Post by Admin on Oct 9, 2016 10:11:18 GMT
CHAP. XI.
Of the Mathematicks in general.
IT is now time to discourse of the Mathematicks, surely the most certain of all the Arts. Yet all of them chiefly consist in the Opinions of their Teache•s who have got the most credit; yet in their several Opinions have committed sundry Errors, which Al∣bumazar among the rest acknowledges, saying, That the Ancients long after Aristotles time did not right∣ly understand the Mathematicks: And that though all these Arts are chiefly invented for the understan∣ding of Figures, Number, and Motion; yet are their Professors forc'd to confess, that there was never any Figure yet found, either according to Art or Nature perfectly Spherical. And though these Arts have been the occasion of little or no Heresie in the Church; yet St. Austin saith, That they avail nothing at all to
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Salvation; and that they do rather lead men into Er∣ror, and take men off from the Contemplation of true Divinity: and as St. Hierome observes, are not the Sciences of Piety.
Of the Mathematicks in general.
IT is now time to discourse of the Mathematicks, surely the most certain of all the Arts. Yet all of them chiefly consist in the Opinions of their Teache•s who have got the most credit; yet in their several Opinions have committed sundry Errors, which Al∣bumazar among the rest acknowledges, saying, That the Ancients long after Aristotles time did not right∣ly understand the Mathematicks: And that though all these Arts are chiefly invented for the understan∣ding of Figures, Number, and Motion; yet are their Professors forc'd to confess, that there was never any Figure yet found, either according to Art or Nature perfectly Spherical. And though these Arts have been the occasion of little or no Heresie in the Church; yet St. Austin saith, That they avail nothing at all to
Page 50
Salvation; and that they do rather lead men into Er∣ror, and take men off from the Contemplation of true Divinity: and as St. Hierome observes, are not the Sciences of Piety.