cultivators of the sciences, some of whom, from their proficiency, must have possessed with considerable clearness and steadiness the elementary ideas on which it depends, we may here mention, after Montucla,[16] Adelbold, whose work On the Sphere was addressed to Pope Sylvester, and whose geometrical reasonings are, according to Montucla,[17] vague and chimerical; Hermann Contractus, a monk of St Gall, who, in 1050, published astronomical works; William of Hirsaugen, who followed his example in 1080; Robert of Lorraine, who was made Bishop of Hereford by William the Conqueror, in consequence of his astronomical knowledge. In the next century, Adelhard Goth, an Englishman, travelled among the Arabs for purposes of study, as Gerbert had done in the preceding age; and on his return, translated the Elements of Euclid, which he had brought from Spain or Egypt. Robert Grostête, Bishop of Lincoln, was the author of an Epitome on the Sphere; Roger Bacon, in his youth the contemporary of Robert, and of his brother Adam Marsh, praises very highly their knowledge in mathematics.

[15] Boëthius, Cons. ii. pr. 7.

[16] Mont. i. 502.

[17] Ib. i. 503.

“And here,” says the French historian of mathematics, whom I have followed in the preceding relation, “it is impossible not to reflect that all those men who, if they did not augment the treasure of the sciences, at least served to transmit it, were monks, or had been such originally. Convents were, during these stormy ages, the asylum of sciences and letters. Without these religious men, who, in the silence of their monasteries, occupied themselves in transcribing, in studying, and in imitating the works of the ancients, well or ill, those works would have perished; perhaps not one of them would have come down to us. The thread which connects us with the Greeks and Romans would have been snapt asunder; the precious productions of [199] ancient literature would no more exist for us, than the works, if any there were, published before the catastrophe that annihilated that highly scientific nation, which, according to Bailly, existed in remote ages in the centre of Tartary, or at the roots of Caucasus. In the sciences we should have had all to create; and at the moment when the human mind should have emerged from its stupor and shaken off its slumbers, we should have been no more advanced than the Greeks were after the taking of Troy.” He adds, that this consideration inspires feelings towards the religious orders very different from those which, when he wrote, were prevalent among his countrymen.

Except so far as their religious opinions interfered, it was natural that men who lived a life of quiet and study, and were necessarily in a great measure removed from the absorbing and blinding interests with which practical life occupies the thoughts, should cultivate science more successfully than others, precisely because their ideas on speculative subjects had time and opportunity to become clear and steady. The studies which were cultivated under the name of the Seven Liberal Arts, necessarily tended to favor this effect. The Trivium,[18] indeed, which consisted of Grammar, Logic, and Rhetoric, had no direct bearing upon those ideas with which physical science is concerned; but the Quadrivium, Music, Arithmetic, Geometry, Astronomy, could not be pursued with any attention, without a corresponding improvement of the mind for the purposes of sound knowledge.[19]

[18] Bruck. iii. 597.

[19] Roger Bacon, in his Specula Mathematica, cap. i., says “Harum scientiarum porta et clavis est mathematica, quam sancti a principio mundi invenerunt, etc. Cujus negligentia jam per triginta vel quadraginta annos destruxit totum studium Latinorum.” I do not know on what occasion this neglect took place.

9. Popular Opinions.—That, even in the best intellects, something was wanting to fit them for scientific progress and discovery, is obvious from the fact that science was so long absolutely stationary. And I have endeavored to show that one part of this deficiency was the want of the requisite clearness and vigor of the fundamental scientific ideas. If these were wanting, even in the most powerful and most cultivated minds, we may easily conceive that still greater confusion and obscurity prevailed in the common class of mankind. They actually adopted the belief, however crude and inconsistent, that the form of the earth and heavens really is what at any place it appears to be; that the earth is flat, and the waters of the sky sustained above a material floor, through which in showers they descend. Yet the true doctrines of [200] astronomy appear to have had some popular circulation. For instance, a French poem of the time of Edward the Second, called Ymage du Monde, contains a metrical account of the earth and heavens, according to the Ptolemaic views; and in a manuscript of this poem, preserved in the library of the University of Cambridge, there are representations, in accordance with the text, of a spherical earth, with men standing upright upon it on every side; and by way of illustrating the tendency of all things to the centre, perforations of the earth, entirely through its mass, are described and depicted; and figures are exhibited dropping balls down each of these holes, so as to meet in the interior. And, as bearing upon the perplexity which attends the motions of up and down, when applied to the globular earth, and the change of the direction of gravity which would occur in passing the centre, the readers of Dante will recollect the extraordinary manner in which the poet and his guide emerge from the bottom of the abyss; and the explanation which Virgil imparts to him of what he there sees. After they have crept through the aperture in which Lucifer is placed, the poet says,

“Io levai gli occhi e credetti vedere
Lucifero com’ io l’ avea lasciato,
E vidile le gambe in su tenere.”
.  .  .  .  “Questi come è fitto
Si sottasopra!” .  .  .  .  .
“Quando mi volsi, tu passast’ il punto
Al qual si traggon d’ ogni parte i pesi.”

Inferno, xxxiv.

.  .  .  . “I raised mine eyes,
Believing that I Lucifer should see
Where he was lately left, but saw him now
With legs held upward.” .  .  . .
“How standeth he in posture thus reversed?”
.  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .  .
“Thou wast on the other side so long as I
Descended; when I turned, thou didst o’erpass
That point to which from every part is dragged
All heavy substance.” Cary.

This is more philosophical than Milton’s representation, in a more scientific age, of Uriel sliding to the earth on a sunbeam, and sliding back again, when the sun had sunk below the horizon.

.  .  .  .  .  “Uriel to his charge
Returned on that bright beam whose point now raised,
Bore him slope downward to the sun, now fallen
Beneath the Azores.” Par. Lost, B. iv.    [201]

The philosophical notions of up and down are too much at variance with the obvious suggestions of our senses, to be held steadily and justly by minds undisciplined in science. Perhaps it was some misunderstood statement of the curved surface of the ocean, which gave rise to the tradition of there being a part of the sea directly over the earth, from which at times an object has been known to fall or an anchor to be let down. Even such whimsical fancies are not without instruction, and may serve to show the reader what that vagueness and obscurity of ideas is, of which I have been endeavoring to trace the prevalence in the dark ages.

We now proceed to another of the features which appears to me to mark, in a very prominent manner, the character of the stationary period.

---

CHAPTER II.
The Commentatorial Spirit of the Middle Ages.

WE have already noticed, that, after the first great achievements of the founders of sound speculation, in the different departments of human knowledge, had attracted the interest and admiration which those who became acquainted with them could not but give to them, there appeared a disposition among men to lean on the authority of some of these teachers;—to study the opinions of others as the only mode of forming their own;—to read nature through books;—to attend to what had been already thought and said, rather than to what really is and happens. This tendency of men’s minds requires our particular consideration. Its manifestations were very important, and highly characteristic of the stationary period; it gave, in a great degree, a peculiar bias and direction to the intellectual activity of many centuries; and the kind of labor with which speculative men were occupied in consequence of this bias, took the place of that examination of realities which must be their employment, in order that real knowledge may make any decided progress.

In some subjects, indeed, as, for instance, in the domains of morals, poetry, and the arts, whose aim is the production of beauty, this opposition between the study of former opinion and present reality, may not be so distinct; inasmuch as it may be said by some, that, in these subjects, opinions are realities; that the thoughts and feelings which [202] prevail in men’s minds are the material upon which we must work, the particulars from which we are to generalize, the instruments which we are to use; and that, therefore, to reject the study of antiquity, or even its authority, would be to show ourselves ignorant of the extent and mutual bearing of the elements with which we have to deal;—would be to cut asunder that which we ought to unite into a vital whole. Yet even in the provinces of history and poetry, the poverty and servility of men’s minds during the middle ages, are shown by indications so strong as to be truly remarkable; for instance, in the efforts of the antiquarians of almost every European country to assimilate the early history of their own state to the poet’s account of the foundation of Rome, by bringing from the sack of Troy, Brutus to England, Bavo to Flanders, and so on. But however this may be, our business at present is, to trace the varying spirit of the physical philosophy of different ages; trusting that, hereafter, this prefatory study will enable us to throw some light upon the other parts of philosophy. And in physics the case undoubtedly was, that the labor of observation, which is one of the two great elements of the progress of knowledge, was in a great measure superseded by the collection, the analysis, the explanation, of previous authors and opinions; experimenters were replaced by commentators; criticism took the place of induction; and instead of great discoverers we had learned men.

1. Natural Bias to Authority.—It is very evident that, in such a bias of men’s studies, there is something very natural; however strained and technical this erudition may have been, the propensities on which it depends are very general, and are easily seen. Deference to the authority of thoughtful and sagacious men, a disposition which men in general neither reject nor think they ought to reject in practical matters, naturally clings to them, even in speculation. It is a satisfaction to us to suppose that there are, or have been, minds of transcendent powers, of wide and wise views, superior to the common errors and blindness of our nature. The pleasure of admiration, and the repose of confidence, are inducements to such a belief. There are also other reasons why we willingly believe that there are in philosophy great teachers, so profound and sagacious, that, in order to arrive at truth, we have only to learn their thoughts, to understand their writings. There is a peculiar interest which men feel in dealing with the thoughts of their fellow-men, rather than with brute matter. Matter feels and excites no sympathies: in seeking for mere laws of nature, there is nothing of mental intercourse with the great spirits of the past, as there is in [203] studying Aristotle or Plato. Moreover, a large portion of this employment is of a kind the most agreeable to most speculative minds; it consists in tracing the consequences of assumed principles: it is deductive like geometry: and the principles of the teachers being known, and being undisputed, the deduction and application of their results is an obvious, self-satisfying, and inexhaustible exercise of ingenuity.

These causes, and probably others, make criticism and commentation flourish, when invention begins to fail, oppressed and bewildered by the acquisitions it has already made; and when the vigor and hope of men’s minds are enfeebled by civil and political changes. Accordingly,[20] the Alexandrian school was eminently characterized by a spirit of erudition, of literary criticism, of interpretation, of imitation. These practices, which reigned first in their full vigor in “the Museum,” are likely to be, at all times, the leading propensities of similar academical institutions.

[20] Degerando, Hist. des Syst. de Philos. iii. p. 134.

How natural it is to select a great writer as a paramount authority, and to ascribe to him extraordinary profundity and sagacity, we may see, in the manner in which the Greeks looked upon Homer; and the fancy which detected in his poems traces of the origin of all arts and sciences, has, as we know, found favor even in modern times. To pass over earlier instances of this feeling, we may observe, that Strabo begins his Geography by saying that he agrees with Hipparchus, who had declared Homer to be the first author of our geographical knowledge; and he does not confine the application of this assertion to the various and curious topographical information which the Iliad and Odyssey contain, concerning the countries surrounding the Mediterranean; but in phrases which, to most persons, might appear the mere play of a poetical fancy, or a casual selection of circumstances, he finds unquestionable evidence of a correct knowledge of general geographical truths. Thus,[21] when Homer speaks of the sun “rising from the soft and deep-flowing ocean,” of his “splendid blaze plunging in the ocean;” of the northern constellation

“Alone unwashen by the ocean wave;”

and of Jupiter, “who goes to the ocean to feast with the blameless Ethiopians;” Strabo is satisfied from these passages that Homer knew the dry land to be surrounded with water: and he reasons in like manner with respect to other points of geography.

[21] Strabo, i. p. 5.

[204] 2. Character of Commentators.—The spirit of commentation, as has already been suggested, turns to questions of taste, of metaphysics, of morals, with far more avidity than to physics. Accordingly, critics and grammarians were peculiarly the growth of this school; and, though the commentators sometimes chose works of mathematical or physical science for their subject (as Proclus, who commented on Euclid’s Geometry, and Simplicius, on Aristotle’s Physics), these commentaries were, in fact, rather metaphysical than mathematical. It does not appear that the commentators have, in any instance, illustrated the author by bringing his assertions of facts to the test of experiment. Thus, when Simplicius comments on the passage concerning a vacuum, which we [formerly] adduced, he notices the argument which went upon the assertion, that a vessel full of ashes would contain as much water as an empty vessel; and he mentions various opinions of different authors, but no trial of the fact. Eudemus had said, that the ashes contained something hot, as quicklime does, and that by means of this, a part of the water was evaporated; others supposed the water to be condensed, and so on.[22]

[22] Simplicius, p. 170.

The Commentator’s professed object is to explain, to enforce, to illustrate doctrines assumed as true. He endeavors to adapt the work on which he employs himself to the state of information and of opinion in his own time; to elucidate obscurities and technicalities; to supply steps omitted in the reasoning; but he does not seek to obtain additional truths or new generalizations. He undertakes only to give what is virtually contained in his author; to develop, but not to create. He is a cultivator of the thoughts of others: his labor is not spent on a field of his own; he ploughs but to enrich the granary of another man. Thus he does not work as a freeman, but as one in a servile condition; or rather, his is a menial, and not a productive service: his office is to adorn the appearance of his master, not to increase his wealth.

