It throws great light upon sundry
claims by modern theologians to take charge of public instruction
and of the evolution of science. So important was it thought to
have "sound learning" guarded and "safe science" taught, that
in many of the universities, as late as the end of the seventeenth
century, professors were forced to take an oath not to hold the
"Pythagorean"--that is, the Copernican--idea as to the movement of
the heavenly bodies. As the contest went on, professors were
forbidden to make known to students the facts revealed by the
telescope. Special orders to this effect were issued by the
ecclesiastical authorities to the universities and colleges of
Pisa, Innspruck, Louvain, Douay, Salamanca, and others. During
generations we find the authorities of these Universities boasting
that these godless doctrines were kept away from their students. It
is touching to hear such boasts made then, just as it is touching
now to hear sundry excellent university authorities boast that they
discourage the reading of Mill, Spencer, and Darwin.
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