The Project Gutenberg eBook ofGospel Philosophy

The Project Gutenberg eBook ofGospel PhilosophyThis ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.Title: Gospel PhilosophyAuthor: J. H. WardRelease date: August 20, 2014 [eBook #46635]Most recently updated: October 24, 2024Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Samuel Shreeve, Mormon Texts Project Intern(MormonTextsProject.org).*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GOSPEL PHILOSOPHY ***

This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this ebook or online atwww.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this eBook.

Title: Gospel PhilosophyAuthor: J. H. WardRelease date: August 20, 2014 [eBook #46635]Most recently updated: October 24, 2024Language: EnglishCredits: Produced by Samuel Shreeve, Mormon Texts Project Intern(MormonTextsProject.org).

Title: Gospel Philosophy

Author: J. H. Ward

Release date: August 20, 2014 [eBook #46635]Most recently updated: October 24, 2024

Language: English

Credits: Produced by Samuel Shreeve, Mormon Texts Project Intern(MormonTextsProject.org).

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GOSPEL PHILOSOPHY ***

GOSPEL PHILOSOPHY,SHOWING THEABSURDITIES OF INFIDELITY,AND THEHARMONY OF THE GOSPELWITH SCIENCE AND HISTORY* * * * *BY ELDER J. H WARD* * * * *ILLUSTRATED WITH NUMEROUS ENGRAVINGS,* * * * *Salt Lake City, Utah:Published at the Juvenile Instructor Office, 1884.Entered, according to act of Congress, in the year 1884, by J. H. Ward, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.* * * * *PREFACE.

* * * * *

BY ELDER J. H WARD

* * * * *

ILLUSTRATED WITH NUMEROUS ENGRAVINGS,

* * * * *

Salt Lake City, Utah:

Published at the Juvenile Instructor Office, 1884.

Entered, according to act of Congress, in the year 1884, by J. H. Ward, in the office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington.

* * * * *

Sectarians generally dread meeting a "Mormon" Elder in discussion, for they well know the humiliating defeat which has been the result to their compeers in hundreds of instances.

But there is another class of persons who often bring formidable-looking arguments against the truths of the gospel. This class is composed frequently of persons of considerable learning, research and intelligence. They have long ago become disgusted with the absurdities of so-called Christianity; and are not slow in showing the disagreement of sectarian dogmas with the teachings of the Bible, or contrasting the Bible with supposed science. In some instances, otherwise valuable scientific works are marred by sneers at the books of inspiration. In this age of earnest thought and research into all branches of knowledge, many of these works fall into the hands of the young and hence the growth of skepticism in the minds of many. Many of the facts contained in this work have been collected from, and references made to larger works not easily accessible to the general reader. A large number of the illustrations have been designed expressly for this work, and engraved by Brother John Held, of Salt Lake City.

To gather into a small compass the leading arguments of infidel writers, and to refute them by well-known facts; to show the cause of the conflict between science and religion; and to harmonize true science with the teachings of God's word, has been the design in writing this little work. That in its perusal the young may find their faith strengthened in the principles of the gospel; thoughtful minds find food for reflection, and the missionary Elder a valuable book of reference, is the earnest wish of

The Author.

* * * * *TABLE OF CONTENTS

* * * * *

CHAPTER 1—

ABSURDITIES OF INFIDELITY

CHAPTER 2—

CAUSES OF THE SUPPOSED CONFLICT BETWEEN SCIENCE AND RELIGION

CHAPTER 3—

FALLACIES OF SCIENTISTS

CHAPTER 4—

DID THE WORLD MAKE ITSELF?

CHAPTER 5—

OUR NEED OF REVELATION

CHAPTER 6—

VALIDITY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT AS SHOWN BY INTERNAL EVIDENCE

