Outlines of Universal History, Designed as a Text-book and for Private Reading

by George Park Fisher

THE WHITES AND THE RED MEN.—It was fortunate for the settlers of New England, that, before their arrival, the Indians had been much reduced in numbers by pestilence. Sometimes they were treated wisely and humanely, and efforts were made by noble men like John Eliot (1604-1690), who has been called "the Apostle to the Indians," to teach and civilize them. But this spirit was not always shown by the whites, and wrongs done by an individual are avenged by savages upon his race. The first important conflict between the English and the Indians was the Pequot War (1636), when the English, helped by the Narragansetts, who were under the influence of Roger Williams, crushed the Pequots, who were a dangerous tribe. A league between the New-England colonies, for mutual counsel and aid, followed (1643). Into this league, Massachusetts would not allow Rhode Island, whose constitution was disliked, to be admitted. There were to be two commissioners to represent each colony in common meetings.

SCIENCE, PHILOSOPHY, LITERATURE.

ASTRONOMY.—In this period wonderful progress was made in astronomy. Copernicus, a German or Polish priest (1473-1543), detected the error of the Ptolemaic system, which made not the sun, but the earth, the center of the solar system. Thus a revolution was made in that science. Tycho Brahe, a Danish astronomer (1546-1601), was a most accurate and indefatigable observer, although he did not adopt the Copernican theory. His pupil Kepler (1571-1630) discovered those great principles respecting the orbits and motions of the planets, which are called the "Laws of Kepler." Galileo (1564-1642), the Italian scientist, in addition to important discoveries in mechanics, with the telescopes, which his ingenuity had constructed, discerned the moons of Jupiter, and made other striking discoveries in the heavens. In promulgating the Copernican doctrine, he incurred the displeasure of ecclesiastics, and was driven by the Inquisition to renounce his opinion. It was reserved for Sir Isaac Newton (1643-1727) to discover the law of gravitation.

JURISPRUDENCE.—In jurisprudence, the Roman law was more and more studied in universities. In political science, Bodin, a learned Frenchman (1530-1596), wrote a work on the State, advocating a strong monarchy. In the Netherlands, Hugo Grotius (1583-1645), a great jurist and scholar, was one of the principal founders of the science of International Law. An eminent expounder of natural and international law in Germany was Pufendorf (1632-1694).

HISTORICAL WRITINGS.—In history, Sleidan, a German (1506-1556), and later a learned statesman, Seckendorf (1626-1692), wrote histories of the Reformation. De Thou, a Frenchman (1553-1617), wrote a valuable history of his own times. Grotius described the war for independence in the Netherlands. Church history, on the Protestant side, was written by a company of authors called the Magdeburg Centuriators; and on the Catholic side, in the Annals of Baronius (who died in 1607). In the Tower of London, Sir Walter Raleigh employed himself in writing a History of the World, remarkable, if not for its researches, for passages of noble eloquence. In Italy, historians followed in the path opened by Machiavelli, through his Discourses on Livy and his Florentine History. Davila (1576-1631) composed a narrative of the Civil Wars in France, and the Cardinal Bentivoglio wrote the history of the Civil War in the Netherlands. Sarpi, a keen Venetian, of much independence of thought, related the history of the Council of Trent, which was followed by a history of the same Council by the more orthodox Pallavicini. In Spain, there was at least one historian of superior value, Mariana, who composed a history of his own country.

MEDICINE.—Medicine felt the benefit of the revival of learning. Hippocrates and Galen were studied, and were translated into Latin. Paracelsus, a German physician (1493-1541), besides broaching various theories more or less visionary, advanced the science on the chemical side, introducing certain mineral remedies. Vesalius, a native of Brussels (1514-1564), who became chief physician of Charles V. and Philip II., dissected the human body, and produced the first comprehensive and systematic view of anatomy. In the sixteenth century clinical instruction was introduced into hospitals. Harvey, an English physician (1578-1657), discovered the circulation of the blood. In the seventeenth century activity in medical study was shown by the rise of various discordant systems.

PHILOSOPHY.—In philosophy, Aristotle continued to be the master in the most conservative schools, where the old ways of thinking were cherished. His ethical doctrines were especially attacked by Luther. Giordano Bruno, an Italian, not without genius, promulgated a theory of pantheism, which identified the Deity with the world. He wandered from land to land, was a vehement assailant of received religious views, and was burned at the stake at Rome (1600). In some gifted minds, the conflict of doctrinal systems, and the influence of the Renaissance, engendered skepticism. Montaigne (1533-1592), the genial essayist on men and manners, the Plutarch of France, is an example of this class. The opposition to Aristotle and to the schoolmen found a great leader in the English philosopher, Francis Bacon (1561-1626). The influence of Lord Bacon was more in stimulating to the use of the inductive method, the method of observation, than in any special value belonging to the rules laid down for it. He pointed out the path of fruitful investigation. Hobbes (1588-1679), an English writer, propounded, in his Leviathan (1651) and in other writings, his theory of the absolute authority of the king, and the related doctrine that right is founded on the necessity of "a common power," if the desires are to be gratified, and if endless destructive contention is to be avoided. From the epoch of Bacon, the natural and physical sciences acquire a new importance. In metaphysical science, the modern epoch dates from Descartes (1596-1650), born in France, who insisted that philosophy must assume nothing, but must start with the proposition, "I think, therefore I am." Before, philosophy had been "the handmaid of theology." It had taken for granted a body of beliefs respecting God, man, and the world. Descartes was a theist. Spinoza (1632-1677), of Jewish extraction, born in Holland, is the founder of modern pantheism. He taught that there is but one substance; that God and the world—the totality of things—are the manifestation of one impersonal being.

LITERATURE IN ITALY.—In Italy, among many authors in different departments of poetry, Tasso (1544-1595), the author of the epic Jerusalem Delivered, is the most eminent. In it, the classic and the romantic styles are combined; the spirit of the Middle Ages blends with the unity and harmony of Homer and Virgil. In the seventeenth century, under the hard Spanish rule, the literary spirit in Italy was chilled.

LITERATURE IN SPAIN AND PORTUGAL.—In Spain, it was poetry and the drama that chiefly flourished. Other sorts of literary activity were stifled with the extinction of liberty. Lope de Vega (1562-1635), one of the most facile and marvelous of all poets, the author of twenty-two hundred dramas,—was the precursor of a school. After him came Calderon (1600-1681), who carried the Spanish drama to its perfection. Early in the seventeenth century Cervantes published the classic tale of Don Quixote, "to render abhorred of men the false and absurd stories contained in books of chivalry," an end which he accomplished. Mariana's (1536-1623) vivid and interesting History of Spain was continued in a less attractive style by Sandoval. Herrera (1549-1625) composed a General History of the Indies. Other works relating to the New World and the Spanish conquests were written. In the production of proverbs, the Spanish mind is without a rival. Not the least of the bad effects of the despotic system of Philip II. was the decay of literature.

The most celebrated writer of Portugal is the poet Camoens (1524-1579), who, in his epic the Lusiad, has treated of the glorious events in the history of his country, giving special prominence to the discovery by Vasco da Gama of the passage to India.