Yet though the Commentator’s employment is thus subordinate and dependent, he is easily led to attribute to it the greatest importance and dignity. To elucidate good books is, indeed, a useful task; and when those who undertake this work execute it well, it would be most unreasonable to find fault with them for not doing more. But the critic, long and earnestly employed on one author, may easily underrate the relative value of other kinds of mental exertion. He may [205] ascribe too large dimensions to that which occupies the whole of his own field of vision. Thus he may come to consider such study as the highest aim, and best evidence of human genius. To understand Aristotle, or Plato, may appear to him to comprise all that is possible of profundity and acuteness. And when he has travelled over a portion of their domain, and satisfied himself that of this he too is master, he may look with complacency at the circuit he has made, and speak of it as a labor of vast effort and difficulty. We may quote, as an expression of this temper, the language of Sir Henry Savile, in concluding a course of lectures on Euclid, delivered at Oxford.[23] “By the grace of God, gentlemen hearers, I have performed my promise; I have redeemed my pledge. I have explained, according to my ability, the definitions, postulates, axioms, and first eight propositions of the Elements of Euclid. Here, sinking under the weight of years, I lay down my art and my instruments.”

[23] Exolvi per Dei gratiam, Domini auditores, promissum; liberavi fldem meam; explicavi pro meo modulo, definitiones, petitiones, communes sententias, et octo priores propositiones Elementorum Euclidis. Hic, annis fessus, cyclos artemque repono.

We here speak of the peculiar province of the Commentator; for undoubtedly, in many instances, a commentary on a received author has been made the vehicle of conveying systems and doctrines entirely different from those of the author himself; as, for instance, when the New Platonists wrote, taking Plato for their text. The labors of learned men in the stationary period, which came under this description, belong to another class.

3. Greek Commentators on Aristotle.—The commentators or disciples of the great philosophers did not assume at once their servile character. At first their object was to supply and correct, as well as to explain their teacher. Thus among the earlier commentators of Aristotle, Theophrastus invented five moods of syllogism in the first figure, in addition to the four invented by Aristotle, and stated with additional accuracy the rules of hypothetical syllogisms. He also not only collected much information concerning animals, and natural events, which Aristotle had omitted, but often differed with his master; as, for instance, concerning the saltness of the sea: this, which the Stagirite attributed to the effect of the evaporation produced by the sun’s rays, was ascribed by Theophrastus to beds of salt at the bottom. Porphyry,[24] who flourished in the third century, wrote a book on the Predicables, which was found to be so suitable a complement [206] to the Predicaments or Categories of Aristotle, that it was usually prefixed to that treatise; and the two have been used as an elementary work together, up to modern times. The Predicables are the five steps which the gradations of generality and particularity introduce;—genus, species, difference, individual, accident:—the Categories are the ten heads under which assertions or predications may be arranged:—substance, quantity, relation, quality, place, time, position, habit, action, passion.

[24] Buhle, Arist. i. 284.

At a later period, the Aristotelian commentators became more servile, and followed the author step by step, explaining, according to their views, his expressions and doctrines; often, indeed, with extreme prolixity, expanding his clauses into sentences, and his sentences into paragraphs. Alexander Aphrodisiensis, who lived at the end of the second century, is of this class; “sometimes useful,” as one of the recent editors of Aristotle says;[25] “but by the prolixity of his interpretation, by his perverse itch for himself discussing the argument expounded by Aristotle, for defending his opinions, and for refuting or reconciling those of others, he rather obscures than enlightens.” At various times, also, some of the commentators, and especially those of the Alexandrian school, endeavored to reconcile, or combined without reconciling, opposing doctrines of the great philosophers of the earlier times. Simplicius, for instance, and, indeed, a great number of the Alexandrian Philosophers,[26] as Alexander, Ammonius, and others, employed themselves in the futile task of reconciling the doctrines of the Pythagoreans, of the Eleatics, of Plato, and of the Stoics, with those of Aristotle. Boethius[27] entertained the design of translating into Latin the whole of Aristotle’s and Plato’s works, and of showing their agreement; a gigantic plan, which he never executed. Others employed themselves in disentangling the confusion which such attempts produced, as John the Grammarian, surnamed Philoponus, “the Labor-loving;” who, towards the end of the seventh century, maintained that Aristotle was entirely misunderstood by Porphyry and Proclus,[28] who had pretended to incorporate his doctrines into those of the New Platonic school, or even to reconcile him with Plato himself on the subject of ideas. Others, again, wrote Epitomes, Compounds, Abstracts; and endeavored to throw the works of the philosopher into some simpler and more obviously regular form, as John of Damascus, in [207] the middle of the eighth century, who made abstracts of some of Aristotle’s works, and introduced the study of the author into theological education. These two writers lived under the patronage of the Arabs; the former was favored by Amrou, the conqueror of Egypt; the latter was at first secretary to the Caliph, but afterwards withdrew to a monastery.[29]

[25] Ib. i. 288.

[26] Ib. i. 311.

[27] Degerando, Hist. des Syst. iv. 100.

[28] Ib. iv. 155.

[29] Deg. iv. 150.

At this period the Arabians became the fosterers and patrons of philosophy, rather than the Greeks. Justinian had, by an edict, closed the school of Athens, the last of the schools of heathen philosophy. Leo, the Isaurian, who was a zealous Iconoclast, abolished also the schools where general knowledge had been taught, in combination with Christianity,[30] yet the line of the Aristotelian commentators was continued, though feebly, to the later ages of the Greek empire. Anna Comnena[31] mentions a Eustratus who employed himself upon the dialectic and moral treatises, and whom she does not hesitate to elevate above the Stoics and Platonists, for his talent in philosophical discussions. Nicephorus Blemmydes wrote logical and physical epitomes for the use of John Ducas; George Pachymerus composed an epitome of the philosophy of Aristotle, and a compend of his logic; Theodore Metochytes, who was famous in his time alike for his eloquence and his learning, has left a paraphrase of the books of Aristotle on Physics, on the Soul, the Heavens,[32] &c. Fabricius states that this writer has a chapter, the object of which is to prove, that all philosophers, and Aristotle and Plato in particular, have disdained the authority of their predecessors. He could hardly help remarking in how different a spirit philosophy had been pursued since their time.

[30] Ib. iv. 163.

[31] Ib. 167.

[32] Ib. 168.

4. Greek Commentators of Plato and others.—I have spoken principally of the commentators of Aristotle, for he was the great subject of the commentators proper; and though the name of his rival, Plato, was graced by a list of attendants, hardly less numerous, these, the Neoplatonists, as they are called, had introduced new elements into the doctrines of their nominal master, to such an extent that they must be placed in a different class. We may observe here, however, how, in this school as in the Peripatetic, the race of commentators multiplied itself. Porphyry, who commented on Aristotle, was commented on by Ammonius; Plotinus’s Enneads were commented on by Proclus and Dexippus. Psellus[33] the elder was a paraphrast of [208] Aristotle; Psellus the younger, in the eleventh century, attempted to restore the New Platonic school. The former of these two writers had for his pupils two men, the emperor Leo, surnamed the Philosopher, and Photius the patriarch, who exerted themselves to restore the study of literature at Constantinople. We still possess the Collection of Extracts of Photius, which, like that of Stobæus and others, shows the tendency of the age to compilations, abstracts, and epitomes,—the extinction of philosophical vitality.

[33] Deg. iv. 169.

5. Arabian Commentators of Aristotle.—The reader might perhaps have expected, that when the philosophy of the Greeks was carried among a new race of intellects, of a different national character and condition, the train of this servile tradition would have been broken; that some new thoughts would have started forth; that some new direction, some new impulse, would have been given to the search for truth. It might have been anticipated that we should have had schools among the Arabians which should rival the Peripatetic, Academic, and Stoic among the Greeks;—that they would preoccupy the ground on which Copernicus and Galileo, Lavoisier and Linnæus, won their fame;—that they would make the next great steps in the progressive sciences. Nothing of this, however, happened. The Arabians cannot claim, in science or philosophy, any really great names; they produced no men and no discoveries which have materially influenced the course and destinies of human knowledge; they tamely adopted the intellectual servitude of the nation which they conquered by their arms; they joined themselves at once to the string of slaves who were dragging the car of Aristotle and Plotinus. Nor, perhaps, on a little further reflection, shall we be surprised at this want of vigor and productive power, in this period of apparent national youth. The Arabians had not been duly prepared rightly to enjoy and use the treasures of which they became possessed. They had, like most uncivilized nations, been passionately fond of their indigenous poetry; their imagination had been awakened, but their rational powers and speculative tendencies were still torpid. They received the Greek philosophy without having passed through those gradations of ardent curiosity and keen research, of obscurity brightening into clearness, of doubt succeeded by the joy of discovery, by which the Greek mind had been enlarged and exercised. Nor had the Arabians ever enjoyed, as the Greeks had, the individual consciousness, the independent volition, the intellectual freedom, arising from the freedom of political institutions. They had not felt the contagious mental activity of a small city,—the elation arising from the general [209] sympathy in speculative pursuits diffused through an intelligent and acute audience; in short, they had not had a national education such as fitted the Greeks to be disciples of Plato and Hipparchus. Hence, their new literary wealth rather encumbered and enslaved, than enriched and strengthened them: in their want of taste for intellectual freedom, they were glad to give themselves up to the guidance of Aristotle and other dogmatists. Their military habits had accustomed them to look to a leader; their reverence for the book of their law had prepared them to accept a philosophical Koran also. Thus the Arabians, though they never translated the Greek poetry, translated, and merely translated, the Greek philosophy; they followed the Greek philosophers without deviation, or, at least, without any philosophical deviations. They became for the most part Aristotelians;—studied not only Aristotle, but the commentators of Aristotle; and themselves swelled the vast and unprofitable herd.

The philosophical works of Aristotle had, in some measure, made their way in the East, before the growth of the Saracen power. In the sixth century, a Syrian, Uranus,[34] encouraged by the love of philosophy manifested by Cosroes, had translated some of the writings of the Stagirite; about the same time, Sergius had given some translations in Syriac. In the seventh century, Jacob of Edessa translated into this language the Dialectics, and added Notes to the work. Such labors became numerous; and the first Arabic translations of Aristotle were formed upon these Persian or Syriac texts. In this succession of transfusions, some mistakes must inevitably have been introduced.

[34] Deg. iv. 196.

The Arabian interpreters of Aristotle, like a large portion of the Alexandrian ones, gave to the philosopher a tinge of opinions borrowed from another source, of which I shall have to speak under the head of Mysticism. But they are, for the most part, sufficiently strong examples of the peculiar spirit of commentation, to make it fitting to notice them here. At the head of them stands[35] Alkindi, who appears to have lived at the court of Almamon, and who wrote commentaries on the Organon of Aristotle. But Alfarabi was the glory of the school of Bagdad; his knowledge included mathematics, astronomy, medicine, and philosophy. Born in an elevated rank, and possessed of a rich patrimony, he led an austere life, and devoted himself altogether to study and meditation. He employed himself particularly in unfolding the import of Aristotle’s treatise On the Soul.[36] Avicenna (Ebn Sina) [210] was at once the Hippocrates and the Aristotle of the Arabians; and certainly the most extraordinary man that the nation produced. In the course of an unfortunate and stormy life, occupied by politics and by pleasures, he produced works which were long revered as a sort of code of science. In particular, his writings on medicine, though they contain little besides a compilation of Hippocrates and Galen, took the place of both, even in the universities of Europe; and were studied as models at Paris and Montpelier, till the end of the seventeenth century, at which period they fell into an almost complete oblivion. Avicenna is conceived, by some modern writers,[37] to have shown some power of original thinking in his representations of the Aristotelian Logic and Metaphysics. Averroes (Ebn Roshd) of Cordova, was the most illustrious of the Spanish Aristotelians, and became the guide of the schoolmen,[38] being placed by them on a level with Aristotle himself, or above him. He translated Aristotle from the first Syriac version, not being able to read the Greek text. He aspired to, and retained for centuries, the title of the Commentator; and he deserves this title by the servility with which he maintains that Aristotle[39] carried the sciences to the highest possible degree, measured their whole extent, and fixed their ultimate and permanent boundaries; although his works are conceived to exhibit a trace of the New Platonism. Some of his writings are directed against an Arabian skeptic, of the name of Algazel, whom we have [already] noticed.

[35] Ib. iv. 187.

[36] Ib. iv. 205.

[37] Deg. iv. 206.

[38] Ib. iv. 247. Averroes died a. d. 1206.

[39] Ib. iv. 248.

When the schoolmen had adopted the supremacy of Aristotle to the extent in which Averroes maintained it, their philosophy went further than a system of mere commentation, and became a system of dogmatism; we must, therefore, in another [chapter], say a few words more of the Aristotelians in this point of view, before we proceed to the revival of science; but we must previously consider some other features in the character of the Stationary Period. [211]

CHAPTER III.
Of the Mysticism of the Middle Ages.

IT has been already several times hinted, that a new and peculiar element was introduced into the Greek philosophy which occupied the attention of the Alexandrian school; and that this element tinged a large portion of the speculations of succeeding ages. We may speak of this peculiar element as Mysticism; for, from the notion usually conveyed by this term, the reader will easily apprehend the general character of the tendency now spoken of; and especially when he sees its effect pointed out in various subjects. Thus, instead of referring the events of the external world to space and time, to sensible connection and causation, men attempted to reduce such occurrences under spiritual and supersensual relations and dependencies; they referred them to superior intelligences, to theological conditions, to past and future events in the moral world, to states of mind and feelings, to the creatures of an imaginary mythology or demonology. And thus their physical Science became Magic, their Astronomy became Astrology, the study of the Composition of bodies became Alchemy, Mathematics became the contemplation of the Spiritual Relations of number and figure, and Philosophy became Theosophy.

The examination of this feature in the history of the human mind is important for us, in consequence of its influence upon the employments and the thoughts of the times now under our notice. This tendency materially affected both men’s speculations and their labours in the pursuit of knowledge. By its direct operation, it gave rise to the newer Platonic philosophy among the Greeks, and to corresponding doctrines among the Arabians; and by calling into a prominent place astrology, alchemy, and magic, it long occupied most of the real observers of the material world. In this manner it delayed and impeded the progress of true science; for we shall see reason to believe that human knowledge lost more by the perversion of men’s minds and the misdirection of their efforts, than it gained by any increase of zeal arising from the peculiar hopes and objects of the mystics.

