" Lavater insisted that comets are signs of
death or calamity, and cited proofs from Scripture.
Catholic and Protestant strove together for the glory of this
doctrine. It was maintained with especial vigour by Fromundus, the
eminent professor and Doctor of Theology at the Catholic University
of Louvain, who so strongly opposed the Copernican system; at the
beginning of the seventeenth century, even so gifted an astronomer
as Kepler yielded somewhat to the belief; and near the end of that
century Voigt declared that the comet of 1618 clearly presaged the
downfall of the Turkish Empire, and he stigmatized as "atheists and
Epicureans" all who did not believe comets to be God's warnings.[183]
II. THEOLOGICAL EFFORTS TO CRUSH THE SCIENTIFIC VIEW.
Out of this belief was developed a great series of efforts to
maintain the theological view of comets, and to put down forever
the scientific view. These efforts may be divided into two classes:
those directed toward learned men and scholars, through the
universities, and those directed toward the people at large,
through the pulpits.
Pages:
335
336
337
338
339
340
341
342
343
344
345
346
347
348
349
350
351
352
353
354
355
356
357
358
359