e same sciences
were developed largely indeed by observation of what is, but still more
by speculation on what ought to be. From the former of these two great
men came into Christian theology many germs of medieval magic, and from
the latter sundry modes of reasoning which aided in the evolution of
these; yet the impulse to human thought given by these great masters
was of inestimable value to our race, and one legacy from them was
especially precious--the idea that a science of Nature is possible, and
that the highest occupation of man is the discovery of its laws. Still
another gift from them was greatest of all, for they gave scientific
freedom. They laid no interdict upon new paths; they interposed no
barriers to the extension of knowledge; they threatened no doom in this
life or in the next against investigators on new lines; they left the
world free to seek any new methods and to follow any new paths which
thinking men could find.

This legacy of belief in science, of respect for scientific pursuits,
and of freedom in scientific research, was especially received by the
school of Alexandria, and above all by Archimedes, who began, just
before the Christian era, to open new paths through the great field of
the inductive sciences by observation, comparison, and experiment.(267)

(267) As to the beginnings of physical science in Greece, and of
the theological opposition to physical science, also Socrates's view
regarding certain branches as interdicted to human study, see Grote's
History of Greece, vol. i, pp. 495 and 504, 505; also Jowett's
introduction to his translation of the Timaeus, and Whewell's History
of the Inductive Sciences. For examples showing the incompatibility of
Plato's methods in physical science with that pursued in modern times,
see Zeller, Plato and the Older Academy, English translation by Alleyne
and Goodwin, pp. 375 et. seq. The supposed opposition to freedom of
opinion in the Laws of Plato, toward the end of his life, can hardly
make against the whole spirit of Greek thought.

The establishment of Christianity, beginning a new evolution of
theology, arrested the normal development of the physical sciences for
over fifteen hundred years. The cause of this arrest was twofold: First,
there was created an atmosphere in which the germs of physical science
could hardly grow--an atmosphere in which all seeking in Nature for
truth as truth was regarded as futile. The general belief derived