It is not our purpose to attempt any general view of the progress and fortunes of the various forms of Mystical Philosophy; but only to exhibit some of its characters, in so far as they illustrate those [212] tendencies of thought which accompanied the retrogradation of inductive science. And of these, the leading feature which demands our notice is that already alluded to; namely, the practice of referring things and events, not to clear and distinct relations, obviously applicable to such cases;—not to general rules capable of direct verification; but to notions vague, distant, and vast, which we cannot bring into contact with facts, because they belong to a different region from the facts; as when we connect natural events with moral or historical causes, or seek spiritual meanings in the properties of number and figure. Thus the character of Mysticism is, that it refers particulars, not to generalizations homogeneous and immediate, but to such as are heterogeneous and remote; to which we must add, that the process of this reference is not a calm act of the intellect, but is accompanied with a glow of enthusiastic feeling.

1. Neoplatonic Theosophy.—The Newer Platonism is the first example of this Mystical Philosophy which I shall consider. The main points which here require our notice are, the doctrine of an Intellectual World resulting from the act of the Divine Mind, as the only reality; and the aspiration after the union of the human soul with this Divine Mind, as the object of human existence. The “Ideas” of Plato were Forms of our knowledge; but among the Neoplatonists they became really existing, indeed the only really existing, Objects; and the inaccessible scheme of the universe which these ideas constitute, was offered as the great subject of philosophical contemplation. The desire of the human mind to approach towards its Creator and Preserver, and to obtain a spiritual access to Him, leads to an employment of the thoughts which is well worth the notice of the religious philosopher; but such an effort, even when founded on revelation and well regulated, is not a means of advance in physics; and when it is the mere result of natural enthusiasm, it may easily obtain such a place in men’s minds as to unfit them for the successful prosecution of natural philosophy. The temper, therefore, which introduces such supernatural communion into the general course of its speculations, may be properly treated as mystical, and as one of the causes of the decline of science in the Stationary Period. The Neoplatonic philosophy requires our notice as one of the most remarkable forms of this Mysticism.

Though Ammonius Saccas, who flourished at the end of the second century, is looked upon as the beginner of the Neoplatonists, his disciple Plotinus is, in reality, the great founder of the school, both by his [213] works, which still remain to us, and by the enthusiasm which his character and manners inspired among his followers. He lived a life of meditation, gentleness, and self-denial, and died in the second year of the reign of Claudius (a. d. 270). His disciple, Porphyry, has given us a Life of him, from which we may see how well his habitual manners were suited to make his doctrines impressive. “Plotinus, the philosopher of our time,” Porphyry thus begins his biography, “appeared like a person ashamed that he was in the body. In consequence of this disposition, he could not bear to talk concerning his family, or his parents, or his country. He would not allow himself to be represented by a painter or statuary; and once, when Aurelius entreated him to permit a likeness of him to be taken, he said, ‘Is it not enough for us to carry this image in which nature has enclosed us, but we must also try to leave a more durable image of this image, as if it were so great a sight?’ And he retained the same temper to the last. When he was dying, he said, ‘I am trying to bring the divinity which is in us to the divinity which is in the universe.’” He was looked upon by his successors with extraordinary admiration and reverence; and his disciple Porphyry collected from his lips, or from fragmental notes, the six Enneads of his doctrines (that is, parts each consisting of nine Books), which he arranged and annotated.

We have no difficulty in finding in this remarkable work examples of mystical speculation. The Intelligible World of realities or essences corresponds to the world of sense[40] in the classes of things which it includes. To the Intelligible World, man’s mind ascends, by a triple road which Plotinus figuratively calls that of the Musician, the Lover, the Philosopher.[41] The activity of the human soul is identified by analogy with the motion of the heavens. “This activity is about a middle point, and thus it is circular; but a middle point is not the same in body and in the soul: in that, the middle point is local; in this, it is that on which the rest depends. There is, however, an analogy; for as in one case, so in the other, there must be a middle point, and as the sphere revolves about its centre, the soul revolves about God through its affections.”

[40] vi. Ennead, iii. 1.

[41] ii. E. ii. 2.

The conclusion of the work is,[42] as might be supposed, upon the approach to, union with, and fruition of God. The author refers again to the analogy between the movements of the soul and those of the heavens. “We move round him like a choral dance; even when we [214] look from him we revolve about him: we do not always look at him, but when we do, we have satisfaction and rest, and the harmony which belongs to that divine movement. In this movement, the mind beholds the fountain of life, the fountain of mind, the origin of being, the cause of good, the root of the soul.”[43] “There will be a time when this vision shall be continual; the mind being no more interrupted, nor suffering any perturbation from the body. Yet that which beholds is not that which is disturbed; and when this vision becomes dim, it does not obscure the knowledge which resides in demonstration, and faith, and reasoning; but the vision itself is not reason, but greater than reason, and before reason.”[44]

[42] vi. Enn. ix. 8.

[43] vi. Enn. ix. 9.

[44] vi. Enn. ix. 10.

The fifth book of the third Ennead has for its subject the Dæmon which belongs to each man. It is entitled “Concerning Love;” and the doctrine appears to be, that the Love, or common source of the passions which is in each man’s mind, is “the Dæmon which they say accompanies each man.”[45] These dæmons were, however (at least by later writers), invested with a visible aspect and with a personal character, including a resemblance of human passions and motives. It is curious thus to see an untenable and visionary generalization falling back into the domain of the senses and the fancy, after a vain attempt to support itself in the region of the reason. This imagination soon produced pretensions to the power of making these dæmons or genii visible; and the Treatise on the Mysteries of the Egyptians, which is attributed to Iamblichus, gives an account of the secret ceremonies, the mysterious words, the sacrifices and expiations, by which this was to be done.

[45] Ficinus, Comm. in v. Enn. iii.

It is unnecessary for us to dwell on the progress of this school; to point out the growth of the Theurgy which thus arose; or to describe the attempts to claim a high antiquity for this system, and to make Orpheus, the poet, the first promulgator of its doctrines. The system, like all mystical systems, assumed the character rather of religion than of a theory. The opinions of its disciples materially influenced their lives. It gave the world the spectacle of an austere morality, a devotional exaltation, combined with the grossest superstitions of Paganism. The successors of Iamblichus appeared rather to hold a priesthood, than the chair of a philosophical school.[46] They were persecuted by Constantine and Constantius, as opponents of Christianity. Sopater, a [215] Syrian philosopher of this school, was beheaded by the former emperor on a charge that he had bound the winds by the power of magic.[47] But Julian, who shortly after succeeded to the purple, embraced with ardor the opinions of Iamblichus. Proclus (who died a. d. 487) was one of the greatest of the teachers of this school;[48] and was, both in his life and doctrines, a worthy successor of Plotinus, Porphyry, and Iamblichus. We possess a biography, or rather a panegyric of him, by his disciple Marinus, in which he is exhibited as a representation of the ideal perfection of the philosophic character, according to the views of the Neoplatonists. His virtues are arranged as physical, moral, purificatory, theoretic, and theurgic. Even in his boyhood, Apollo and Minerva visited him in his dreams: he studied oratory at Alexandria, but it was at Athens that Plutarch and Lysianus initiated him in the mysteries of the New Platonists. He received a kind of consecration at the hands of the daughter of Plutarch, the celebrated Asclepigenia, who introduced him to the traditions of the Chaldeans, and the practices of theurgy; he was also admitted to the mysteries of Eleusis. He became celebrated for his knowledge and eloquence; but especially for his skill in the supernatural arts which were connected with the doctrines of his sect. He appears before us rather as a hierophant than a philosopher. A large portion of his life was spent in evocations, purifications, fastings, prayers, hymns, intercourse with apparitions, and with the gods, and in the celebration of the festivals of Paganism, especially those which were held in honor of the Mother of the Gods. His religious admiration extended to all forms of mythology. The philosopher, said he, is not the priest of a single religion, but of all the religions of the world. Accordingly, he composed hymns in honor of all the divinities of Greece, Rome, Egypt, Arabia;—Christianity alone was excluded from his favor.

[46] Deg. iii. 407

[47] Gibbon, iii. 352.

[48] Deg. iii. 419.

The reader will find an interesting view of the School of Alexandria, in M. Barthelemy Saint-Hilaire’s Rapport on the Mémoires sent to the Academy of Moral and Political Sciences at Paris, in consequence of its having, in 1841, proposed this as the subject of a prize, which was awarded in 1844. M. Saint-Hilaire has prefixed to this Rapport a dissertation on the Mysticism of that school. He, however, uses the term Mysticism in a wider sense than my purpose, which regarded mainly the bearing of the doctrines of this school upon the progress of the Inductive Sciences, has led me to do. Although he finds much to [216] admire in the Alexandrian philosophy, he declares that they were incapable of treating scientific questions. The extent to which this is true is well illustrated by the extract which he gives from Plotinus, on the question, “Why objects appear smaller in proportion as they are more distant.” Plotinus denies that the reason of this is that the angles of vision become smaller. His reason for this denial is curious enough. If it were so, he says, how could the heaven appear smaller than it is, since it occupies the whole of the visual angle?

2. Mystical Arithmetic.—It is unnecessary further to exemplify, from Proclus, the general mystical character of the school and time to which he belonged; but we may notice more specially one of the forms of this mysticism, which very frequently offers itself to our notice, especially in him; and which we may call Mystical Arithmetic. Like all the kinds of Mysticism, this consists in the attempt to connect our conceptions of external objects by general and inappropriate notions of goodness, perfection, and relation to the divine essence and government; instead of referring such conceptions to those appropriate ideas, which, by due attention, become perfectly distinct, and capable of being positively applied and verified. The subject which is thus dealt with, in the doctrines of which we now speak, is Number; a notion which tempts men into these visionary speculations more naturally than any other. For number is really applicable to moral notions—to emotions and feelings, and to their objects—as well as to the things of the material world. Moreover, by the discovery of the principle of musical concords, it had been found, probably most unexpectedly, that numerical relations were closely connected with sounds which could hardly be distinguished from the expression of thought and feeling; and a suspicion might easily arise, that the universe, both of matter and of thought, might contain many general and abstract truths of some analogous kind. The relations of number have so wide a bearing, that the ramifications of such a suspicion could not easily be exhausted, supposing men willing to follow them into darkness and vagueness; which it is precisely the mystical tendency to do. Accordingly, this kind of speculation appeared very early, and showed itself first among the Pythagoreans, as we might have expected, from the attention which they gave to the theory of harmony: and this, as well as some other of the doctrines of the Pythagorean philosophy, was adopted by the later Platonists, and, indeed, by Plato himself, whose speculations concerning number have decidedly a mystical character. The mere mathematical relations of numbers,—as odd and even, perfect and imperfect, [217] abundant and defective,—were, by a willing submission to an enthusiastic bias, connected with the notions of good and beauty, which were suggested by the terms expressing their relations; and principles resulting from such a connection were woven into a wide and complex system. It is not necessary to dwell long on this subject; the mere titles of the works which treated of it show its nature. Archytas[49] is said to have written a treatise on the number ten: Telaugé, the daughter of Pythagoras, wrote on the number four. This number, indeed, which was known by the name of the Tetractys, was very celebrated in the school of Pythagoras. It is mentioned in the “Golden Verses,” which are ascribed to him: the pupil is conjured to be virtuous,

Ναὶ μὰ τὸν ἁμετέρᾳ ψυχᾷ παραδόντα τετρακτὺν
Παγὰν ἀεννάου φύσεως . . . .
By him who stampt The Four upon the mind,—
The Four, the fount of nature’s endless stream.

[49] Mont. ii. 123.

In Plato’s works, we have evidence of a similar belief in religious relations of Number; and in the new Platonists, this doctrine was established as a system. Proclus, of whom we have been speaking, founds his philosophy, in a great measure, on the relation of Unity and Multiple; from this, he is led to represent the causality of the Divine Mind by three Triads of abstractions; and in the development of one part of this system, the number seven is introduced.[50] “The intelligible and intellectual gods produce all things triadically; for the monads in these latter are divided according to number; and what the monad was in the former, the number is in these latter. And the intellectual gods produce all things hebdomically; for they evolve the intelligible, and at the same time intellectual triads, into intellectual hebdomads, and expand their contracted powers into intellectual variety.” Seven is what is called by arithmeticians a prime number, that is, it cannot be produced by the multiplication of other numbers. In the language of the New Platonists, the number seven is said to be a virgin, and without a mother, and it is therefore sacred to Minerva. The number six is a perfect number, and is consecrated to Venus.

[50] Procl. v. 3, Taylor’s translation.

The relations of space were dealt with in like manner, the Geometrical properties being associated with such physical and metaphysical notions as vague thought and lively feeling could anyhow connect with them. We may consider, as an example of this,[51] Plato’s opinion [218] concerning the particles of the four elements. He gave to each kind of particle one of the five regular solids, about which the geometrical speculations of himself and his pupils had been employed. The particles of fire were pyramids, because they are sharp, and tend upwards; those of earth are cubes, because they are stable, and fill space; the particles of air are octahedral, as most nearly resembling those of fire; those of water are the icositetrahedron, as most nearly spherical. The dodecahedron is the figure of the element of the heavens, and shows its influence in other things, as in the twelve signs of the zodiac. In such examples we see how loosely space and number are combined or confounded by these mystical visionaries.

[51] Stanley, Hist. Phil.

