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HISTORICAL VIEW OF THE

SECTION III.

THE STATE OF SCIENCE DURING THE AGE OF THE ROMANEMPIRE TO THE PERIOD OF ITS DISSOLUTION.

Physical Science among the Romans.

A very slight acquaintance with the literature of theRomans suffices to show that in that nation so eminentin war, in polite literature, and civil policy, there pre-vailed at all times a remarkable indisposition to thepursuit of mathematical and physical science. Whenthe treasures of Greek literature were opened to theincipient curiosity of Rome , reposing from her earliertriumphs, the works of the poets, orators, and moralphilosophers of that country, were sought with avidityand studied with ardour; whilst those of the geometersand astronomers were totally neglected: and thesesciences, so highly estimated in the country which gavethem birth, were not merely disregarded in Italy , buteven considered beneath the attention of a man of goodbirth and liberal education : they were imagined to par-take of a mechanical, and therefore servile, character.The practical results were seen to be made use of bythe mechanical artist, and the abstract principles weretherefore supposed to be, as it were,, contaminated byhis touch. This unfortunate peculiarity in the taste ofhis countrymen is remarked by Cicero . And it maynot he irrelevant to enquire, whether similar prejudicesdo not prevail to some extent even among ourselves ;and whether the exclusive attachment to classical studies,and the cultivation of the Roman literature, as the solebasis of the education of the higher classes, may not bethe source from which such prejudices are too commonlyimbibed.

Nevertheless it must in fairness be admitted, that thereare instances in some of the Roman authors of better