That some of his utterances of this sort
made him enemies is doubtless true, but the charges on which St.
Bonaventura silenced him, and Jerome of Ascoli imprisoned him,
and successive popes kept him in prison for fourteen years, were
"dangerous novelties" and suspected sorcery.
Sad is it to think of what this great man might have given to
the world had ecclesiasticism allowed the gift. He held the key
of treasures which would have freed mankind from ages of error
and misery. With his discoveries as a basis, with his method as
a guide, what might not the world have gained! Nor was the wrong
done to that age alone; it was done to this age also. The
nineteenth century was robbed at the same time with the
thirteenth. But for that interference with science the
nineteenth century would be enjoying discoveries which will not
be reached before the twentieth century, and even later.
Thousands of precious lives shall be lost, tens of thousands
shall suffer discomfort, privation, sickness, poverty,
ignorance, for lack of discoveries and methods which, but for
this mistaken dealing with Roger Bacon and his compeers, would
now be blessing the earth.
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