These numerical dreams of ancient philosophers have been imitated by modern writers; for instance, by Peter Bungo and Kircher, who have written De Mysteriis Numerorum. Bungo treats of the mystical properties of each of the numbers in order, at great length. And such speculations have influenced astronomical theories. In the first edition of the Alphonsine Tables,[52] the precession was represented by making the first point of Aries move, in a period of 7000 years, through a circle of which the radius was 18 degrees, while the circle moved round the ecliptic in 49,000 years; and these numbers, 7000 and 49,000, were chosen probably by Jewish calculators, or with reference to Jewish Sabbatarian notions.

[52] Montucla, i. 511.

3. Astrology.—Of all the forms which mysticism assumed, none was cultivated more assiduously than astrology. Although this art prevailed most universally and powerfully during the stationary period, its existence, even as a detailed technical system, goes back to a very early age. It probably had its origin in the East; it is universally ascribed to the Babylonians and Chaldeans; the name Chaldean was, at Rome, synonymous with mathematicus, or astrologer; and we read repeatedly that this class of persons were expelled from Italy by a decree of the senate, both during the times of the republic and of the empire.[53] The recurrence of this act of legislation shows that it was not effectual: “It is a class of men,” says Tacitus, “which, in our city, will always be prohibited, and will always exist.” In Greece, it does not appear that the state showed any hostility to the professors of this art. They undertook, it would seem, then, as at a later period, to determine the course of a man’s character and life from the configuration of the stars at the moment of his birth. We do not possess any of the [219] speculations of the early astrologers; and we cannot therefore be certain that the notions which operated in men’s minds when the art had its birth, agreed with the views on which it was afterwards defended, when it became a matter of controversy. But it appears probable, that, though it was at later periods supported by physical analogies, it was originally suggested by mythological belief. The Greeks spoke of the influences or effluxes (ἀπόῤῥοιας) which proceeded from the stars; but the Chaldeans had probably thought rather of the powers which they exercised as deities. In whatever manner the sun, moon, and planets came to be identified with gods and goddesses, it is clear that the characters ascribed to these gods and goddesses regulate the virtues and powers of the stars which bear their names. This association, so manifestly visionary, was retained, amplified, and pursued, in an enthusiastic spirit, instead of being rejected for more distinct and substantial connections; and a pretended science was thus formed, which bears the obvious stamp of mysticism.

[53] Tacit. Ann. ii. 32. xii. 52. Hist. I. 22, II. 62.

That common sense of mankind which teaches them that theoretical opinions are to be calmly tried by their consequences and their accordance with facts, appears to have counteracted the prevalence of astrology in the better times of the human mind. Eudoxus, as we are informed by Cicero,[54] rejected the pretensions of the Chaldeans; and Cicero himself reasons against them with arguments as sensible and intelligent as could be adduced by a writer of the present day; such as the different fortunes and characters of persons born at the same time; and the failure of the predictions, in the case of Pompey, Crassus, Cæsar, to whom the astrologers had foretold glorious old age and peaceful death. He also employs an argument which the reader would perhaps not expect from him,—the very great remoteness of the planets as compared with the distance of the moon. “What contagion can reach us,” he asks, “from a distance almost infinite?”

[54] Cic. de Div. ii. 42.

Pliny argues on the same side, and with some of the same arguments.[55] “Homer,” he says, “tells us that Hector and Polydamus were born the same night;—men of such different fortune. And every hour, in every part of the world, are born lords and slaves, kings and beggars.”

[55] Hist. Nat. vii. 49.

The impression made by these arguments is marked in an anecdote told concerning Publius Nigidius Figulus, a Roman of the time of Julius Cæsar, whom Lucan mentions as a celebrated astrologer. It is [220] said, that when an opponent of the art urged as an objection the different fates of persons born in two successive instants, Nigidius bade him make two contiguous marks on a potter’s wheel, which was revolving rapidly near them. On stopping the wheel, the two marks were found to be really far removed from each other; and Nigidius is said to have received the name of Figulus (the potter), in remembrance of this story, His argument, says St. Augustine, who gives us the narrative, was as fragile as the ware which the wheel manufactured.

As the darkening times of the Roman empire advanced, even the stronger minds seem to have lost the clear energy which was requisite to throw off this delusion. Seneca appears to take the influence of the planets for granted; and even Tacitus[56] seems to hesitate. “For my own part,” says he, “I doubt; but certainly the majority of mankind cannot be weaned from the opinion, that, at the birth of each man, his future destiny is fixed; though some things may fall out differently from the predictions, by the ignorance of those who profess the art; and that thus the art is unjustly blamed, confirmed as it is by noted examples in all ages.” The occasion which gives rise to these reflections of the historian is the mention of Thrasyllus, the favorite astrologer of the Emperor Tiberius, whose skill is exemplified in the following narrative. Those who were brought to Tiberius on any important matter, were admitted to an interview in an apartment situated on a lofty cliff in the island of Capreæ. They reached this place by a narrow path, accompanied by a single freedman of great bodily strength; and on their return, if the emperor had conceived any doubts of their trustworthiness, a single blow buried the secret and its victim in the ocean below. After Thrasyllus had, in this retreat, stated the results of his art as they concerned the emperor, Tiberius asked him whether he had calculated how long he himself had to live. The astrologer examined the aspect of the stars, and while he did this, as the narrative states, showed hesitation, alarm, increasing terror, and at last declared that, “the present hour was for him critical, perhaps fatal.” Tiberius embraced him, and told him “he was right in supposing he had been in danger, but that he should escape it;” and made him thenceforth his confidential counsellor.

[56] Ann. vi. 22.

The belief in the power of astrological prediction which thus obtained dominion over the minds of men of literary cultivation and practical energy, naturally had a more complete sway among the speculative [221] but unstable minds of the later philosophical schools of Alexandria, Athens, and Rome. We have a treatise on astrology by Proclus, which will serve to exemplify the mystical principle in this form. It appears as a commentary on a work on the same subject called “Tetrabiblos,” ascribed to Ptolemy; though we may reasonably doubt whether the author of the “Megale Syntaxis” was also the writer of the astrological work. A few notices of the commentary of Proclus will suffice.[57] The science is defended by urging how powerful we know the physical effects of the heavenly bodies to be. “The sun regulates all things on earth;—the birth of animals, the growth of fruits, the flowing of waters, the change of health, according to the seasons: he produces heat, moisture, dryness, cold, according to his approach to our zenith. The moon, which is the nearest of all bodies to the earth, gives out much influence; and all things, animate and inanimate, sympathize with her: rivers increase and diminish according to her light; the advance of the sea, and its recess, are regulated by her rising and setting; and along with her, fruits and animals wax and wane, either wholly or in part.” It is easy to see that by pursuing this train of associations (some real and some imaginary) very vaguely and very enthusiastically, the connections which astrology supposes would receive a kind of countenance. Proclus then proceeds to state[58] the doctrines of the science. “The sun,” he says, “is productive of heat and dryness; this power is moderate in its nature, but is more perceived than that of the other luminaries, from his magnitude, and from the change of seasons. The nature of the moon is for the most part moist; for being the nearest to the earth, she receives the vapors which rise from moist bodies, and thus she causes bodies to soften and rot. But by the illumination she receives from the sun, she partakes in a moderate degree of heat. Saturn is cold and dry, being most distant both from the heating power of the sun, and the moist vapors of the earth. His cold, however, is most prevalent, his dryness is more moderate. Both he and the rest receive additional powers from the configurations which they make with respect to the sun and moon.” In the same manner it is remarked that Mars is dry and caustic, from his fiery nature, which, indeed, his color shows. Jupiter is well compounded of warm and moist, as is Venus. Mercury is variable in his character. From these notions were derived others concerning the beneficial or hurtful effect of these stars. Heat and [222] moisture are generative and creative elements; hence the ancients, says Proclus, deemed Jupiter, and Venus, and the Moon to have a good power; Saturn and Mercury, on the other hand, had an evil nature.

[57] I. 2.

[58] I. 4.

Other distinctions of the character of the stars are enumerated, equally visionary, and suggested by the most fanciful connections. Some are masculine, and some feminine: the Moon and Venus are of the latter kind. This appears to be merely a mythological or etymological association. Some are diurnal, some nocturnal: the Moon and Venus are of the latter kind, the Sun and Jupiter of the former; Saturn and Mars are both.

The fixed stars, also, and especially those of the zodiac, had especial influences and subjects assigned to them. In particular, each sign was supposed to preside over a particular part of the body; thus Aries had the head assigned to it, Taurus the neck, and so on.

The most important part of the sky in the astrologer’s consideration, was that sign of the zodiac which rose at the moment of the child’s birth; this was, properly speaking, the horoscope, the ascendant, or the first house; the whole circuit of the heavens being divided into twelve houses, in which life and death, marriage and children, riches and honors, friends and enemies, were distributed.

We need not attempt to trace the progress of this science. It prevailed extensively among the Arabians, as we might expect from the character of that nation. Albumasar, of Balkh in Khorasan, who flourished in the ninth century, who was one of their greatest astronomers, was also a great astrologer; and his work on the latter subject, “De Magnis Conjunctionibus, Annorum Revolutionibus ac eorum Perfectionibus,” was long celebrated in Europe. Aboazen Haly (the writer of a treatise “De Judiciis Astrorum”), who lived in Spain in the thirteenth century, was one of the classical authors on this subject.

It will easily be supposed that when this apotelesmatic or judicial astrology obtained firm possession of men’s minds, it would be pursued into innumerable subtle distinctions and extravagant conceits; and the more so, as experience could offer little or no check to such exercises of fancy and subtlety. For the correction of rules of astrological divination by comparison with known events, though pretended to by many professors of the art, was far too vague and fallible a guidance to be of any real advantage. Even in what has been called Natural Astrology, the dependence of the weather on the heavenly bodies, it is easy to see what a vast accumulation of well-observed facts is requisite to establish [223] any true rule; and it is well known how long, in spite of facts, false and groundless rules (as the dependence of the weather on the moon) may keep their hold on men’s minds. When the facts are such loose and many-sided things as human characters, passions, and happiness, it was hardly to be expected that even the most powerful minds should be able to find a footing sufficiently firm, to enable them to resist the impression of a theory constructed of sweeping and bold assertions, and filled out into a complete system of details. Accordingly, the connection of the stars with human persons and actions was, for a long period, undisputed. The vague, obscure, and heterogeneous character of such a connection, and its unfitness for any really scientific reasoning, could, of course, never be got rid of; and the bewildering feeling of earnestness and solemnity, with which the connection of the heavens with man was contemplated, never died away. In other respects, however, the astrologers fell into a servile commentatorial spirit; and employed themselves in annotating and illustrating the works of their predecessors to a considerable extent, before the revival of true science.

It may be mentioned, that astrology has long been, and probably is, an art held in great esteem and admiration among other eastern nations besides the Mohammedans; for instance, the Jews, the Indians, the Siamese, and the Chinese. The prevalence of vague, visionary, and barren notions among these nations, cannot surprise us; for with regard to them we have no evidence, as with regard to Europeans we have, that they are capable, on subjects of physical speculation, of originating sound and rational general principles. The Arts may have had their birth in all parts of the globe; but it is only Europe, at particular favored periods of its history, which has ever produced Sciences.

We are, however, now speaking of a long period, during which this productive energy was interrupted and suspended. During this period Europe descended, in intellectual character, to the level at which the other parts of the world have always stood. Her Science was then a mixture of Art and Mysticism; we have considered several forms of this Mysticism, but there are two others which must not pass unnoticed, Alchemy and Magic.

We may observe, before we proceed, that the deep and settled influence which Astrology had obtained among them, appears perhaps most strongly in the circumstance, that the most vigorous and clear-sighted minds which were concerned in the revival of science, did not, for a long period, shake off the persuasion that there was, in this art, some element of truth. Roger Bacon, Cardan, Kepler, Tycho Brahe, [224] Francis Bacon, are examples of this. These, or most of them, rejected all the more obvious and extravagant absurdities with which the subject had been loaded; but still conceived that some real and valuable truth remained when all these were removed. Thus Campanella,[59] whom we shall have to [speak] of as one of the first opponents of Aristotle, wrote an “Astrology purified from all the Superstitions of the Jews and Arabians, and treated physiologically.”

[59] Bacon, De Aug. iii. 4.

4. Alchemy.—Like other kinds of Mysticism, Alchemy seems to have grown out of the notions of moral, personal, and mythological qualities, which men associated with terms, of which the primary application was to physical properties. This is the form in which the subject is presented to us in the earliest writings which we possess on the subject of chemistry;—those of Geber[60] of Seville, who is supposed to have lived in the eighth or ninth century. The very titles of Geber’s works show the notions on which this pretended science proceeds. They are, “Of the Search of Perfection;” “Of the Sum of Perfection, or of the Perfect Magistery;” “Of the Invention of Verity, or Perfection.” The basis of this phraseology is the distinction of metals into more or less perfect; gold being the most perfect, as being the most valuable, most beautiful, most pure, most durable; silver the next; and so on. The “Search of Perfection” was, therefore, the attempt to convert other metals into gold; and doctrines were adopted which represented the metals as all compounded of the same elements, so that this was theoretically possible. But the mystical trains of association were pursued much further than this; gold and silver were held to be the most noble of metals; gold was their King, and silver their Queen. Mythological associations were called in aid of these fancies, as had been done in astrology. Gold was Sol, silver was Luna, the moon; copper, iron, tin, lead, were assigned to Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn. The processes of mixture and heat were spoken of as personal actions and relations, struggles and victories. Some elements were conquerors, some conquered; there existed preparations which possessed the power of changing the whole of a body into a substance of another kind: these were called magisteries.[61] When gold and quicksilver are combined, the king and the queen are married, to produce children of their own kind. It will easily be conceived, that when chemical operations were described in phraseology of this sort, the enthusiasm of the [225] fancy would be added to that of the hopes, and observation would not be permitted to correct the delusion, or to suggest sounder and more rational views.

