The intellectual attack made on existing opinions by the French Revolution was not of a scientific, but of a literary character; it was critical and aggressive.

But Science has never been an aggressor.

She has always acted on the defensive, and left to her antagonist the making of wanton attacks.

Nevertheless, literary dissent is not of such ominous import as scientific; for literature is, in its nature, local--science is cosmopolitan.
If, now, we demand, What has science done for the promotion of modern civilization; what has it done for the happiness, the well-being of society?
we shall find our answer in the same manner that we reached a just estimate of what Latin Christianity had done.

The reader of the foregoing paragraphs would undoubtedly infer that there must have been an amelioration in the lot of our race; but, when we apply the touchstone of statistics, that inference gathers precision.