Italian scientific societies.  Once firmly established in the north of Italy, Science soon extended her sway over the entire peninsula.  The increasing number of her devotees is indicated by the rise and rapid multiplication of learned societies.  These were reproductions of the Moorish ones that had formerly existed in Granada and Cordova.  As if to mark by a monument the track through which civilizing influences had come, the Academy of Toulouse, founded in 1345, has survived to our own times.  It represented, however, the gay literature of the south of France, and was known under the fanciful title of “the Academy of Floral Games.”  The first society for the promotion of physical science, the Academia Secretorum Naturae, was founded at Naples, by Baptista Porta.  It was, as Tiraboschi relates, dissolved by the ecclesiastical authorities.  The Lyncean was founded by Prince Frederic Cesi at Rome; its device plainly indicated its intention:  a lynx, with its eyes turned upward toward heaven, tearing a triple-headed Cerberus with its claws.  The Accademia del Cimento, established at Florence, 1657, held its meetings in the ducal palace.  It lasted ten years, and was then suppressed at the instance of the papal government; as an equivalent, the brother of the grand-duke was made a cardinal.  It numbered many great men, such as Torricelli and Castelli, among its members.  The condition of admission into it was an abjuration of all faith, and a resolution to inquire into the truth.  These societies extricated the cultivators of science from the isolation in which they had hitherto lived, and, by promoting their intercommunication and union, imparted activity and strength to them all.

Returning now from this digression, this historical sketch of the circumstances under which science was introduced into Europe, I pass to the consideration of its manner of action and its results.

Intellectual influence of science.  The influence of science on modern civilization has been twofold:  1.  Intellectual; 2.  Economical.  Under these titles we may conveniently consider it.

Intellectually it overthrew the authority of tradition.  It refused to accept, unless accompanied by proof, the dicta of any master, no matter how eminent or honored his name.  The conditions of admission into the Italian Accademia del Cimento, and the motto adopted by the Royal Society of London, illustrate the position it took in this respect.

It rejected the supernatural and miraculous as evidence in physical discussions.  It abandoned sign-proof such as the Jews in old days required, and denied that a demonstration can be given through an illustration of something else, thus casting aside the logic that had been in vogue for many centuries.

In physical inquiries, its mode of procedure was, to test the value of any proposed hypothesis, by executing computations in any special case on the basis or principle of that hypothesis, and then, by performing an experiment or making an observation, to ascertain whether the result of these agreed with the result of the computation.  If it did not, the hypothesis was to be rejected.