[60] Thomson’s Hist. of Chem. i. 117.

[61] Boyle, Thomson’s Hist. Ch. i. 25. Carolus Musitanus.

The exaggeration of the vague notion of perfection and power in the object of the alchemist’s search, was carried further still. The same preparation which possessed the faculty of turning baser metals into gold, was imagined to be also a universal medicine, to have the gift of curing or preventing diseases, prolonging life, producing bodily strength and beauty: the philosophers’ stone was finally invested with every desirable efficacy which the fancy of the “philosophers” could devise.

It has been usual to say that Alchemy was the mother of Chemistry; and that men would never have made the experiments on which the real science is founded, if they had not been animated by the hopes and the energy which the delusive art inspired. To judge whether this is truly said, we must be able to estimate the degree of interest which men feel in purely speculative truth, and in the real and substantial improvement of art to which it leads. Since the fall of Alchemy, and the progress of real Chemistry, these motives have been powerful enough to engage in the study of the science, a body far larger than the Alchemists ever were, and no less zealous. There is no apparent reason why the result should not have been the same, if the progress of true science had begun sooner. Astronomy was long cultivated without the bribe of Astrology. But, perhaps, we may justly say this;—that, in the stationary period, men’s minds were so far enfeebled and degraded, that pure speculative truth had not its full effect upon them; and the mystical pursuits in which some dim and disfigured images of truth were sought with avidity, were among the provisions by which the human soul, even when sunk below its best condition, is perpetually directed to something above the mere objects of sense and appetite;—a contrivance of compensation, as it were, in the intellectual and spiritual constitution of man.

5. Magic.—Magical Arts, so far as they were believed in by those who professed to practise them, and so far as they have a bearing in science, stand on the same footing as astrology; and, indeed, a close alliance has generally been maintained between the two pursuits. Incapacity and indisposition to perceive natural and philosophical causation, an enthusiastic imagination, and such a faith as can devise and maintain supernatural and spiritual connexions, are the elements of this, as of other forms of Mysticism. And thus, that temper which led men to aim at the magician’s supposed authority over the elements, [226] is an additional exemplification of those habits of thought which prevented the progress of real science, and the acquisition of that command over nature which is founded on science, during the interval now before us.

But there is another aspect under which the opinions connected with this pursuit may serve to illustrate the mental character of the Stationary Period.

The tendency, during the middle ages, to attribute the character of Magician to almost all persons eminent for great speculative or practical knowledge, is a feature of those times, which shows how extensive and complete was the inability to apprehend the nature of real science. In cultivated and enlightened periods, such as those of ancient Greece, or modern Europe, knowledge is wished for and admired, even by those who least possess it: but in dark and degraded periods, superior knowledge is a butt for hatred and fear. In the one case, men’s eyes are open; their thoughts are clear; and, however high the philosopher may be raised above the multitude, they can catch glimpses of the intervening path, and see that it is free to all, and that elevation is the reward of energy and labor. In the other case, the crowd are not only ignorant, but spiritless; they have lost the pleasure in knowledge, the appetite for it, and the feeling of dignity which it gives: there is no sympathy which connects them with the learned man: they see him above them, but know not how he is raised or supported: he becomes an object of aversion and envy, of vague suspicion and terror; and these emotions are embodied and confirmed by association with the fancies and dogmas of superstition. To consider superior knowledge as Magic, and Magic as a detestable and criminal employment, was the form which these feelings of dislike assumed; and at one period in the history of Europe, almost every one who had gained any eminent literary fame, was spoken of as a magician. Naudæus, a learned Frenchman, in the seventeenth century, wrote “An Apology for all the Wise Men who have been unjustly reported Magicians, from the Creation to the present Age.” The list of persons whom he thus thinks it necessary to protect, are of various classes and ages. Alkindi, Geber, Artephius, Thebit, Raymund Lully, Arnold de Villâ Novâ, Peter of Apono, and Paracelsus, had incurred the black suspicion as physicians or alchemists. Thomas Aquinas, Roger Bacon, Michael Scott, Picus of Mirandula, and Trithemius, had not escaped it, though ministers of religion. Even dignitaries, such as Robert Grosteste, Bishop of Lincoln, Albertus Magnus, Bishop of Ratisbon, [227] Popes Sylvester the Second, and Gregory the Seventh, had been involved in the wide calumny. In the same way in which the vulgar confounded the eminent learning and knowledge which had appeared in recent times, with skill in dark and supernatural arts, they converted into wizards all the best-known names in the rolls of fame; as Aristotle, Solomon, Joseph, Pythagoras; and, finally, the poet Virgil was a powerful and skilful necromancer, and this fancy was exemplified by many strange stories of his achievements and practices.

The various results of the tendency of the human mind to mysticism, which we have here noticed, form prominent features in the intellectual character of the world, for a long course of centuries. The theosophy and theurgy of the Neoplatonists, the mystical arithmetic of the Pythagoreans and their successors, the predictions of the astrologers, the pretences of alchemy and magic, represent, not unfairly, the general character and disposition of men’s thoughts, with reference to philosophy and science. That there were stronger minds, which threw off in a greater or less degree this train of delusive and unsubstantial ideas, is true; as, on the other hand, Mysticism, among the vulgar or the foolish, often went to an extent of extravagance and superstition, of which I have not attempted to convey any conception. The lesson which the preceding survey teaches us is, that during the Stationary Period, Mysticism, in its various forms, was a leading character, both of the common mind, and of the speculations of the most intelligent and profound reasoners; and that this Mysticism was the opposite of that habit of thought which we have stated Science to require; namely, clear Ideas, distinctly employed to connect well-ascertained Facts; inasmuch as the Ideas in which it dealt were vague and unstable, and the temper in which they were contemplated was an urgent and aspiring enthusiasm, which could not submit to a calm conference with experience upon even terms. The fervor of thought in some degree supplied the place of reason in producing belief; but opinions so obtained had no enduring value; they did not exhibit a permanent record of old truths, nor a firm foundation for new. Experience collected her stores in vain, or ceased to collect them, when she had only to pour them into the flimsy folds of the lap of Mysticism; who was, in truth, so much absorbed in looking for the treasures which were to fall from the skies, that she heeded little how scantily she obtained, or how loosely she held, such riches as might be found near her. [228]

CHAPTER IV.
Of the Dogmatism of the Stationary Period.

IN speaking of the character of the age of commentators, we noticed principally the ingenious servility which it displays;—the acuteness with which it finds ground for speculation in the expression of other men’s thoughts;—the want of all vigor and fertility in acquiring any real and new truths. Such was the character of the reasoners of the stationary period from the first; but, at a later day, this character, from various causes, was modified by new features. The servility which had yielded itself to the yoke, insisted upon forcing it on the necks of others: the subtlety which found all the truth it needed in certain accredited writings, resolved that no one should find there, or in any other region, any other truths; speculative men became tyrants without ceasing to be slaves; to their character of Commentators they added that of Dogmatists.

1. Origin of the Scholastic Philosophy.—The causes of this change have been very happily analyzed and described by several modern writers.[62] The general nature of the process may be briefly stated to have been the following.

[62] Dr. Hampden, in the Life of Thomas Aquinas, in the Encyc. Metrop. Degerando, Hist. Comparée, vol. iv. Also Tennemann, Hist. of Phil. vol. viii. Introduction.

The tendencies of the later times of the Roman empire to a commenting literature, and a second-hand philosophy, have already been noticed. The loss of the dignity of political freedom, the want of the cheerfulness of advancing prosperity, and the substitution of the less philosophical structure of the Latin language for the delicate intellectual mechanism of the Greek, fixed and augmented the prevalent feebleness and barrenness of intellect. Men forgot, or feared, to consult nature, to seek for new truths, to do what the great discoverers of other times had done; they were content to consult libraries, to study and defend old opinions, to talk of what great geniuses had said. They sought their philosophy in accredited treatises, and dared not question such doctrines as they there found.

The character of the philosophy to which they were thus led, was determined by this want of courage and originality. There are various [229] antagonist principles of opinion, which seem alike to have their root in the intellectual constitution of man, and which are maintained and developed by opposing sects, when the intellect is in vigorous action. Such principles are, for instance,—the claims of Authority and of Reason to our assent;—the source of our knowledge in Experience or in Ideas;—the superiority of a Mystical or of a Skeptical turn of thought. Such oppositions of doctrine were found in writers of the greatest fame; and two of those, who most occupied the attention of students, Plato and Aristotle, were, on several points of this nature, very diverse from each other in their tendency. The attempt to reconcile these philosophers by Boëthius and others, we have [already] noticed; and the attempt was so far successful, that it left on men’s minds the belief in the possibility of a great philosophical system which should be based on both these writers, and have a claim to the assent of all sober speculators.

But, in the mean time, the Christian Religion had become the leading subject of men’s thoughts; and divines had put forward its claims to be, not merely the guide of men’s lives, and the means of reconciling them to their heavenly Master, but also to be a Philosophy in the widest sense in which the term had been used;—a consistent speculative view of man’s condition and nature, and of the world in which he is placed.

These claims had been acknowledged; and, unfortunately, from the intellectual condition of the times, with no due apprehension of the necessary ministry of Observation, and Reason dealing with observation, by which alone such a system can be embodied. It was held without any regulating principle, that the philosophy which had been bequeathed to the world by the great geniuses of heathen antiquity, and the Philosophy which was deduced from, and implied by, the Revelations made by God to man, must be identical; and, therefore, that Theology is the only true philosophy. Indeed, the Neoplatonists had already arrived, by other roads, at the same conviction. John Scot Erigena, in the reign of Alfred, and consequently before the existence of the Scholastic Philosophy, properly so called, had reasserted this doctrine.[63] Anselm, in the eleventh century, again brought it forward;[64] and Bernard de Chartres, in the thirteenth.[65]

[63] Deg. iv. 351.

[64] Ib. iv. 388.

[65] Ib. iv. 418.

This view was confirmed by the opinion which prevailed, concerning the nature of philosophical truth; a view supported by the theory [230] of Plato, the practice of Aristotle, and the general propensities of the human mind: I mean the opinion that all science may be obtained by the use of reasoning alone;—that by analysing and combining the notions which common language brings before us, we may learn all that we can know. Thus Logic came to include the whole of Science; and accordingly this Abelard expressly maintained.[66] I have [already] explained, in some measure, the fallacy of this belief, which consists, as has been well said,[67] “in mistaking the universality of the theory of language for the generalization of facts.” But on all accounts this opinion is readily accepted; and it led at once to the conclusion, that the Theological Philosophy which we have described, is complete as well as true.

[66] Deg. iv. 407.

[67] Enc. Met. 807.

Thus a Universal Science was established, with the authority of a Religious Creed. Its universality rested on erroneous views of the relation of words and truths; its pretensions as a science were admitted by the servile temper of men’s intellects; and its religious authority was assigned it, by making all truth part of religion. And as Religion claimed assent within her own jurisdiction under the most solemn and imperative sanctions, Philosophy shared in her imperial power, and dissent from their doctrines was no longer blameless or allowable. Error became wicked, dissent became heresy; to reject the received human doctrines, was nearly the same as to doubt the Divine declarations. The Scholastic Philosophy claimed the assent of all believers.

The external form, the details, and the text of this philosophy, were taken, in a great measure, from Aristotle; though, in the spirit, the general notions, and the style of interpretation, Plato and the Platonists had no inconsiderable share. Various causes contributed to the elevation of Aristotle to this distinction. His Logic had early been adopted as an instrument of theological disputation; and his spirit of systematization, of subtle distinction, and of analysis of words, as well as his disposition to argumentation, afforded the most natural and grateful employment to the commentating propensities. Those principles which we before noted as the leading points of his physical philosophy, were selected and adopted; and these, presented in a most technical form, and applied in a systematic manner, constitute a large portion of the philosophy of which we now speak, so far as it pretends to deal with physics.

2. Scholastic Dogmas.—But before the complete ascendancy of Aristotle was thus established, when something of an intellectual waking [231] took place after the darkness and sleep of the ninth and tenth centuries, the Platonic doctrines seem to have had, at first, a strong attraction for men’s minds, as better falling in with the mystical speculations and contemplative piety which belonged to the times. John Scot Erigena[68] may be looked upon as the reviver of the New Platonism in the tenth century. Towards the end of the eleventh, Peter Damien,[69] in Italy, reproduced, involved in a theological discussion, some Neoplatonic ideas. Godefroy[70] also, censor of St. Victor, has left a treatise, entitled Microcosmus; this is founded on a mystical analogy, often afterwards again brought forward, between Man and the Universe. “Philosophers and theologians,” says the writer, “agree in considering man as a little world; and as the world is composed of four elements, man is endowed with four faculties, the senses, the imagination, reason, and understanding.” Bernard of Chartres,[71] in his Megascosmus and Microcosmus, took up the same notions. Hugo, abbot of St. Victor, made a contemplative life the main point and crown of his philosophy; and is said to have been the first of the scholastic writers who made psychology his special study.[72] He says the faculties of the mind are “the senses, the imagination, the reason, the memory, the understanding, and the intelligence.”

[68] Deg. iv. 35.

[69] Ib. iv. 367.

[70] Ib. iv. 413.

[71] Ib. iv. 419.

