St. Thomas Aquinas, the great
light of the universal Church in the thirteenth century, whose
works the Pope now reigning commends as the centre and source of
all university instruction, accepted and handed down the same
opinion. The sainted Albert the Great, the most noted genius of the
medieval Church in natural science, received and developed this
theory. These men and those who followed them founded upon
scriptural texts and theological reasonings a system that for
seventeen centuries defied every advance of thought.[175]
The main evils thence arising were three: the paralysis of
self-help, the arousing of fanaticism, and the strengthening of
ecclesiastical and political tyranny. The first two of these
evils--the paralysis of self-help and the arousing of
fanaticism--are evident throughout all these ages. At the
appearance of a comet we constantly see all Christendom, from pope
to peasant, instead of striving to avert war by wise statesmanship,
instead of striving to avert pestilence by observation and reason,
instead of striving to avert famine by skilful economy, whining
before fetiches, trying to bribe them to remove these signs of
God's wrath, and planning to wreak this supposed wrath of God upon
misbelievers.
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