without a certain beauty and use--as let Spenser's "Faerie Queen"
bear witness--till the latter half of the seventeenth century.

After that time a rapid change began. It is marked by--it has been
notably assisted by--the foundation of our own Royal Society. Its
causes I will not enter into; they are so inextricably mixed, I
hold, with theological questions, that they cannot be discussed
here. I will only point out to you these facts: that, from the
latter part of the seventeenth century, the noblest heads and the
noblest hearts of Europe concentrated themselves more and more on
the brave and patient investigation of physical facts, as the source
of priceless future blessings to mankind; that the eighteenth
century which it has been the fashion of late to depreciate, did
more for the welfare of mankind, in every conceivable direction,
than the whole fifteen centuries before it; that it did this good
work by boldly observing and analysing facts; that this boldness
towards facts increased in proportion as Europe became indoctrinated
with the Jewish literature; and that, notably, such men as Kepler,
Newton, Berkeley, Spinoza, Leibnitz, Descartes, in whatsoever else
they differed, agreed in this, that their attitude towards Nature
was derived from the teaching of the Jewish sages. I believe that
we are not yet fully aware how much we owe to the Jewish mind, in
the gradual emancipation of the human intellect. The connection may
not, of course, be one of cause and effect; it may be a mere
coincidence. I believe it to be a cause; one of course of very many
causes: but still an integral cause. At least the coincidence is
too remarkable a fact not to be worthy of investigation.

I said, just now--The emancipation of the human intellect. I did
not say--Of science or of the scientific intellect; and for this