[72] Ib. iv. 415.

Physics does not originally and properly form any prominent part of the Scholastic Philosophy, which consists mainly of a series of questions and determinations upon the various points of a certain technical divinity. Of this kind is the Book of Sentences of Peter the Lombard (bishop of Paris), who is, on that account, usually called “Magister Sententiarum;” a work which was published in the twelfth century, and was long the text and standard of such discussions. The questions are decided by the authority of Scripture and of the Fathers of the Church, and are divided into four Books, of which the first contains questions concerning God and the doctrine of the Trinity in particular; the second is concerning the Creation; the third, concerning Christ and the Christian Religion; and the fourth treats of Religious and Moral Duties. In the second book, as in many of the writers of this time, the nature of Angels is considered in detail, and the Orders of their Hierarchy, of which there were held to be nine. The physical discussions enter only as bearing upon the scriptural history of the creation, and cannot be taken as a specimen of the work; but I may observe, that in speaking of the division of the waters above the [232] firmament, he gives one opinion, that of Bede, that the former waters are the solid crystalline heavens in which the stars are fixed,[73] “for crystal, which is so hard and transparent, is made of water.” But he mentions also the opinion of St. Augustine, that the waters above the heavens are in a state of vapor, (vaporaliter) and in minute drops; “if, then, water can, as we see in clouds, be so minutely divided that it may be thus supported as vapor on air, which is naturally lighter than water; why may we not believe that it floats above that lighter celestial element in still minuter drops and still lighter vapors? But in whatever manner the waters are there, we do not doubt that they are there.”

[73] Lib. ii. Distinct. xiv. De opere secundæ diei.

The celebrated Summa Theologicæ of Thomas Aquinas is a work of the same kind; and anything which has a physical bearing forms an equally small part of it. Thus, of the 512 Questions of the Summa, there is only one (Part I., Quest. 115), “on Corporeal Action,” or on any part of the material world; though there are several concerning the celestial Hierarchies, as “on the Act of Angels,” “on the Speaking of Angels,” “on the Subordination of Angels,” “on Guardian Angels,” and the like. This, of course, would not be remarkable in a treatise on Theology, except this Theology were intended to constitute the whole of Philosophy.

We may observe, that in this work, though Plato, Avecibron, and many other heathen as well as Christian philosophers, are adduced as authority, Aristotle is referred to in a peculiar manner as “the philosopher.” This is noticed by John of Salisbury, as attracting attention in his time (he died a.d. 1182). “The various Masters of Dialectic,” says he,[74] “shine each with his peculiar merit; but all are proud to worship the footsteps of Aristotle; so much so, indeed, that the name of philosopher, which belongs to them all, has been pre-eminently appropriated to him. He is called the philosopher autonomatice, that is, by excellence.”

[74] Metalogicus, lib. ii. cap. 16.

The Question concerning Corporeal Action, in Aquinas, is divided into six Articles; and the conclusion delivered upon the first is,[75] that “Body being compounded of power and act, is active as well as passive.” Against this it is urged, that quantity is an attribute of body, and that quantity prevents action; that this appears in fact, since a larger body is more difficult to move. The author replies, that [233] “quantity does not prevent corporeal form from action altogether, but prevents it from being a universal agent, inasmuch as the form is individualized, which, in matter subject to quantity, it is. Moreover, the illustration deduced from the ponderousness of bodies is not to the purpose; first, because the addition of quantity is not the cause of gravity, as is proved in the fourth book, De Cœlo and De Mundo” (we see that he quotes familiarly the physical treatises of Aristotle); “second, because it is false that ponderousness makes motion slower; on the contrary, in proportion as any thing is heavier, the more does it move with its proper motion; thirdly, because action does not take place by local motion, as Democritus asserted; but by this, that something is drawn from power into act.”

[75] Summa, P. i. Q. 115. Art. 1.

It does not belong to our purpose to consider either the theological or the metaphysical doctrines which form so large a portion of the treatises of the schoolmen. Perhaps it may hereafter appear, that some light is thrown on some of the questions which have occupied metaphysicians in all ages, by that examination of the history of the Progressive Sciences in which we are now engaged; but till we are able to analyze the leading controversies of this kind, it would be of little service to speak of them in detail. It may be noticed, however, that many of the most prominent of them refer to the great question, “What is the relation between actual things and general terms?” Perhaps in modern times, the actual things would be more commonly taken as the point to start from; and men would begin by considering how classes and universals are obtained from individuals. But the schoolmen, founding their speculations on the received modes of considering such subjects, to which both Aristotle and Plato had contributed, travelled in the opposite direction, and endeavored to discover how individuals were deduced from genera and species;—what was “the Principle of Individuation.” This was variously stated by different reasoners. Thus Bonaventura[76] solves the difficulty by the aid of the Aristotelian distinction of Matter and Form. The individual derives from the Form the property of being something, and from the Matter the property of being that particular thing. Duns Scotus,[77] the great adversary of Thomas Aquinas in theology, placed the principle of Individuation in “a certain determining positive entity,” which his school called Hæcceity or thisness. “Thus an individual man is Peter, because his humanity is combined with Petreity.” The force [234] of abstract terms is a curious question, and some remarkable experiments in their use had been made by the Latin Aristotelians before this time. In the same way in which we talk of the quantity and quality of a thing, they spoke of its quiddity.[78]

[76] Deg. iv. 573.

[77] Ib. iv. 523.

[78] Deg. iv. 494.

We may consider the reign of mere disputation as fully established at the time of which we are now speaking; and the only kind of philosophy henceforth studied was one in which no sound physical science had or could have a place. The wavering abstractions, indistinct generalizations, and loose classifications of common language, which we have already noted as the fountain of the physics of the Greek Schools of philosophy, were also the only source from which the Schoolmen of the middle ages drew their views, or rather their arguments: and though these notional and verbal relations were invested with a most complex and pedantic technicality, they did not, on that account, become at all more precise as notions, or more likely to lead to a single real truth. Instead of acquiring distinct ideas, they multiplied abstract terms; instead of real generalizations, they had recourse to verbal distinctions. The whole course of their employments tended to make them, not only ignorant of physical truth, but incapable of conceiving its nature.

Having thus taken upon themselves the task of raising and discussing questions by means of abstract terms, verbal distinctions, and logical rules alone, there was no tendency in their activity to come to an end, as there was no progress. The same questions, the same answers, the same difficulties, the same solutions, the same verbal subtleties,—sought for, admired, cavilled at, abandoned, reproduced, and again admired,—might recur without limit. John of Salisbury[79] observes of the Parisian teachers, that, after several years’ absence, he found them not a step advanced, and still employed in urging and parrying the same arguments; and this, as Mr. Hallam remarks,[80] “was equally applicable to the period of centuries.” The same knots were tied and [235] untied; the same clouds were formed and dissipated. The poet’s censure of “the Sons of Aristotle,” is just as happily expressed:

They stand
Locked up together hand in hand
Every one leads as he is led,
The same bare path they tread,
And dance like Fairies a fantastic round,
But neither change their motion nor their ground.

[79] He studied logic at Paris, at St. Geneviève, and then left them. “Duodecennium mihi elapsum est diversis studiis occupatum. Jucundum itaque visum est veteres quos reliqueram, et quos adhuc Dialectica detinebat in monte, (Sanctæ Genovefæ) revisere socios, conferre cum eis super ambiguitatibus pristinis; ut nostrûm invicem collatione mutuâ commetiremur profectum. Inventi sunt, qui fuerant, et ubi; neque enim ad palmam visi sunt processisse ad quæstiones pristinis dirimendas, neque propositiunculam unam adjecerant. Quibus urgebant stimulis eisdem et ipsi urgebantur,” &c. Metalogicus, lib. ii. cap. 10.

[80] Middle Ages, iii. 537.

It will therefore be unnecessary to go into any detail respecting the history of the School Philosophy of the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth centuries. We may suppose it to have been, during the intermediate time, such as it was at first and at last. An occasion to consider its later days will be brought before us by the course of our subject. But, even during the most entire ascendency of the scholastic doctrines, the elements of change were at work. While the doctors and the philosophers received all the ostensible homage of men, a doctrine and a philosophy of another kind were gradually forming: the practical instincts of man, their impatience of tyranny, the progress of the useful arts, the promises of alchemy, were all disposing men to reject the authority and deny the pretensions of the received philosophical creed. Two antagonist forms of opinion were in existence, which for some time went on detached, and almost independent of each other; but, finally, these came into conflict, at the time of Galileo; and the war speedily extended to every part of civilized Europe.

3. Scholastic Physics.—It is difficult to give briefly any appropriate examples of the nature of the Aristotelian physics which are to be found in the works of this time. As the gravity of bodies was one of the first subjects of dispute when the struggle of the rival methods began, we may notice the mode in which it was treated.[81] “Zabarella maintains that the proximate cause of the motion of elements is the form, in the Aristotelian sense of the term: but to this sentence we,” says Keckerman, “cannot agree; for in all other things the form is the proximate cause, not of the act, but of the power or faculty from which the act flows. Thus in man, the rational soul is not the cause of the act of laughing, but of the risible faculty or power.” Keckerman’s system was at one time a work of considerable authority: it was published in 1614. By comparing and systematizing what he finds in Aristotle, he is led to state his results in the form of definitions [236] and theorems. Thus, “gravity is a motive quality, arising from cold, density, and bulk, by which the elements are carried downwards.” “Water is the lower, intermediate element, cold and moist.” The first theorem concerning water is, “The moistness of the water is controlled by its coldness, so that it is less than the moistness of the air; though, according to the sense of the vulgar, water appears to moisten more than air.” It is obvious that the two properties of fluids, to have their parts easily moved, and to wet other bodies, are here confounded. I may, as a concluding specimen of this kind, mention those propositions or maxims concerning fluids, which were so firmly established, that, when Boyle propounded the true mechanical principles of fluid action, he was obliged to state his opinions as “hydrostatical paradoxes.” These were,—that fluids do not gravitate in proprio loco; that is, that water has no gravity in or on water, since it is in its own place;—that air has no gravity on water, since it is above water, which is its proper place;—that earth in water tends to descend, since its place is below water;—that the water rises in a pump or siphon, because nature abhors a vacuum;—that some bodies have a positive levity in others, as oil in water; and the like.

[81] Keckerman, p. 1428.

4. Authority of Aristotle among the Schoolmen.—The authority of Aristotle, and the practice of making him the text and basis of the system, especially as it regarded physics, prevailed during the period of which we speak. This authority was not, however, without its fluctuations. Launoy has traced one part of its history in a book On the various Fortune of Aristotle in the University of Paris. The most material turns of this fortune depend on the bearing which the works of Aristotle were supposed to have upon theology. Several of Aristotle’s works, and more especially his metaphysical writings, had been translated into Latin, and were explained in the schools of the University of Paris, as early as the beginning of the thirteenth century.[82] At a council held at Paris in 1209, they were prohibited, as having given occasion to the heresy of Almeric (or Amauri), and because “they might give occasion to other heresies not yet invented.” The Logic of Aristotle recovered its credit some years after this, and was publicly taught in the University of Paris in the year 1215; but the Natural Philosophy and Metaphysics were prohibited by a decree of Gregory the Ninth, in 1231. The Emperor Frederic the Second employed a number of learned men to translate into Latin, from the Greek and [237] Arabic, certain books of Aristotle, and of other ancient sages; and we have a letter of Peter de Vineis, in which they are recommended to the attention of the University of Bologna: probably the same recommendation was addressed to other Universities. Both Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas wrote commentaries on Aristotle’s works; and as this was done soon after the decree of Gregory the Ninth, Launoy is much perplexed to reconcile the fact with the orthodoxy of the two doctors. Campanella, who was one of the first to cast off the authority of Aristotle, says, “We are by no means to think that St. Thomas aristotelized; he only expounded Aristotle, that he might correct his errors; and I should conceive he did this with the license of the Pope.” This statement, however, by no means gives a just view of the nature of Albertus’s and Aquinas’s commentaries. Both have followed their author with profound deference.[83] For instance, Aquinas[84] attempts to defend Aristotle’s assertion, that if there were no resistance, a body would move through a space in no time; and the same defence is given by Scotus.

[82] Mosheim, iii. 157.

[83] Deg. N. 475.

[84] F. Piccolomini, ii. 835.

We may imagine the extent of authority and admiration which Aristotle would attain, when thus countenanced, both by the powerful and the learned. In universities, no degree could be taken without a knowledge of the philosopher. In 1452, Cardinal Totaril established this rule in the University of Paris.[85] When Ramus, in 1543, published an attack upon Aristotle, it was repelled by the power of the court, and the severity of the law. Francis the First published an edict, in which he states that he had appointed certain judges, who had been of opinion,[86] “que le dit Ramus avoit été téméraire, arrogant et impudent; et que parcequ’en son livre des animadversions il reprenait Aristotle, estait évidemment connue et manifeste son ignorance.” The books are then declared to be suppressed. It was often a complaint of pious men, that theology was corrupted by the influence of Aristotle and his commentators. Petrarch says,[87] that one of the Italian learned men conversing with him, after expressing much contempt for the apostles and fathers, exclaimed, “Utinam tu Averroen pati posses, ut videres quanto ille tuis his nugatoribus major sit!”

[85] Launoy, pp. 108, 128.

[86] Launoy, p. 132.

[87] Hallam, M. A. iii. 536.