CHAPTER 7—

NEW TESTAMENT FACTS CORROBORATED BY SECULAR WRITERS

CHAPTER 8—

HISTORICAL GLIMPSES OF NEW TESTAMENT TIMES

CHAPTER 9—

FULFILLMENT OF PROPHECY

CHAPTER 10—

INFIDEL OBJECTIONS CONSIDERED

CHAPTER 11—

MOSES AND MODERN SCIENCE

CHAPTER 12—

HARMONY OF GENESIS AND GEOLOGY

CHAPTER 13—

SCIENTIFIC PROOFS OF SPIRITUAL LIFE

CHAPTER 14—

FAITH AND INFIDELITY CONTRASTED

* * * * *INDEX

* * * * *

* * * * *CHAPTER I.ABSURDITIES OF INFIDELITY.THE PRESENT AN EARNEST AGE—AN EARNEST RELIGION REQUIRED—YOUNG MEN LIABLE TO SKEPTICISM—LITERARY FOPS—SCIENTISTS DO NOT AGREE—TESTIMONY OF SOCRATES AND PLATO—ABSURDITIES OF BRAHMINISM—ATTEMPTS OF FRENCH INFIDELS—ROSETTA STONE—MODERN SPIRITUALISM.

* * * * *

The gospel is truly a grand system. Let us try to entertain right views concerning it. Let us enlarge our minds to grasp it, that we may, to some extent at least, conceive its greatness and appreciate its beauties.

The peculiar wants of the age in which we live are worthy of deep and careful consideration. Never was there a time in the history of the race, when learning and general intelligence were so well diffused as at the present. The press is throwing off continually its millions of printed pages, which are scattered broadcast as the leaves of Autumn. Books on almost every conceivable subject can be cheaply bought; and journals,magazines and pamphlets, both of a good and evil influence, attract the attention of the young.

Never was there a time of more intense activity. Who can pass through the crowded streets of our cities, listen to the throbbings of the steam-engine, the hum of machinery, the appliances of electricity, gaze at the vast trains that are driven with fire and vapor along our railways, or view those magnificent structures that cross the mighty deep, without feeling that this is an earnest age?

Now, this earnest, active, thinking age demands a religion that has life and power in it. Not a religion of cold formality and narrow sectarianism, but a religion that will satisfy the intellect with its truths, touch the heart with its love, sway the will with its persuasiveness, gratify the taste with its beauties and fill the imagination with its sublimities. A religion is wanted that will enlist upon its side the whole nature of man, and command his willing and devoted homage; a religion that, bearing the full impress of its Author's image, shall carry its own credentials with it; and which, clothed with all the elements of truth and righteousness, beauty and grandeur of love and power, shall be revered by all those who love the truth, and dreaded by all who love it not.

This is the religion that the gospel reveals. There is no antagonism between philosophy and faith, between science and religion, whatever the seeming oppositions of the present; in reality it is perfect harmony. The gospel overwhelms, nay, rather, includes all philosophy.

In the life of many young men there is a period of skepticism. Then the young man is extremely liable to doubt. Then he questions all his previous convictions, challenges all his accepted opinions, and is in danger of drifting aimlessly on the wide tossing sea of unbelief, the sport of every wind of doctrine, the easy prey of every theory conceived by the ingenious brain of man.

At this period his faith in God and man is liable to be swept away through a misconception of the real teachings of science, and the example of those who seek to excuse their wicked lives under the specious plea of unbelief. This period of skeptical tendency comes early in life, frequently when the young man is in college or in the schools of science, when he begins to think and act for himself. It is intelligent, earnest young men of brains and capacity who are in special danger from the skepticism of the age.

Many of these young men have been trained in the Sabbath school, but at nineteen or twenty a change comes over them. They feel the strength and vigor of awakening manhood, and that impatience of authority which is characteristic of young men in this formative period of life. A young man hears of men of learning who reject religion; he reads now and then a magazine full of doubts and insinuations, and he begins to feel that all his belief is simply the result of his education, and that under other circumstances he might have been a Confucian, a Buddhist or a Mahometan. Perhaps he meets with a tolerably educated but skepticalfriend, who tells him in effect that religion is a fraud, that the Bible is a very good book, to be sure, but destitute of divine authority. He tells him, in a word, that these things may do for women and children to believe, but as for himself, he has put away all such belief along with his childish toys.

Our young man listens to all this flippant nonsense with itching ears, until, at length, he pretends to believe the world was made by chance, is governed by chance and all things that exist are only the effects of chance.

But there is a comical side to this question, as well as to many others. Prof. Agassiz wisely observes that, "men frequently talk very learnedly of what they know but very little;" and I know of nothing more irresistibly ludicrous than to see one of these so-called scientific skeptics, who scarcely knows the difference between the leg of a wasp and the horn of a beetle, and yet will assume to patronize the Almighty and talk about progress and culture as though he was the most remarkable prodigy of the age in which he lives.

