Pioneers of Science

MP3 Audio CD. Pioneers of Science

LECTURE I

COPERNICUS AND THE MOTION OF THE EARTH


The ordinary run of men live among phenomena of which they know nothing
and care less. They see bodies fall to the earth, they hear sounds, they
kindle fires, they see the heavens roll above them, but of the causes
and inner working of the whole they are ignorant, and with their
ignorance they are content.

"Understand the structure of a soap-bubble?" said a cultivated literary
man whom I know; "I wouldn't cross the street to know it!"

And if this is a prevalent attitude now, what must have been the
attitude in ancient times, when mankind was emerging from savagery, and
when history seems composed of harassments by wars abroad and
revolutions at home? In the most violently disturbed times indeed, those
with which ordinary history is mainly occupied, science is quite
impossible. It needs as its condition, in order to flourish, a fairly
quiet, untroubled state, or else a cloister or university removed from
the din and bustle of the political and commercial world. In such places
it has taken its rise, and in such peaceful places and quiet times true
science will continue to be cultivated.