INTRODUCTION.
When Galilæo discovered the phases of Venus through his telescope, he was cast into prison by the tribunal of the Inquisition.—He was cast into prison, as Milton in his Areopagitica has well described it, only for differing in astronomy from the Franciscan and Dominican monks.—Imperfect as the state of science was in the age of that great philosopher, it was nevertheless believed to be at its fullest maturity, and it has always been so considered from Noah's flood to the present hour; the pride of man will scarcely enable him to accept the most manifest evidence of his senses, when brought into collision with the most manifest errors which time has sanctioned; and until ignorance shall be fairly pushed from her stool by the main force of truth, she will continue
