As alchemy in its first form, seeking for
the philosopher's stone and the transmutation of metals, had
given way to alchemy in its second form, seeking for the elixir
of life and remedies more or less magical for disease, so now
the latter yielded to the search for truth as truth. More and
more the "solemnly constituted impostors" were resisted in
every field. A great line of physicists and chemists began to
appear.[404b]
II.
Just at the middle of the seventeenth century, and at the very
centre of opposition to physical science, Robert Boyle began the
new epoch in chemistry. Strongly influenced by the writings of
Bacon and the discoveries of Galileo, he devoted himself to
scientific research, establishing at Oxford a laboratory and
putting into it a chemist from Strasburg. For this he was at
once bitterly attacked. In spite of his high position, his
blameless life, his liberal gifts to charity and learning, the
Oxford pulpit was especially severe against him, declaring that
his researches were destroying religion and his experiments
undermining the university.
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