The Warfare of Science

by Andrew Dickson White

From the dismissal of the scientific professors from the University of Salamanca by Ferdinand VII. of Spain, in the beginning of this century, down to sundry dealings with scientific men in our own land and time, we might study another interesting phase of the same warfare; but, passing all this, I shall simply present a few typical conflicts that have occurred within the last ten years.

During the years 1867 and 1868 the war which had been long smouldering in France, between the Church and the whole system of French advanced education, came to an outbreak. Toward the end of the last century, after the Church had held possession of advanced instruction in France for more than a thousand years, and had, so far as it was able, made experimental science contemptible; and after the Church authorities had deliberately resisted and wrecked Turgot's noble plans for the establishment of a system of public schools, the French nation decreed the establishment of the most thorough and complete system of the higher public instruction then known. It was kept under lay control, and became one of the great glories of France.

But, emboldened by the restoration of the Bourbons, the Church began to undermine the hated system, and in 1868 had made such progress that all was ready for an assault.

Foremost among the leaders of the besieging party was the Bishop of Orleans—Dupanloup—a man of much buzzing vigor. In various ways, and especially in an open letter, he had fought the "Materialism" of the School of Medicine at Paris, and especially were his attacks leveled at Professors Vulpian and See, and the Minister of Public Instruction, Duruy, a man of great merit, whose only crime was a quiet resistance to clerical control. [154]

In these writings, Bishop Dupanloup stigmatized Darwin, Huxley, Lyell, and others, as authors of "shameful theories," and made especial use of the recent phrase of a naturalist, that "it is more glorious to be a monkey perfected than an Adam degenerated."

The direct attack was made in the French Senate, and the storming party in that body was led by a venerable and conscientious prelate, Cardinal de Bonnechose.

It was charged by Archbishop de Bonnechose and his party, that the tendencies of the teachings of these professors were fatal to religion and morality. A heavy artillery of phrases was hurled, such as "sapping the foundations," etc., "breaking down the bulwarks," etc., etc., and, withal, a new missile was used with much effect, the epithet of "materialist." The result can be easily guessed; crowds came to the lecture-rooms of these professors, and the lecture-room of Prof. See, the chief offender, was crowded to suffocation.

A siege was begun in due form. A young physician was sent by the cardinal's party into the heterodox camp as a spy. Having heard one lecture of Prof. See, he returned with information that seemed to promise easy victory to the besieging party. He brought a terrible statement, one that seemed enough to overwhelm See, Vulpian, Duruy, and the whole hated system of public instruction in France.

Good Cardinal Bonnechose seized the tremendous weapon. Rising in his place in the Senate, he launched a most eloquent invective against the Minister of State who could protect such a fortress of impiety as the College of Medicine; and, as a climax, he asserted, on the evidence of his spy fresh from Prof. See's lecture-room, that the professor had declared, in his lecture of the day before, that so long as he had the honor to hold his professorship he would combat the false idea of the existence of the soul. The weapon seemed resistless, and the wound fatal; but M. Duruy rose and asked to be heard.