nature and of human life which lay outside the writings of the ancients. This "bookishness" formed a real defect of Renaissance systems of training. A Moravian bishop named Comenius, who gave his long life almost wholly to teaching, stands for a reaction against humanistic education. He proposed that the vernacular Comenius, tongues, as well as the classics, should be made 1592-1671 subjects of study. For this purpose he prepared A.D. a reading book, which was translated into a dozen European languages, and even into Arabic, Persian, and Turkish. Comenius also believed that the curriculum should include the study of geography, world history, and government, and the practice of the manual arts. He was one of the first to advocate the teaching of science. Perhaps his most notable idea was that of a national system of education, reaching from primary grades to the university. "Not only," he writes, "are the children of the rich and noble to be drawn to school, but all alike, rich and poor, boys and girls, in great towns and small, down to the country villages." The influence of this Slavic teacher is more and more felt in modern systems of education. 216. The Scientific Renaissance Humanism and science The Middle Ages were not by any means ignorant of science,1 but its study naturally received a great impetus when the Renaissance brought before educated men all that the Greeks and Romans had done in mathematics, physics, astronomy, medicine, and other subjects. The invention of printing also fostered the scientific revival by making it easy to spread knowledge abroad in every land. The pioneers of Renaissance science were Italians, but students in France, England, Germany, and other countries soon took up the work of enlightenment. The names of some Renaissance scientists stand as landmarks in the history of thought. The first place must be given to Copernicus, the founder of modern astronomy. He was a 1 See page 572. Copernicus, 1473-1543 A.D. Pole, but lived many years in Italy. Patient study and calculation led him to the conclusion that the earth turns upon its own axis, and, together with the planets, revolves around the sun. The book in which he announced this conclusion did not appear until the very end of his life. A copy of it reached him on his deathbed. Medieval astronomers had generally accepted the Ptolemaic system. Some students before Copernicus had indeed sug The Copernican theory about a central sun, but he first gave reasons for such a belief. The new theory met much opposition, not only in the universities, which clung to the time-honored Ptolemaic system, but also among theologians, who thought that it contradicted many statements in the Bible. Moreover, people could not easily reconcile themselves to the idea that the earth, instead of being the center of the universe, is only one member of the solar system, that it is, in fact, only a mere speck of cosmic dust. gested that the earth and planets might rotate Galileo, 1564-1642 A.D. An Italian scientist, Galileo, made one of the first telescopes it was about as powerful as an opera glass — and turned it on the heavenly bodies with wonderful results. He found the sun moving unmistakeably on its axis, Venus showing phases according to her position in relation to the sun, Jupiter accompanied by revolving moons, or satellites, and the Milky Way composed of a multitude of separate stars. Galileo rightly believed that these discoveries confirmed the theory of Copernicus. Another man of genius, the German Kepler, worked out the mathematical laws which govern the movements of the planets. Kepler, 1571- He made it clear that the planets revolve around the sun in elliptical instead of circular orbits. Kepler's investigations afterwards led to the discovery of the principle of gravitation. 1630 A.D. Two other scientists did epochal work in a field far removed from astronomy. Vesalius, a Fleming, who studied in Italian 1 See page 133. medical schools, gave to the world the first careful description of the human body based on actual dissection. Vesalius, He was thus the founder of human anatomy. 1514-1564 Harvey, an Englishman, after observing living ani- A.D., and mals, announced the discovery of the circulation of 1578-1657 the blood. He thereby founded human physiology. Harvey, A.D. Copernicus, Galileo, Kepler, Vesalius, Harvey, and their fellow workers built up the scientific method. In the Middle Ages students had mostly been satisfied to accept The what Aristotle and other philosophers had said, scientific without trying to prove their statements.1 Kepler, method for instance, was the first to disprove the Aristotelian idea that, as all perfect motion is circular, therefore the heavenly bodies must move in circular orbits. Similarly, the world had to wait many centuries before Harvey showed Aristotle's error in supposing that the blood arose in the liver, went thence to the heart, and by the veins was conducted over the body. The new scientific method rested on observation and experiment. Students learned at length to take nothing for granted, to set aside all authority, and to go straight to nature for their facts. As Lord Bacon,2 one of Shakespeare's contemporaries and a severe critic of the old scholasticism, declared, "All depends on keeping the eye steadily fixed upon the facts of nature, and so receiving their images simply as they are, for God forbid that we should give out a dream of our own imagination for a pattern of the world." Modern science, to which we owe so much, is a product of the Renaissance. 