If, then, we are confronted with some statement by scientists affirming that there is a scientific inaccuracy in the Bible, we have no remark to make but that the Bible was not meant to be a text-book of exact science. If it is urged that there are contradictions between the Bible and science, then the case demands attention. We know that truth cannot contradict itself; but we know that we may err in apprehending it, and that science may err in its assumptions of fact. Hence in the matter of Biblical Apology, when dealing with science, it is of the first importance that we render an exact account to ourselves of what _science affirms_ and of what the _Sacred Scripture affirms_. It is important to note here the distinction which P. Brucker points out; namely, what _science affirms_, not what _scientists affirm_. "The latter often mingle _conjecture_, more or less probable, with the definitely ascertained results of scientific experiment; they often accept as facts certain observations and plausible conclusions which are not always deduced from legitimate premises nor in a strictly logical method." The human mind is always prone to accept the plausible for the true, the appearance of things for their substance, the general for the universal, the part for the whole, or the probable for the proved. This is demonstrated by the history of scientific hypotheses in nearly every department of human knowledge. In the next place, we must be quite sure to ascertain _what the Sacred Scriptures affirm_. Apologists place themselves in a needlessly responsible position when, in the difficult task of determining a doubtful reading of the Sacred Text, they assume an interpretation which may be gainsaid by scientific _proof_. The teaching of St. Augustine and St. Thomas on this subject is that we are not to interpret in any _particular_ sense any part of Sacred Scripture which admits of a different interpretation. And here Leo XIII. in his Encyclical gives us an important point to consider when he says that the defenders of the Sacred Scriptures must not consider that they are obliged to defend _each single_ opinion of isolated Fathers of the Church.[9] There is a difference between a _prudent conservatism_ and a timid and slavish repetition of time-honored views. Also between _an intelligent advance_ of well-founded, though _new_ views, and an excessive temerity, which rashly replaces the tradition of ages by the suggestions of new science. "Hence any attempt to prove that the statements of the Bible imply in every case exact conformity with the latest results of scientific research is a needless and, under circumstances, a dangerous experiment; for although there are instances where (as in chap. i. of Genesis) the Bible statements anticipate the exactest results of scientific investigation by many centuries, yet it is not and need not be so in all instances.