the irrefragable
authority of Scripture. The conjectures of Copernicus and his disciples
were all disposed of by the one solid argument: God's omnipotence can
operate in infinitely various ways. If something appears to our
observation to happen in one particular way, we must not curtail God's
arm, and sustain a thing in which we may be deceived." The irony is
evident.

Rome did not permit the truth about the solar system to be taught till
after the middle of the eighteenth century, and Galileo's books remained
on the Index till 1835. The prohibition was fatal to the study of
natural science in Italy.

The Roman Index reminds us of the significance of the invention of
printing in the struggle for freedom of thought, by making

[91] it easy to propagate new ideas far and wide. Authority speedily
realized the danger, and took measures to place its yoke on the new
contrivance, which promised to be such a powerful ally of reason. Pope
Alexander VI inaugurated censorship of the Press by his Bull against
unlicensed printing (1501). In France King Henry II made printing
without official permission punishable by death. In Germany, censorship
was introduced in 1529. In England, under Elizabeth, books could not be
printed without a license, and printing presses were not allowed except
in London, Oxford, and Cambridge; the regulation of the Press was under
the authority of the Star Chamber. Nowhere did the Press become really
free till the nineteenth century.

While the Reformation and the renovated Roman Church meant a reaction
against the Renaissance, the vital changes which the Renaissance
signified--individualism, a new intellectual attitude to the world, the
cultivation of secular knowledge--were permanent and destined to lead,
amid the competing intolerances of Catholic and Protestant powers, to
the goal of liberty. We shall see how reason and the growth of knowledge
undermined the bases of theological authority. At each step in this
process, in which philosophical speculation, historical

[92] criticism, natural science have all taken part, the opposition
between reason and faith deepened; doubt, clear or vague, increased; and
secularism, derived from the Humanists, and always implying scepticism,
whether latent or conscious, substituted an interest in the fortunes of
the human race upon earth for the interest in a future world. And along
with this steady intellectual advance, toleration gained ground and
freedom won m