When the revival of letters began to take place, and a number of men of ardent and elegant minds, susceptible to the impressions of beauty of style and dignity of thought, were brought into contact with Greek literature, Plato had naturally greater charms for them. A [238] powerful school of Platonists (not Neoplatonists) was formed in Italy, including some of the principal scholars and men of genius of the time; as Picus of Mirandula in the middle, Marsilius Ficinus at the end, of the fifteenth century. At one time, it appeared as if the ascendency of Aristotle was about to be overturned; but, in physics at least, his authority passed unshaken through this trial. It was not by disputation that Aristotle could be overthrown; and the Platonists were not persons whose doctrines led them to use the only decisive method in such cases, the observation and unfettered interpretation of facts.

The history of their controversies, therefore, does not belong to our design. For like reasons we do not here speak of other authors, who opposed the scholastic philosophy on general theoretical grounds of various kinds. Such examples of insurrection against the dogmatism which we have been reviewing, are extremely interesting events in the history of the philosophy of science. But, in the present work, we are to confine ourselves to the history of science itself; in the hope that we may thus be able, hereafter, to throw a steadier light upon that philosophy by which the succession of stationary and progressive periods, which we are here tracing, may be in some measure explained. We are now to close our account of the stationary period, and to enter upon the great subject of the progress of physical science in modern times.

5. Subjects omitted. Civil Law, Medicine.—My object has been to make my way, as rapidly as possible, to this period of progress; and in doing this, I have had to pass over a long and barren track, where almost all traces of the right road disappear. In exploring this region, it is not without some difficulty that he who is travelling with objects such as mine, continues a steady progress in the proper direction; for many curious and attractive subjects of research come in his way: he crosses the track of many a controversy, which in its time divided the world of speculators, and of which the results may be traced, even now, in the conduct of moral, or political, or metaphysical discussions; or in the common associations of thought, and forms of language. The wars of the Nominalists and Realists; the disputes concerning the foundations of morals, and the motives of human actions; the controversies concerning predestination, free will, grace, and the many other points of metaphysical divinity; the influence of theology and metaphysics upon each other, and upon other subjects of human curiosity; the effects of opinion upon politics, and of political condition upon opinion; the influence of literature and philosophy [239] upon each other, and upon society; and many other subjects;—might be well worth examination, if our hope of success did not reside in pursuing, steadily and directly, those inquiries in which we can look for a definite and certain reply. We must even neglect two of the leading studies of those times, which occupied much of men’s time and thoughts, and had a very great influence on society; the one dealing with Notions, the other with Things; the one employed about moral rules, the other about material causes, but both for practical ends; I mean, the study of the Civil Law, and of Medicine. The second of these studies will hereafter come before us, as one of the principal occasions which led to the cultivation of chemistry; but, in itself, its progress is of too complex and indefinite a nature to be advantageously compared with that of the more exact sciences. The Roman Law is held, by its admirers, to be a system of deductive science, as exact as the mathematical sciences themselves; and it may, therefore, be useful to consider it, if we should, in the sequel, have to examine how far there can exist an analogy between moral and physical science. But, after a few more words on the middle ages, we must return to our task of tracing the progress of the latter.

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CHAPTER V.
Progress of the Arts in the Middle Ages.

ART and Science.—I shall, before I resume the history of science, say a few words on the subject described in the title of this chapter, both because I might otherwise be accused of doing injustice to the period now treated of; and also, because we shall by this means bring under our notice some circumstances which were important as being the harbingers of the revival of progressive knowledge.

The accusation of injustice towards the state of science in the middle ages, if we were to terminate our survey of them with what has hitherto been said, might be urged from obvious topics. How do we recognize, it might be asked, in a picture of mere confusion and mysticism of thought, of servility and dogmatism of character, the powers and acquirements to which we owe so many of the most important inventions which we now enjoy? Parchment and paper, printing and engraving, improved glass and steel, gunpowder, clocks, telescopes, [240] the mariner’s compass, the reformed calendar, the decimal notation, algebra, trigonometry, chemistry, counterpoint, an invention equivalent to a new creation of music;—these are all possessions which we inherit from that which has been so disparagingly termed the Stationary Period. Above all, let us look at the monuments of architecture of this period;—the admiration and the despair of modern architects, not only for their beauty, but for the skill disclosed in their construction. With all these evidences before us, how can we avoid allowing that the masters of the middle ages not only made some small progress in Astronomy, which has, grudgingly as it would seem, been admitted in a former Book; but also that they were no small proficients in other sciences, in Optics, in Harmonics, in Physics, and, above all, in Mechanics?

If, it may be added, we are allowed, in the present day, to refer to the perfection of our arts as evidence of the advanced state of our physical philosophy;—if our steam-engines, our gas-illumination, our buildings, our navigation, our manufactures, are cited as triumphs of science;—shall not prior inventions, made under far heavier disadvantages,—shall not greater works, produced in an earlier state of knowledge, also be admitted as witnesses that the middle ages had their share, and that not a small or doubtful one, of science?

To these questions I answer, by distinguishing between Art, and Science in that sense of general Inductive Systematic Truth, which it bears in this work. To separate and compare, with precision, these two processes, belongs to the Philosophy of Induction; and the attempt must be reserved for another place: but the leading differences are sufficiently obvious. Art is practical, Science is speculative: the former is seen in doing; the latter rests in the contemplation of what is known. The Art of the builder appears in his edifice, though he may never have meditated on the abstract propositions on which its stability and strength depends. The Science of the mathematical mechanician consists in his seeing that, under certain conditions, bodies must sustain each other’s pressure, though he may never have applied his knowledge in a single case.

Now the remark which I have to make is this:—in all cases the Arts are prior to the related Sciences. Art is the parent, not the progeny, of Science; the realization of principles in practice forms part of the prelude, as well as of the sequel, of theoretical discovery. And thus the inventions of the middle ages, which have been above enumerated, though at the present day they may be portions of our sciences, are no evidence that the sciences then existed; but only that [241] those powers of practical observation and practical skill were at work, which prepare the way for theoretical views and scientific discoveries.

It may be urged, that the great works of art do virtually take for granted principles of science; and that, therefore, it is unreasonable to deny science to great artists. It may be said, that the grand structures of Cologne, or Amiens, or Canterbury, could not have been erected without a profound knowledge of mechanical principles.

To this we reply, that such knowledge is manifestly not of the nature of that which we call science. If the beautiful and skilful structures of the middle ages prove that mechanics then existed as a science, mechanics must have existed as a science also among the builders of the Cyclopean walls of Greece and Italy, or of our own Stonehenge; for the masses which are there piled on each other, could not be raised without considerable mechanical skill. But we may go much further. The actions of every man who raises and balances weights, or walks along a pole, take for granted the laws of equilibrium; and even animals constantly avail themselves of such principles. Are these, then, acquainted with mechanics as a science? Again, if actions which are performed by taking advantage of mechanical properties prove a knowledge of the science of mechanics, they must also be allowed to prove a knowledge of the science of geometry, when they proceed on geometrical properties. But the most familiar actions of men and animals proceed upon geometrical truths. The Epicureans held, as Proclus informs us, that even asses knew that two sides of a triangle are greater than the third. And animals may truly be said to have a practical knowledge of this truth; but they have not, therefore, a science of geometry. And in like manner among men, if we consider the matter strictly, a practical assumption of a principle does not imply a speculative knowledge of it.

We may, in another way also, show how inadmissible are the works of the Master Artists of the middle ages into the series of events which mark the advance of Science. The following maxim is applicable to a history, such as we are here endeavoring to write. We are employed in tracing the progress of such general principles as constitute each of the sciences which we are reviewing; and no facts or subordinate truths belong to our scheme, except so far as they tend to or are included in these higher principles; nor are they important to us, any further than as they prove such principles. Now with regard to processes of art like those which we have referred to, namely, the inventions of the middle ages, let us ask, what principle each of them [242] illustrates? What chemical doctrine rests for its support on the phenomena of gunpowder, or glass, or steel? What new harmonical truth was illustrated in the Gregorian chant? What mechanical principle unknown to Archimedes was displayed in the printing-press? The practical value and use, the ingenuity and skill of these inventions is not questioned; but what is their place in the history of speculative knowledge? Even in those cases in which they enter into such a history, how minute a figure do they make! how great is the contrast between their practical and theoretical importance! They may in their operation have changed the face of the world; but in the history of the principles of the sciences to which they belong, they may be omitted without being missed.

As to that part of the objection which was stated by asking, why, if the arts of our age prove its scientific eminence, the arts of the middle ages should not be received as proof of theirs; we must reply to it, by giving up some of the pretensions which are often put forwards on behalf of the science of our times. The perfection of the mechanical and other arts among us proves the advanced condition of our sciences, only in so far as these arts have been perfected by the application of some great scientific truth, with a clear insight into its nature. The greatest improvement of the steam-engine was due to the steady apprehension of an atmological doctrine by Watt; but what distinct theoretical principle is illustrated by the beautiful manufactures of porcelain, or steel, or glass? A chemical view of these compounds, which would explain the conditions of success and failure in their manufacture, would be of great value in art; and it would also be a novelty in chemical theory; so little is the present condition of those processes a triumph of science, shedding intellectual glory on our age. And the same might be said of many, or of most, of the processes of the arts as now practised.

2. Arabian Science.—Having, I trust, established the view I have stated, respecting the relation of Art and Science, we shall be able very rapidly to dispose of a number of subjects which otherwise might seem to require a detailed notice. Though this distinction has been recognized by others, it has hardly been rigorously adhered to, in consequence of the indistinct notion of science which has commonly prevailed. Thus Gibbon, in speaking of the knowledge of the period now under our notice, says,[88] “Much useful experience had been acquired in [243] the practice of arts and manufactures; but the science of chemistry owes its origin and improvement to the industry of the Saracens. They,” he adds, “first invented and named the alembic for the purposes of distillation, analyzed the substances of the three kingdoms of nature, tried the distinction and affinities of alkalies and acids, and converted the poisonous minerals into soft and salutary medicines.” The formation and realization of the notions of analysis and of affinity, were important steps in chemical science, which, as I shall hereafter endeavor to show, it remained for the chemists of Europe to make at a much later period. If the Arabians had done this, they might with justice have been called the authors of the science of chemistry; but no doctrines can be adduced from their works which give them any title to this eminent distinction. Their claims are dissipated at once by the application of the maxim above stated. What analysis of theirs tended to establish any received principle of chemistry? What true doctrine concerning the differences and affinities of acids and alkalies did they teach? We need not wonder if Gibbon, whose views of the boundaries of scientific chemistry were probably very wide and indistinct, could include the arts of the Arabians within its domain; but they cannot pass the frontier of science if philosophically defined, and steadily guarded.

[88] Decline and Fall, vol. x. p. 43.

The judgment which we are thus led to form respecting the chemical knowledge of the middle ages, and of the Arabians in particular, may serve to measure the condition of science in other departments; for chemistry has justly been considered one of their strongest points. In botany, anatomy, zoology, optics, acoustics, we have still the same observations to make, that the steps in science which, in the order of progress, next followed what the Greeks had done, were left for the Europeans of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The merits and advances of the Arabian philosophers in astronomy and pure mathematics, we have already described.

3. Experimental Philosophy of the Arabians.—The estimate to which we have thus been led, of the scientific merits of the learned men of the middle ages, is much less exalted than that which has been formed by many writers; and, among the rest, by some of our own time. But I am persuaded that any attempt to answer the questions just asked, will expose the untenable nature of the higher claims which have been advanced in favor of the Arabians. We can deliver no just decision, except we will consent to use the terms of science in a strict and precise sense: and if we do this, we shall find little, either in the [244] particular discoveries or general processes of the Arabians, which is important in the history of the Inductive Sciences.[89]

[89] If I might take the liberty of criticising an author who has given a very interesting view of the period in question (Mahometanism Unveiled, by the Rev. Charles Forster, 1829), I would remark, that in his work this caution is perhaps too little observed. Thus, he says, in speaking of Alhazen (vol. ii. p. 270), “the theory of the telescope may be found in the work of this astronomer;” and of another, “the uses of magnifying glasses and telescopes, and the principle of their construction, are explained in the Great Work of (Roger) Bacon, with a truth and clearness which have commanded universal admiration.” Such phrases would be much too strong, even if used respecting the optical doctrines of Kepler, which were yet incomparably more true and clear than those of Bacon. To employ such language, in such cases, is to deprive such terms as theory and principle of all meaning.

The credit due to the Arabians for improvements in the general methods of philosophizing, is a more difficult question; and cannot be discussed at length by us, till we examine the history of such methods in the abstract, which, in the present work, it is not our intention to do. But we may observe, that we cannot agree with those who rank their merits high in this respect. We have already seen, that their minds were completely devoured by the worst habits of the stationary period,—Mysticism and Commentation. They followed their Greek leaders, for the most part, with abject servility, and with only that kind of acuteness and independent speculation which the Commentator’s vocation implies. And in their choice of the standard subjects of their studies, they fixed upon those works, the Physical Books of Aristotle, which have never promoted the progress of science, except in so far as they incited men to refute them; an effect which they never produced on the Arabians. That the Arabian astronomers made some advances beyond the Greeks, we have already stated: the two great instances are, the discovery of the Motion of the Sun’s Apogee by Albategnius, and the discovery (recently brought to light) of the existence of the Moon’s Second Inequality, by Aboul Wefa. But we cannot but observe in how different a manner they treated these discoveries, from that with which Hipparchus or Ptolemy would have done. The Variation of the Moon, in particular, instead of being incorporated into the system by means of an Epicycle, as Ptolemy had done with the Evection, was allowed, almost immediately, so far as we can judge, to fall into neglect and oblivion: so little were the learned Arabians prepared to take their lessons from observation as well as from books. That in many subjects they made experiments, may easily be allowed: there never was a period of the earth’s history, and least of all a period of commerce [245] and manufactures, luxury and art, medicine and engineering, in which there were not going on innumerable processes, which may be termed Experiments; and, in addition to these, the Arabians adopted the pursuit of alchemy, and the love of exotic plants and animals. But so far from their being, as has been maintained,[90] a people whose “experimental intellect” fitted them to form sciences which the “abstract intellect” of the Greeks failed in producing, it rather appears, that several of the sciences which the Greeks had founded, were never even comprehended by the Arabians. I do not know any evidence that these pupils ever attained to understand the real principles of Mechanics, Hydrostatics, and Harmonics, which their masters had established. At any rate, when these sciences again became progressive, Europe had to start where Europe had stopped. There is no Arabian name which any one has thought of interposing between Archimedes the ancient, and Stevinus and Galileo the moderns.

