Religion and science; Religion and science -- History; Science -- History
The Protestantism of England was little better. In 1772 sailed the
famous English expedition for scientific discovery under Cook. The
greatest by far of all the scientific authorities chosen to accompany
it was Dr. Priestley. Sir Joseph Banks had especially invited him; but
the clergy of Oxford and Cambridge intervened. Priestley was considered
unsound in his views of the Trinity; it was suspected that this would
vitiate his astronomical observations; he was rejected, and the
expedition crippled.[80]
Nor has the warfare against dead champions of science been carried on
only by the older Church.
On the 10th of May, 1859, was buried Alexander von Humboldt. His
labors were among the greatest glories of the century, and his funeral
one of the most imposing that Berlin had ever seen; among those who
honored themselves by their presence was the prince regent--the present
emperor. But of the clergy it was observed that none were present save
the officiating clergyman and a few regarded as unorthodox.[81]
Nor have attempts to renew the battle been wanting in these latter
days. The attempt in the Church of England, in 1864, to fetter science,
which was brought to ridicule by Herschel, Bowring, and De Morgan; the
Lutheran assemblage at Berlin, in 1868, to protest against "science
falsely so called," in the midst of which stood Pastor Knak denouncing
the Copernican theory; the "Syllabus," the greatest mistake of the
Roman Church, are all examples of this.[82]
And now, what has been won by either party in this long and terrible
war? The party which would subordinate the methods and aims of science
to those of theology, though in general obedient to deep convictions,
had given to Christianity a series of the worst blows it had ever
received. They had made large numbers of the best men in Europe hate
it. Why did Ricetto and Bruno and Vanini, when the crucifix was
presented to them in their hours of martyrdom, turn from that blessed
image with loathing?[83] Simply because Christianity had been made to
them identical with the most horrible oppression of the mind.
Worse than that, the well-meaning defenders of the faith had wrought
into the very fibre of the European heart that most unfortunate of all
ideas, the idea that there is a necessary antagonism between science
and religion. Like the landsman who lashes himself to the anchor of
the sinking ship, they had attached the fundamental doctrines of
Christianity, by the strongest cords of logic which they could spin,
to these mistaken ideas in science, and the advance of knowledge had
wellnigh engulfed them.
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