CHAPTER VII

THE PROGRESS OF RATIONALISM

(NINETEENTH CENTURY)

MODERN science, heralded by the researches of Copernicus, was founded in
the seventeenth century, which saw the demonstration of the Copernican
theory, the discovery of gravitation, the discovery of the circulation
of the blood, and the foundation

[177] of modern chemistry and physics. The true nature of comets was
ascertained, and they ceased to be regarded as signs of heavenly wrath.
But several generations were to pass before science became, in
Protestant countries, an involuntary arch-enemy of theology. Till the
nineteenth century, it was only in minor points, such as the movement of
the earth, that proved scientific facts seemed to conflict with
Scripture, and it was easy enough to explain away these inconsistencies
by a new interpretation of the sacred texts. Yet remarkable facts were
accumulating which, though not explained by science, seemed to menace
the credibility of Biblical history. If the story of Noah’s Ark and the
Flood is true, how was it that beasts unable to swim or fly inhabit
America and the islands of the Ocean? And what about the new species
which were constantly being found in the New World and did not exist in
the Old? Where did the kangaroos of Australia drop from? The only
explanation compatible with received theology seemed to be the
hypothesis of innumerable new acts of creation, later than the Flood. It
was in the field of natural history that scientific men of the
eighteenth century suffered most from the coercion of authority.
Linnaeus felt it in Sweden, Buffon