Not until 1773 did one of the more broad-minded cardinals
--Zelanda--succeed in gaining permission that Prof. Minasi should
discuss the Linnaean system at Rome.
And Protestantism was quite as oppressive. In a letter to Eloius,
Linnaeus tells of the rebuke given to science by one of the great
Lutheran prelates of Sweden, Bishop Svedberg. From various parts of
Europe detailed statements had been sent to the Royal Academy of
Science that water had been turned into blood, and well-meaning
ecclesiastics had seen in this an indication of the wrath of God,
certainly against the regions in which these miracles had occurred
and possibly against the whole world. A miracle of this sort
appearing in Sweden, Linnaeus looked into it carefully and found
that the reddening of the water was caused by dense masses of
minute insects. News of this explanation having reached the bishop,
he took the field against it; he denounced this scientific
discovery as "a Satanic abyss" (_abyssum Satanae_), and declared
"The reddening of the water is _not_ natural," and "when God allows
such a miracle to take place Satan endeavours, and so do his
ungodly, self-reliant, self-sufficient, and worldly tools, to make
it signify nothing.
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