It is enough to disgust an honest man, to see some of these literary fops going along with Darwin's works under one arm and a case of transfixed grasshoppers and butterflies under the other, talking about Huxley's "protoplasm" and "natural selection," and "nebular hypothesis," and "biogensis," and "abigensis," all the while lisping with an "exthquithit lithp," and indicating by word, tone and gesture that all who dissent from their opinionsare grossly ignorant and scarcely worthy of their notice.

But the greatest joke is that the scientists which they so much admire do not agree. Darwin is charging at Lamarch, Walace spearing Cope, and Herschel denouncing Ferguson. How many colors in a ray of sun-light? Seven, says Newton; only three, says David Brewster. How high above the earth is the Aurora Borealis, or Northern Light? Two and a half miles, says Prof. Lias; one hundred and sixty-five, says Prof. Tumming. La Place says the moon was not put in the right place, it should have been four times as far away; while Prof. Lionville comes up just in time and gives us the wonderful information (?) that the Creator was acquainted with His business and fixed it exactly right.

How far is the sun from the earth? Less than a million miles, says Zadkiel; seventy-six millions of miles, says La Caille; eighty-two millions, says Humboldt; ninety millions, says Henderson; one hundred and four millions, says Mayer. Only a slight difference of one hundred and three millions of miles, or a good deal farther than a person could travel, at the rate of fifty miles per hour, during the next two centuries, if he could live that long. And yet, amidst all this confusion and contradiction, we are coolly asked to give up the words of inspiration and hang our hopes of the future on the miserable vagaries of self-contradicting philosophers.

Another very ludicrous as well as amusing instanceof the folly of infidelity is the fact that skeptics will catch at almost anything upon which to hang their faith. All around us, in every grade of society, are to be found men who will tell us that the Vedas and Shasters of the Hindoos are far more trustworthy than the writings of Moses, Isaiah, Paul, Nephi or Joseph. They will tell us what sublime philosophers Brahma and Confucius were, while, at the same time, they have never read a word of their doctrines, or even seen a volume of their works. All they know is what some other truth-hating infidel has told them.

But for the sake of argument let us glance at some of these wonderful writings. Socrates, one of the greatest of heathen philosophers, admits, "We must of necessity wait till some one from Him, who careth for us, shall come and instruct us how to behave toward God and toward man."

Plato declares, "We cannot know of ourselves what will be pleasing to God; it is necessary that a law-giver should be sent from heaven to instruct us." And he further adds, "Oh, how greatly do I long to see that man!" (Plato's Republic, Book iv and vi.)

Who has not felt sad at the dying words of Socrates, "I am going out of the world and you are to continue in it, but which of us has the better part is a secret to all but God." Nor is the philosophy of India any better. A few years ago, when, through the labors of Oriental scholars, the Vedas and Shasters of the Hindoos were translated and printed in European languages, a great shout wentup from the army of infidels. "Here," said they, "is the true chronology. Henceforth the Jewish records must hide their heads." Accordingly the Shasters were, for a time, in high repute among those who knew very little about them.

Now, when we remember that these much-vaunted histories profess to reach back throughma-ha-yugsor epochs of 4,320,000 of our years, that a thousand of these epochs makes akalpaor one day of the life of Brahma—the nights being of the same duration—and that his life consists of one hundred years of such days and nights, we can easily see the absurdity of these histories. In these works are also the records of the seven great continents of the world, separated by seven rivers and seven chains of mountains, four hundred thousand miles high, and the history of the families of their kings, one of whom had ten thousand sons, another sixty thousand who were born in a pumpkin, nourished in pans of milk, reduced to ashes by the curse of a demon and restored to life by the waters of the Ganges. These records give statements of wonderful eclipses, comets and deluges, seven of which covered the earth, not merely to the top of these wonderfully high mountains, but even reaching to the polar star. Yet infidels have the assurance to quote these as standard works of undoubted authority, and worthy of the credence of intelligent beings. (Duff's India, page127.)

Nor are the promises of the future life any less absurd than the foregoing. "Tell me," said awealthy Hindoo, who had given all his wealth to the Brahmins who surrounded his dying bed, that he might obtain a pardon of his sins, "what shall become of my soul when I die?" The priest replied, "Your soul will go into the body of a holy cow." "And after that?" he asked again. "It will pass into the body of a divine peacock." "And after that?" "It will pass into a flower." "Where, O, where will it go last of all?" cried the dying man. "Where will it go last of all? Ah! that is the question."