217. The Economic Renaissance Thus far the Renaissance has been studied as an intellectual and artistic movement, which did much to liberate the human mind and brought the Middle Ages to an end in An economic literature, in art, and in science. It is necessary, change however, to consider the Renaissance era from another point of 1 See page 571. Not to be confused with his countryman, Roger Bacon, who lived in the thirteenth century. See page 573. view. During this time an economic change of vast significance was taking place in rural life all over western Europe. We refer to the decline and ultimate extinction of medieval serfdom. Serfdom imposed a burden only less heavy than the slavery which it had displaced. The serf, as has been shown,1 might Decline of serfdom not leave the manor in which he was born, he might not sell his holdings of land, and, finally, he had to give up a large part of his time to work without pay for the lord of the manor. This system of forced labor was at once unprofitable to the lord and irksome to his serfs. After the revival of trade and industry in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries had brought more money into circulation, the lord discovered how much better it was to hire men to work for him, as he needed them, instead of depending on serfs who shirked their tasks as far as possible. The latter, in turn, were glad to pay the lord a fixed sum for the use of land, since now they could devote themselves entirely to its cultivation. Both parties gained by an arrangement which converted the manorial lord into a landlord and the serf into a free tenantfarmer paying rent. The "Black Death " The emancipation of the peasantry was hastened, strangely enough, as the result of perhaps the most terrible calamity that has ever afflicted mankind. About the middle of the fourteenth century a pestilence of Asiatic origin, now known to have been the bubonic plague, reached the West. The "Black Death," so called because among its symptoms were dark patches all over the body, moved steadily across Europe. The way for its ravages had been prepared by the unhealthful conditions of ventilation and drainage in towns and cities. After attacking Greece, Sicily, Italy, Spain, France, and Germany, the plague entered England in 1349 A.D. and within less than two years swept away probably half the population of that country. The mortality elsewhere was enormous, one estimate setting it as high as twenty-five millions for all Europe. A similar plague devastated the Roman world during the reign of Justinian. Effects of the "Black Death" The pestilence in England, as in other countries, caused a great scarcity of labor. For want of hands to bring in the harvest, crops rotted on the ground, while sheep and cattle, with no one to care for them, strayed through the deserted fields. The free peasants who survived demanded and received higher wages. Even the serfs, whose labor was now more valued, found themselves in a better position. The lord of a manor, in order to keep his laborers, would often allow them to substitute money payments for personal services. When the serfs got no concessions, they frequently took to flight and hired themselves to the highest bidder. 1351 A.D. The governing classes of England, who at this time were mainly landowners, believed that the workers were taking an unfair advantage of the situation. So in 1351 First Statute A.D. Parliament passed a law fixing the maximum of Laborers, wage in different occupations and punishing with imprisonment those who refused to accept work when it was offered to them. The fact that Parliament had to reenact this law thirteen times within the next century shows that it did not succeed in preventing a general rise of wages. It only exasperated the working classes. The 1381 A.D. A few years after the first Statute of Laborers the restlessness and discontent among the masses led to a serious outbreak. It was one of the few attempts at violent revolution which the English working people have made. Peasants' One of the inspirers of the rebellion was a wander- Rebellion, ing priest named John Ball. He went about preaching that all goods should be held in common and the distinction between lords and serfs wiped away. "When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the gentleman?" asked John Ball. Uprisings occurred in nearly every part of England, but the one in Kent had most importance. The rioters marched on London and presented their demands to the youthful king, Richard II. He promised to abolish serfdom and to give them a free pardon. As soon, however, as Richard had gathered an army, he put down the revolt |