and basilisk in profane
writings. Hence such contributions to knowledge as that the basilisk
kills serpents by his breath and men by his glance, that the lion when
pursued effaces his tracks with the end of his tail, that the pelican
nourishes her young with her own blood, that serpents lay aside their
venom before drinking, that the salamander quenches fire, that the hyena
can talk with shepherds, that certain birds are born of the fruit of a
certain tree when it happens to fall into the water, with other masses
of science equally valuable.

As to the method of bringing science to bear on Scripture, the
Physiologus gives an example, illustrating the passage in the book of
Job which speaks of the old lion perishing for lack of prey. Out of
the attempt to explain an unusual Hebrew word in the text there came a
curious development of error, until we find fully evolved an account of
the "ant-lion," which, it gives us to understand, was the lion mentioned
by Job, and it says: "As to the ant-lion, his father hath the shape of
a lion, his mother that of an ant; the father liveth upon flesh and the
mother upon herbs; these bring forth the ant-lion, a compound of both
and in part like to either; for his fore part is like that of a lion and
his hind part like that of an ant. Being thus composed, he is neither
able to eat flesh like his father nor herbs like his mother, and so he
perisheth."

In the middle of the thirteenth century we have a triumph of this
theological method in the great work of the English Franciscan
Bartholomew on The Properties of Things. The theological method as
applied to science consists largely in accepting tradition and in
spinning arguments to fit it. In this field Bartholomew was a master.
Having begun with the intent mainly to explain the allusions in
Scripture to natural objects, he soon rises logically into a survey of
all Nature. Discussing the "cockatrice" of Scripture, he tells us: "He
drieth and burneth leaves with his touch, and he is of so great venom
and perilous that he slayeth and wasteth him that nigheth him without
tarrying; and yet the weasel overcometh him, for the biting of the
weasel is death to the cockatrice. Nevertheless the biting of the
cockatrice is death to the weasel if the weasel eat not rue before. And
though the cockatrice be venomous without remedy while he is alive,
yet he looseth all the malice when he is burnt to ashes. His ashes be
accounted profitable in working of