While British infidels were admiring the sacred writings of the Hindoos, and holding them up before the world as superior to the word of God, French skeptics were busy in a similar employment. When Napoleon invaded Egypt, in 1798, he took with him a large corps of scientific men. In the ceiling of a temple at Dendera, in Upper Egypt, some of these scientists discovered a stone, tablet covered with strange characters. These characters, it was concluded, were a representation of the relative positions of the sun, moon and stars at the time the temple was built; and, calculating backwards, it was found that this could not be less than seventeen thousand years ago. This tablet was taken from the ceiling of the temple and carried away to France, and placed in the national library in Paris. Hundreds of thousands came to see the antediluvian monument, and infidel commentators were never wanting to inform them that this remarkable stone proved the whole Bible to be a series of lies. One of the discoverers, afterwardsa professor in the University of Breslau, published a pamphlet, entitled, "Invincible proof that the earth is at least ten times older than is taught by the Bible." During the next thirty years, scores of such publications followed; and the base slander received many additions and improvements, until it was a common saying that this stone proved that "the priests of Egypt were carving astronomy on their pyramids ten thousand years before Adam was born."

It did not shake their credulity in the least, that no two of their wise men were agreed by some thousands of years, how old the stone was—that no one even knew the first principles of the Egyptian system of astronomy, and thatnone of them could read the hieroglyphics.

But, in 1832, the curious Egyptian astronomy was studied, and it then appeared that this object, which had caused so much commotion, was simply a calendar stone to aid in the measurement of time; and that the positions of the sun, moon and stars were so placed to enable common observers to ascertain the beginning of the year. At length, by means of the Rosetta Stone—which furnished a key to these hieroglyphics—Champolion and others learned to read the inscriptions on Egyptian monuments.

Rosetta Stone

[Rosetta Stone, showing present and original form, and specimens of Greek, Coptic and Hieroglyphic characters.]

The Rosetta Stone was discovered by the French, in 1799, at Rosetta, Egypt. When in a perfect condition it was a tablet of black basalt, three feet high, two feet five inches wide, and ten inches thick. The inscription was in three languages:

Coptic, Greek and ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. On the publication of the inscriptions it was found that they were the key to the hieroglyphic characters. It was then discovered that the names of Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, were engraved on the stone, as well as the names of the Roman emperors Tiberius, Claudius, Nero and Domitian. The inscriptions revealed the fact that they had no reference to early Egyptian history. The edifice in which the first-mentioned stone was found was

simply a heathen Roman temple, built between the fourteenth and eighty-first years of the Christian era. Even at the present time, in the noon-day of modern science and so-called civilization, astrologers, mediums, clairvoyants and fortune-tellers by the hundred find a profitable business among those who consider themselves too learned, wise and progressive to believe in the word of God. One infidel lecturer even advertises that he will reveal to you the secrets of the future and cure you of any disease you may have, if you will only enclose in a letter a few hairs taken from your right temple and—and—a—ten dollar bill. Concerning the future life, infidels have every variety of oracles, conjectures and suppositions; but for their guesses they have no proof. The only thing upon which they seem agreed is in denying the resurrection of the body. According to their ideas, a poor, naked, shivering, table-rapping spirit, obliged to fly over the world at the sigh of any brainless fop or silly, sentimental girl, or the bidding of some brazen-faced strumpet, is all that ever shall exist of all the great and good men and women that have lived upon the earth. To such wild unreason does the mind of man descend when it rejects the gospel, for only through it life and immortality are brought to light. A year or two since, the leader of American infidels, Robert Ingersol, was called to deliver a funeral oration over the body of his brother. In that short discourse there were many beautiful sentiments:

but through it all, as through a transparent glass, was shown the need, which even Ingersol felt, of divine revelation and divine guidance.

* * * * *CHAPTER II.CAUSES OF THE SUPPOSED CONFLICT BETWEEN SCIENCE AND RELIGION.SCIENCE AND REVELATION HARMONIZE—WANT OF REVELATION THE CAUSE OF BARBARISM—BENEFITS AND EVILS OF ROMANISM—CONFLICT CONCERNING GEOGRAPHY—PHILOSOPHY OF COSMAS—STRUGGLES OF COPERNICUS—BRUNO —GALILEO—OPPOSITION OF LUTHER—SERVETUS BURNED—PROTESTANT BIGOTRY—CAUSES OF INFIDELITY.