[90] Mahometanism Unveiled, ii. 271.

4. Roger Bacon.—There is one writer of the middle ages, on whom much stress has been laid, and who was certainly a most remarkable person. Roger Bacon’s works are not only so far beyond his age in the knowledge which they contain, but so different from the temper of the times, in his assertion of the supremacy of experiment, and in his contemplation of the future progress of knowledge, that it is difficult to conceive how such a character could then exist. That he received much of his knowledge from Arabic writers, there can be no doubt; for they were in his time the repositories of all traditionary knowledge. But that he derived from them his disposition to shake off the authority of Aristotle, to maintain the importance of experiment, and to look upon knowledge as in its infancy, I cannot believe, because I have not myself hit upon, nor seen quoted by others, any passages in which Arabian writers express such a disposition. On the other hand, we do find in European writers, in the authors of Greece and Rome, the solid sense, the bold and hopeful spirit, which suggest such tendencies. We have already seen that Aristotle asserts, as distinctly as words can express, that all knowledge must depend on observation, and that science must be collected from facts by induction. We have seen, too, that the Roman writers, and Seneca in particular, speak with an enthusiastic confidence of the progress which science must make in the course of ages. When Roger Bacon holds similar language in the thirteenth century, the resemblance is probably rather a sympathy of character, than a matter of direct derivation; but I know of nothing [246] which proves even so much as this sympathy in the case of Arabian philosophers.

A good deal has been said of late of the coincidences between his views, and those of his great namesake in later times, Francis Bacon.[91] The resemblances consist mainly in such points as I have just noticed; and we cannot but acknowledge, that many of the expressions of the Franciscan Friar remind us of the large thoughts and lofty phrases of the Philosophical Chancellor. How far the one can be considered as having anticipated the method of the other, we shall examine more advantageously, when we come to consider what the character and effect of Francis Bacon’s works really are.[92]

[91] Hallam’s Middle Ages, iii. 549. Forster’s Mahom. U. ii. 313.

[92] In the Philosophy of the Inductive Sciences, I have given an account at considerable length of Roger Bacon’s mode of treating Arts and Sciences; and have also compared more fully his philosophy with that of Francis Bacon; and I have given a view of the bearing of this latter upon the progress of Science in modern times. See Phil. Ind. Sc. book xii. chaps. 7 and 11. See also the [Appendix] to this volume.

5. Architecture of the Middle Ages.—But though we are thus compelled to disallow several of the claims which have been put forwards in support of the scientific character of the middle ages, there are two points in which we may, I conceive, really trace the progress of scientific ideas among them; and which, therefore, may be considered as the prelude to the period of discovery. I mean their practical architecture, and their architectural treatises.

In a previous [chapter] of this book, we have endeavored to explain how the indistinctness of ideas, which attended the decline of the Roman empire, appears in the forms of their architecture;—in the disregard, which the decorative construction exhibits, of the necessary mechanical conditions of support. The original scheme of Greek ornamental architecture had been horizontal masses resting on vertical columns: when the arch was introduced by the Romans, it was concealed, or kept in a state of subordination: and the lateral support which it required was supplied latently, marked by some artifice. But the struggle between the mechanical and the decorative construction[93] ended in the complete disorganization of the classical style. The [247] inconsistencies and extravagances of which we have noticed the occurrence, were results and indications of the fall of good architecture. The elements of the ancient system had lost all principle of connection and regard to rule. Building became not only a mere art, but an art exercised by masters without skill, and without feeling for real beauty.

[93] See Mr. Willis’s admirable Remarks on the Architecture of the Middle Ages, chap. ii.
Since the publication of my first edition, Mr. Willis has shown that much of the “mason-craft” of the middle ages consisted in the geometrical methods by which the artists wrought out of the blocks the complex forms of their decorative system.
To the general indistinctness of speculative notions on mechanical subjects prevalent in the middle ages, there may have been some exceptions, and especially so long as there were readers of Archimedes. Boëthius had translated the mechanical works of Archimedes into Latin, as we learn from the enumeration of his works by his friend Cassiodorus (Variar. lib i. cap. 45), “Mechanicum etiam Archimedem latialem siculis reddidisti.” But Mechanicus was used in those times rather for one skilled in the art of constructing wonderful machines than in the speculative theory of them. The letter from which the quotation is taken is sent by King Theodoric to Boëthius, to urge him to send the king a water-clock.

When, after this deep decline, architecture rose again, as it did in the twelfth and succeeding centuries, in the exquisitely beautiful and skilful forms of the Gothic style, what was the nature of the change which had taken place, so far as it bears upon the progress of science? It was this:—the idea of true mechanical relations in an edifice had been revived in men’s minds, as far as was requisite for the purposes of art and beauty: and this, though a very different thing from the possession of the idea as an element of speculative science, was the proper preparation for that acquisition. The notion of support and stability again became conspicuous in the decorative construction, and universal in the forms of building. The eye which, looking for beauty in definite and significant relations of parts, is never satisfied except the weights appear to be duly supported,[94] was again gratified. Architecture threw off its barbarous characters: a new decorative construction was matured, not thwarting and controlling, but assisting and harmonizing with the mechanical construction. All the ornamental parts were made to enter into the apparent construction. Every member, almost every moulding, became a sustainer of weight; and by the multiplicity of props assisting each other, and the consequent subdivision of weight, the eye was satisfied of the stability of the structure, notwithstanding the curiously-slender forms of the separate parts. The arch and the vault, no longer trammelled by an incompatible system of decoration, but favoured by more tractable forms, were only limited by the skill of the builders. Everything showed that, practically at least, men possessed and applied, with steadiness and pleasure, the idea of mechanical pressure and support.

[94] Willis, pp. 15–21. I have throughout this description of the formation of the Gothic style availed myself of Mr. Willis’s well-chosen expressions.

The possession of this idea, as a principle of art, led, in the course of time, to its speculative development as the foundation of a science; [248] and thus Architecture prepared the way for Mechanics. But this advance required several centuries. The interval between the admirable cathedrals of Salisbury, Amiens, Cologne, and the mechanical treatises of Stevinus, is not less than three hundred years. During this time, men were advancing towards science; but in the mean time, and perhaps from the very beginning of the time, art had begun to decline. The buildings of the fifteenth century, erected when the principles of mechanical support were just on the verge of being enunciated in general terms, exhibit those principles with a far less impressive simplicity and elegance than those of the thirteenth. We may hereafter inquire whether we find any other examples to countenance the belief, that the formation of Science is commonly accompanied by the decline of Art.

The leading principle of the style of the Gothic edifices was, not merely that the weights were supported, but that they were seen to be so; and that not only the mechanical relations of the larger masses, but of the smaller members also, were displayed. Hence we cannot admit, as an origin or anticipation of the Gothic, a style in which this principle is not manifested. I do not see, in any of the representations of the early Arabic buildings, that distribution of weights to supports, and that mechanical consistency of parts, which would elevate them above the character of barbarous architecture. Their masses are broken into innumerable members, without subordination or meaning, in a manner suggested apparently by caprice and the love of the marvellous. “In the construction of their mosques, it was a favorite artifice of the Arabs to sustain immense and ponderous masses of stone by the support of pillars so slender, that the incumbent weight seemed, as it were, suspended in the air by an invisible hand.”[95] This pleasure in the contemplation of apparent impossibilities is a very general disposition among mankind; but it appears to belong to the infancy, rather than the maturity of intellect. On the other hand, the pleasure in the contemplation of what is clear, the craving for a thorough insight into the reasons of things, which marks the European mind, is the temper which leads to science.

[95] Mahometanism Unveiled, ii. 255.

6. Treatises on Architecture.—No one who has attended to the architecture which prevailed in England, France, and Germany, from the twelfth to the fifteenth century, so far as to comprehend its beauty, harmony, consistency, and uniformity, even in the minutest parts and most obscure relations, can look upon it otherwise than as a [249] remarkably connected and definite artificial system. Nor can we doubt that it was exercised by a class of artists who formed themselves by laborious study and practice, and by communication with each other. There must have been bodies of masters and of scholars, discipline, traditions, precepts of art. How these associated artists diffused themselves over Europe, and whether history enables us to trace them in a distinct form, I shall not here discuss. But the existence of a course of instruction, and of a body of rules of practice, is proved beyond dispute by the great series of European cathedrals and churches, so nearly identical in their general arrangements, and in their particular details. The question then occurs, have these rules and this system of instruction anywhere been committed to writing? Can we, by such evidence, trace the progress of the scientific idea, of which we see the working in these buildings?

We are not to be surprised, if, during the most flourishing and vigorous period of the art of the middle ages, we find none of its precepts in books. Art has, in all ages and countries, been taught and transmitted by practice and verbal tradition, not by writing. It is only in our own times, that the thought occurs as familiar, of committing to books all that we wish to preserve and convey. And, even in our own times, most of the Arts are learned far more by practice, and by intercourse with practitioners, than by reading. Such is the case, not only with Manufactures and Handicrafts, but with the Fine Arts, with Engineering, and even yet, with that art, Building, of which we are now speaking.

We are not, therefore, to wonder, if we have no treatises on Architecture belonging to the great period of the Gothic masters;—or if it appears to have required some other incitement and some other help, besides their own possession of their practical skill, to lead them to shape into a literary form the precepts of the art which they knew so well how to exercise:—or if, when they did write on such subjects, they seem, instead of delivering their own sound practical principles, to satisfy themselves with pursuing some of the frivolous notions and speculations which were then current in the world of letters.

Such appears to be the case. The earliest treatises on Architecture come before us under the form which the commentatorial spirit of the middle ages inspired. They are Translations of Vitruvius, with Annotations. In some of these, particularly that of Cesare Cesariano, published at Como, in 1521, we see, in a very curious manner, how the habit of assuming that, in every department of literature, the ancients [250] must needs be their masters, led these writers to subordinate the members of their own architecture to the precepts of the Roman author. We have Gothic shafts, mouldings, and arrangements, given as parallelisms to others, which profess to represent the Roman style, but which are, in fact, examples of that mixed manner which is called the style of the Cinque cento by the Italians, of the Renaissance by the French, and which is commonly included in our Elizabethan. But in the early architectural works, besides the superstitions and mistaken erudition which thus choked the growth of real architectural doctrines, another of the peculiar elements of the middle ages comes into view;—its mysticism. The dimensions and positions of the various parts of edifices and of their members, are determined by drawing triangles, squares, circles, and other figures, in such a manner as to bound them; and to these geometrical figures were assigned many abstruse significations. The plan and the front of the Cathedral at Milan are thus represented in Cesariano’s work, bounded and subdivided by various equilateral triangles; and it is easy to see, in the earnestness with which he points out these relations, the evidence of a fanciful and mystical turn of thought.[96]

[96] The plan which he has given, fol. 14, he has entitled “Ichnographia Fundamenti sacræ Ædis baricephalæ, Germanico more, à Trigono ac Pariquadrato perstructa, uti etiam ea quæ nunc Milani videtur.”
The work of Cesariano was translated into German by Gualter Rivius, and published at Nuremberg, in 1548, under the title of Vitruvius Teutsch, with copies of the Italian diagrams. A few years ago, in an article in the Wiener Jahrbücher (Oct.–Dec., 1821), the reviewer maintained, on the authority of the diagrams in Rivius’s book, that Gothic architecture had its origin in Germany and not in England.

We thus find erudition and mysticism take the place of much of that development of the architectural principles of the middle ages which would be so interesting to us. Still, however, these works are by no means without their value. Indeed many of the arts appear to flourish not at all the worse, for being treated in a manner somewhat mystical; and it may easily be, that the relations of geometrical figures, for which fantastical reasons are given, may really involve principles of beauty or stability. But independently of this, we find, in the best works of the architects of all ages (including engineers), evidence that the true idea of mechanical pressure exists among them more distinctly than among men in general, although it may not be developed in a scientific form. This is true up to our own time, and the arts which such persons cultivate could not be successfully [251] exercised if it were not so. Hence the writings of architects and engineers during the middle ages do really form a prelude to the works on scientific mechanics. Vitruvius, in his Architecture, and Julius Frontinus, who, under Vespasian, wrote On Aqueducts, of which he was superintendent, have transmitted to us the principal part of what we know respecting the practical mechanics and hydraulics of the Romans. In modern times the series is resumed. The early writers on architecture are also writers on engineering, and often on hydrostatics: for example, Leonardo da Vinci wrote on the equilibrium of water. And thus we are led up to Stevinus of Bruges, who was engineer to Prince Maurice of Nassau, and inspector of the dykes in Holland; and in whose work, on the processes of his art, is contained the first clear modern statement of the scientific principles of hydrostatics.

Having thus explained both the obstacles and the prospects which the middle ages offered to the progress of science, I now proceed to the history of the progress, when that progress was once again resumed. ~Additional material in the [3rd edition].~