RELIGION AND CHEMISTRY AND PHYSICS
The establishment of Christianity, beginning a new evolution of
theology, arrested the normal development of the physical sciences for
more than 1500 years. The work begun by Aristotle and carried on to such
a high state of relative perfection by Archimedes, was stifled by the
early Christians. An atmosphere was then created in which physical
science could not grow. The general belief derived from the New
Testament was that the end of the world was at hand, and the early
Church Fathers poured contempt upon all investigators of the science of
nature.
Then, too, for science there was established an insurmountable barrier,
in that the most careful inductions of science from ascertained facts
must conform to the view of nature given in the myth and legends of the
Bible. For 1500 years science was forced to confine itself to a system
of deducing scientific truth from scriptural texts. It was the accepted
word of the clergy that science was futile and dangerous which led to
the discrediting of Roger Bacon's works.
In 1163 Pope Alexander III forbade the study of physics to all
ecclesiastics, which of course, in that age, meant prohibition of all
such scientific studies to the only persons likely to follow them.
Roger Bacon was first to practice extensively the experimental method of
science. Through his researches the inventions of clocks, lenses, and
the formula for extracting phosphorus, manganese, and bismuth were
brought to light. Bitterly attacked by the clergy, he attempted to
defend himself by stating that much which was ascribed to demons
resulted from natural means. This statement but added fuel to the flame.
For in 1278 the authorities of the Franciscan Order assembled at Paris,
solemnly condemned Bacon's teachings, and the general of the
Franciscans, Jerome of Ascoli, afterwards Pope, threw him into prison,
where he remained for fourteen years. At the age of eighty, he was
released from prison declaring, "Would that I had not given myself so
much trouble for the love of science."
"Sad is it to think of what this great man might have given to the world
had ecclesiasticism allowed the gift. He held the key to treasures which
would have freed mankind from ages of error and misery. With his
discoveries as a basis, with his method as a guide, what might not the
world have gained! Nor was the wrong done to that age alone; it was done
to this age also.... Thousands of precious lives shall be lost, tens of
thousands shall suffer discomfort, privations, sickness, poverty,
ignorance, for lack of discoveries and methods which, but for this
mistaken dealing with Roger Bacon and his compeers, would now be
blessing the earth." (_White: "Warfare of Science."_)
Centuries afterwards, for stating the same claim, namely, that much
which was attributed to demons, resulted from natural causes, Cornelius
Agrippa, Weyer, Flade, Loos, Bekker, and a multitude of other
investigators and thinkers, suffered confiscation of property, loss of
position, and even torture and death.
In the latter half of the sixteenth century, John Baptist Porta, who was
the first to show how to reduce the metallic oxides and thus laid the
foundation of several important industries, was summoned to Rome by
Pope Paul II, and forbidden to continue his researches.
Both in Protestant and Catholic countries instruction in chemistry and
physics was discouraged by Church authorities, and in England the
theologians strenuously opposed the Royal Society and the Association
for the Advancement of Science.
Francis Bacon and Boyle were denounced by the clergy, and Lavoisier was
sent to the scaffold by the Parisian mob. Priestley had his home, his
library, instruments, and papers containing the results of long years of
scientific research burned by a Birmingham mob that had been instigated
by Anglican clergymen. He was driven into exile, and the mob would have
murdered him if they could have laid their hands upon him.
Yet, in spite of the opposition of the clergy, an opposition of such
force that one may well wonder how these tender embryonic sciences could
have withstood the terrific ecclesiastical onslaughts, the truths of
chemistry and physics continued to diffuse themselves among the
intelligent observers. The value to humanity of these two sciences is
now established as inestimable.