No. I.
It has been ascertained by the researches of a curious
investigator,[270] that many celebrated philosophers of recent times
have, for the most part, taken what they advance from the works of the
ancients. These modern acquisitions are numerous and important; and as
it is presumed that many may be instructed, and more be surprised by
their enumeration, a succinct account of them is proposed.
It appears as unjust to praise and admire nothing but what savours of
antiquity, as to despise whatever comes from thence, and to approve of
nothing but what is recent. The moderns certainly have much merit, and
have laboured not a little in the advancement of science; but the
ancients paved the way, wherein at present is made so rapid a progress:
and we may in that respect join Quintilian, who declared, seventeen
hundred years ago, “that antiquity had so instructed us by its example,
and the doctrines of its great masters, that we could not have been born
in a more happy age, than that which had been so illuminated by their
care.” While it would be ingratitude to deny such masters the encomiums
due to them, envy alone would refuse the moderns the praise they so
amply deserve. Justice ought to be rendered to both. In comparing the
merits of the moderns and ancients, a distinction ought to be made
between the arts and sciences, which require long experience and
practice to bring them to perfection, and those which depend solely on
talent and genius. Without doubt the former, in so long a series of
ages, have been extended more and more; and, with the assistance of
printing and other discoveries, have been brought to a very high degree
of perfection by the moderns. Our astronomers understand much better the
nature of the stars, and the whole planetary system, than Hipparchus,
Ptolemy, and others of the ancients; but it may be doubted, whether they
had gone so far, unaided by telescopes. The moderns have nearly
perfected the art of navigation, and discovered new worlds; yet without
the compass, America had probably remained unknown. Likewise, by long
observation, and experiments often repeated, we have brought botany,
anatomy, and chirurgery, to their present excellence. Many secrets of
nature, which one age was insufficient to penetrate, have been laid open
in a succession of many. Philosophy has assumed a new air; and the
trifling and vain cavils of the schools, have at length been put to
flight by the reiterated efforts of Ramus, Bacon, Gassendi, Descartes,
Newton, Gravesand, Leibnitz, and Wolf. While, therefore, willingly
conceding to the moderns every advantage they are fairly entitled to,
the share which the ancients had in beating out for us the pathways to
knowledge is an interesting subject of inquiry.
* * * * *
For two thousand years the ancient philosophers were so fully in
possession of the general esteem, that they often led men blindfold.
They were listened to as oracles, and their very obscurities regarded as
too sacred to be pried into by common eyes. An _ipse dixit_ of
Pythagoras, Aristotle, or any other ancient sage, was enough to decide
the most difficult case: the learned bowed in a body, and expressed
their satisfaction, while they surrendered their judgment. These habits
of submission were ill adapted to advance knowledge. A few noble
spirits, who, in recompense of their labours, have been honoured with
the glorious title of restorers of learning, quickly felt the hardship
of the bondage, and threw off the yoke of Aristotle. But instead of
following the example of those great men, whose incessant studies, and
profound researches, had so enriched the sciences, some of their
successors were content to make them the basis of their own slight
works; and a victory, which might have tended to the perfecting of the
human mind, dwindled into a petty triumph. Bruno, Cardan, Bacon,
Galileo, Descartes, Newton, and Leibnitz, the heroes of the literary
commonwealth, had too much merit, not to own that of the ancients. They
did them justice, and avowed themselves their disciples; but the
half-learned and feeble, whose little stock and strength were
insufficient to raise to themselves a name, rail at those from whom they
stole the riches with which they are bedecked, and ungratefully conceal
their obligations to their benefactors.
The method made use of by the moderns, in the new philosophy, recommends
itself by its own excellence; for the spirit of analysis and geometry
that pervades their manner of treating subjects, has contributed so
much to the advancement of science, that it were to be wished they had
never swerved from it. It is not, however, to be denied, that the
noblest parts of that system of philosophy, received with so much
applause in the three last centuries, were known and inculcated by
Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, and Plutarch. Of these great men, it may
be believed that they well knew how to demonstrate what they
communicated; although the arguments, upon which some portions of their
demonstrations were founded, have not come down to us. Yet, if in those
works which have escaped destruction from the fanaticism of ignorance,
and the injuries of time, we meet with numberless instances of
penetration and exact reasoning in their manner of relating their
discoveries, it is reasonable to presume that they exerted the same care
and logical accuracy in support of these truths, which are but barely
mentioned in the writings preserved to us. Among the titles of their
lost books are many respecting subjects mentioned only in general in
their other writings. We may conclude, therefore, that we should have
met with the proofs we now want, had they not thought it unnecessary to
repeat them, after having published them in so many other works, to
which they often refer, and of which the titles are handed down to us by
Diogenes Laertius, Suidas, and other ancients, with exactness sufficient
to give us an idea of the greatness of our loss. From numerous examples
of this kind, which might be quoted, one may be selected respecting
Democritus. That great man was the author of two books, from the titles
of which it evidently appears, that he was one of the principal
inventors of the elementary doctrine which treats of those lines and
solids that are termed irrational, and of the contact of circles and
spheres.
It is remarkable, that the illustrious ancients, by the mere force of
their own natural talents, attained to all those acquisitions of
knowledge which our experiments, aided by instruments thrown in our way
by chance, serve only to confirm. Without the assistance of a telescope
Democritus knew and taught, that the milky way was an assemblage of
innumerable stars that escape our sight, and whose united splendour
produces in the heavens the whiteness, which we denominate by that name;
and he ascribed the spots in the moon to the exceeding height of its
mountains and depth of its vallies. True it is, that the moderns have
gone farther, and found means to measure the height of those same
mountains; yet Democritus’s researches were those of a great genius;
whereas the operations of the moderns are merely organical and mechanic.
Besides which, we have this advantage,--that _we_ work upon _their_
canvass.
Finally, it may be repeated, that there is scarcely any discovery
ascribed to the moderns, but what was not only known to the ancients,
but supported by them with the most solid arguments. The demonstration
of this position will at least have this good effect; it will abate our
prejudices against the ancients, occasioned by a blind admiration of
some moderns, who had never shone at all but for the light they borrowed
of their masters. Their opinions fairly stated from their own works, and
often in their words, must render the decision easy; and the result may
restore to the early philosophers some part at least of their disputed
glory.
[270] The Rev. L. Dutens, in his “Inquiry into the Origin of the
Discoveries attributed to the Moderns.”
* * * * *
_For the Table Book._