Had not such men as Roger Bacon and his long line
of successors been thwarted by theological authority,--had not
such men as Thomas Aquinas, Vincent of Beauvais, and Albert the
Great been drawn or driven from the paths of science into the
dark, tortuous paths of theology, leading no whither,--the world
to-day, at the end of the nineteenth century, would have arrived
at the solution of great problems and the enjoyment of great
results which will only be reached at the end of the twentieth
century, and even in generations more remote. Diseases like
typhoid fever, influenza and pulmonary consumption, scarlet
fever, diphtheria, pneumonia, and _la grippe_, which now carry off
so many most precious lives, would have long since ceased to
scourge the world.
Still, there is one cause for satisfaction: the law
governing the relation of theology to disease is now well before
the world, and it is seen in the fact that, just in proportion as
the world progressed from the sway of Hippocrates to that of the
ages of faith, so it progressed in the frequency and severity of
great pestilences; and that, on the other hand, just in
proportion as the world has receded from that period when
theology was all-pervading and all-controlling, plague after
plague has disappeared, and those remaining have become less and
less frequent and virulent.
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