* * * * *

Truth is ever harmonious. Science and religion, in the true sense of the terms, can never be in conflict with each other. The direct revelations of God to man must ever agree with the results of scientific investigation. Invention and discovery are but the unfolding of the laws, attributes and objects of nature to man's finite understanding—the action of the divine will on the minds of men. So, whether man seeks for spiritual truth through the revelations of God, or looks out upon the material world and investigates the working of physical laws, the result must be the same. A truth revealed to the sensitive, impulsive humanheart to-day in its full play of emotions and passions cannot be at any real variance with a truth written upon a far-off planet rolling in the depths of space, or upon a fossil whose poor life ebbed away thousands of years ago. Yet, strange to say, a conflict has been going on for years between some students of science on one side and the devotees of religion on the other. Nearly all the great and good men of the medieval or modern times have been engaged on one side or the other, and a hard contest it has been. The war has been waged longer, the battles have been fiercer, the sieges more persistent, the diplomacy more far-reaching, and the revenge more deadly than ever characterized the military campaigns of Alexander, Caesar or Napoleon.

Let us then inquire into the causes of this conflict and try and understand something concerning it. In the first place we must be careful not to underrate science. On every side we see its beneficent effects. The food we eat, the clothes we wear, and the houses we dwell in depend in a great measure upon it for their existence. When we travel it is mostly by the appliances of science. The books we read are manufactured by its aid. It transmits our messages to and from our friends, and prepares the light that illuminates our streets and dwellings. It has contributed greatly to relieve human suffering and promote human happiness, and to distinguish the civilized from the savage races of the earth.

And what has religion done? So long as it wastrue and pure it was the favored child of heaven. While the true church existed upon the earth, whether Jewish or Christian, we hear of no conflict between its members and the students of science. On the other hand we find from their writings that Moses, Job, David, Solomon and Isaiah were the leading scientists of the ages in which they lived. They understood natural history, architecture, sculpture, poetry, music, botany, and in astronomy they made such progress that many of the constellations still retain the names they used, such as Orion, Pleaides, etc. (See Job xxxviii, 31;Amos v, 8.) We read of no conflict between the truths of science and the teachings of Paul, though he was one of the most learned men of the age in which he lived. On the other hand the discourse of Paul in the court of the Areopagus, was the complement or sequel of ideas already held by the most celebrated Grecian philosophers. (See Acts xvii, 19-23.)

It was not till after the great apostasy, when the voice of inspiration had ceased, that the great conflict commenced between science and the so-called Christian church.

We shall better understand this fact, when we recollect that from the time of the apostles to the ninth century, science, literature and philosophy were well nigh extinct. No schools of painting flourished, no models in sculpture were designed, no order of architecture arose, no great poem was written, and no history compiled, which have been deemed worthy to be transmitted to our times. Itwas only when European society came largely in contact with Jewish and Saracen influences during the wars of the Crusades and in contact with the Jews and Saracens of Spain, that any decided advances were made. As if to mark out to the world the real cause of its intellectual degradation, the regeneration of Italy commenced with the banishment of the popes to Avignon. Their exile continued more than seventy years; and during their absence, so rapid was the social and intellectual progress that on their return to Rome, they found it impossible to make any successful resistance, or to restore the old condition of society.

Yet even in her apostatized condition the Catholic church did much for the amelioration of society. At the commencement of the fourth century of the Christian era, a cloud of more than Cimmerian darkness overshadowed western Europe. It was then occupied by wandering savages. The period embraced in the next thousand years greatly improved its condition. It was during this period that the population were organized into families, communities and cities. Those centuries found it full of bondmen—they left it without a slave. Where there had been trackless forests, there were now farms, orchards and villages. Instead of bloody chieftains drinking out of their enemies' skulls, there were parish priests teaching the masses the crude beginning of religious thought. Instead of gladiatorial combats, which characterized ancient Roman civilization, there werethoughtful men gravely pondering the problems of free agency and moral responsibility.

Enveloped as she was by the evils of the times, the Catholic church gave rise to many improvements. She taught the doctrine of an ultimate accountability for personal deeds, of which the ancient inhabitants of Europe had very indistinct perceptions. Under her direction the brotherhood of man was taught as it had never been before, and was illustrated, not merely by individual acts of charity, the memory of which is soon forgotten, but also by the establishment of permanent institutions, such as hospitals, alms-houses, schools and asylums for the relief of the afflicted, for the spread of knowledge and the succoring of the oppressed. Many of her high dignitaries, and even popes, were men who had risen from the humbler ranks of society. These men, true to their instincts, were often the champions of right against might. In an age of tyranny, the very organization of the church was essentially republican. It thus paved the way for modern representative governments, and prepared the minds of men for their introduction.

Still it was not over nations and communities that Rome showed her chief power, but in her control of domestic and individual interests. History presents no record like hers. Her pontiffs in the quiet halls of the Vatican could equally take in a hemisphere at a glance or examine the private character of any individual. Was there a rebellion in Spain? Her agents informed her ofit. Was there an obscure philosopher in Germany writing down the results of his investigations? She also knew it. While she restrained the power and tyranny of kings by her influence, she also relieved the hungry beggar or wandering minstrel at the monastery gate. In all Europe there was not a man too obscure, too insignificant or too desolate for her. Surrounded by her solemnities every one received his name at her altar, her bells chimed at his marriage and her knell tolled at his funeral. By her confessionals she extorted from him the secrets of his life, and by her penances she punished him for his faults. In the hour of sickness and trouble her servants sought him out, teaching him to place his trust in God, and strengthening him for the trials of life by the example of the good and faithful of former days. And when at length his lifeless body had become an offense, even to his friends, she received it into her consecrated ground, there to rest till the resurrection morning. She raised woman from nearly the condition of a slave and made her the equal and fit companion of man; and in turn, received a recompense by a firm friend in every home. In an age of bloodshed and plunder she lifted up her hand in defense of the weak, and made her sanctuaries a refuge for the despairing and oppressed.

But here arose the difficulty. The so-called Christian church by apostasy had lost the key of revelation. Her decisions depended not upon the voice of inspiration but upon the musty parchments of the past. Claiming to be the church ofGod, she regarded her decisions as infallible and irrevocable, her teachings as beyond question. Her ideas were crystalized; her philosophy, if indeed it was worthy of that name, was stationary, as must be the case with all systems reposing on a final revelation of God. In the domain of the Catholic church during the space of a thousand years, namely from the time of the apostles to the eleventh century, not a book had been written, not a painting executed, nor statue sculptured of sufficient merit to rescue the name of the author from oblivion. Throughout the length and breadth of Europe there fell a dark cloud of intellectual stagnation, an invisible atmosphere of oppression ready to break down morally and physically whatever opposed its weight; except where a few feeble rays of light were kept flickering by the efforts of Jewish and Mahometan scholars. She at once disclosed her human and denied her divine origin by attempting to force fixed laws on society in the presence of higher truths and advancing civilization.

The first great conflict was in reference to geography—the shape and surface of the earth. When science disclosed the fact that the earth was round, there was a great commotion, and so much the more since it was by Mahometan scholars that the discovery had been made. It was asked, "Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?" In other words, "Is it possible for vile Mahometans to understand and teach such a truth when it is not yet known to the assumed church of God?" Atonce the war-spirit became fierce and hot. The great writer Eusebius treated the doctrine with contempt. Lactantius asks, "Is there any one so senseless, as to believe that there are men whose footsteps are higher than their heads? That the crops and trees grow downwards? That the rains, snow and hail fall upward to the earth?" (For further particulars see Whewel's Hist. Induct. Sciences, Vol. I, page196.) At this stage of the controversy, Cosmas Indicopleustes, by direction of the Catholic church, undertook to give a description of the earth. According to Cosmas, the universe is in the form of an immense box, twice as broad as it is high and twice as long as it is broad. At the bottom of this box lies the earth, surrounded by four great seas or oceans. At the outer edges of these seas, rise immense walls, which support the vault of heaven, even as the walls of a house support the roof; and thus walls and vault shut in the earth and all the heavenly bodies. This vast box he divides into two compartments or stories. In the lower one men were said to live, and sun, moon and stars to move. The upper one was said to be the abode of God and angels, whose principal work was to push and pull the sun and planets to and fro, and to open the windows of heaven, and thus regulate the quantity of rain.

The ignorance or impudence of Cosmas can only be partially imagined, when we recollect that he supported his theory by reference to the Bible, and quotedGenesis i, 6;Job xxvi, 11;Psalms cxlviii, 4;Isaiah xl, 22. All the sublime poetry andbeautiful imagery of these texts were thus debased to give credence to the wild vagaries of this ignorant man.

Space will not permit us to follow this contest in all its phases: suffice it to say that so late as the fourteenth century Cecco d' Ascoli was burned alive for asserting his belief in the rotundity of the earth. (See Neander's History of the Christian Church, Vol. II, page63.) The student of history will also remember how Columbus at the great council of Salamanca was overwhelmed by texts of scripture wrested from their rightful meaning. It was only after the successful navigation of the earth, by Magellan's ship, theSan Vittoria, that Rome ceased to persecute the adherents of this doctrine. In all this contest Rome's dogmas only resulted in injury to herself. The authority of the scriptures was not in the end weakened, but rather strengthened; but to thinking men, Rome's claim of divine right to interpret the scriptures was of little value. Rome had been "weighed in the balances and found wanting."

It was therefore in a scientific not less than a religious point of view that many leading minds looked with favor toward that great religious, movement known as the Reformation.

While Luther, Calvin and Zwingle were busy denouncing the corruptions of the Romish church, the forces were preparing for the second great conflict between science and so-called religion, namely, that concerning the motion of the earth. Copernicus lived at the same time as Luther, and diedtwo years before him. His was as brave a life as ever lived in story. For thirty-six years, at the very time the Protestant struggle was raging, he was working at that immortal book,De Revolutionibus Orbum, in which he so clearly demonstrates the motion of the earth, and the revolution of the planets around the sun. But he dared not print it for many years. If he published it at Rome, it would fall into the hands of the Inquisition; if he caused it to be printed in Germany, there were the Protestant leaders no less hostile; if he sent it to Switzerland, there stood Calvin and Zwingle ready to burn it. At length the work was ready for the press. By the entreaty of the Romish Cardinal Schomberg, and with many apologies, Copernicus ventured to publish it. He was now old and feeble. Patiently he waited at death's door to see a printed copy. At length the long looked-for copy arrived, he saw it, composed himself and died, 1543.

Seven years after the death of Copernicus, was born that strange mortal, Giordano Bruno. For teaching the rotation of the earth he had to flee to Switzerland. But Calvin held power there and Bruno was soon obliged to leave. Driven in succession from England, France and Germany, and, like Noah's dove, finding no rest for the sole of his foot, he at length ventured to return to Italy. He was arrested in Venice, and after eight years of solitary confinement, was burned at Rome, February 16, 1600. When the atrocious sentence was passed upon him, he nobly replied, "Perhaps it is withgreater fear that ye pass this sentence upon me than I receive it."

Meanwhile Galileo was prosecuting his studies at Florence. In May, 1609, he made his first telescope and pointing it toward the heavens saw the satellites of Jupiter and the phases of Venus. These were two of the weightiest arguments that had as yet been presented in favor of the Copernican theory. Already Galileo began to encounter vulgar indignation which accused him of impiety. In 1611, Galileo publicly exhibited the spots upon the sun. This only excited the rage of his persecutors. Goaded by opposition he wrote a letter, in 1613, to the Abbe Castelli, showing that the scriptures were given for our salvation, and not to teach astronomy in particular. This was repeating Bruno's offense. Galileo was brought before the Inquisition, and, after years of imprisonment, only saved his life by denying the great truths he had discovered. He died 1642, in the seventy-eighth year of his age, the prisoner of the Inquisition. But religious bigotry did not end there. It tried to follow him beyond the grave, disputing his right to make a will and denying him burial in consecrated ground. Nor were the leaders of the Protestant cause less bitter.

In reference to Copernicus, Luther declared, "People give ear to an upstart astrologer, who strives to show that the earth revolves;" and again, "This fool (Copernicus) wishes to reverse the whole system of astronomy." Melancthon, in his treatiseInitia Doctrinea Physicae, says, "The eyes are thewitnesses that the heavens revolve about the earth in the space of twenty-four hours," and adds, "Now it is a want of decency to assert publicly the notions of Copernicus;" and Zwingle declares, "The earth can be no where, if not in the center of the universe. It is a part of a good mind to accept the truth as revealed by God, and acquiesce in it." (See Geschichte des Materialismus, Vol. I, page217.)

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