FORE:"You don't mean to say he's in it!" Isidore cried, grimly amused. "The cunningest fox in all Europe. Truly the Lalage is a wonderful woman! But I see our friend Dr. Bruce is burning to tell me a story. Pray go on."
FORE:On the way I was stopped by two soldiers, one of whom examined my papers, and, finding that I was a journalist, revealed himself as a colleague, in ordinary times editor of the K?lnische Zeitung. He shook both my hands quite excitedly, glad to meet a colleague, and, better still, one from the "friendly" Netherlands.
FORE:CHAPTER II
THREE:It was Hetty who came back with the second message that the Countess would see her visitor presently in her dressing-room. The girl started as she recognized the features of the detective.
THREE:They were gambling in earnest, there were hundreds of pounds in notes and gold on the dull green cloth. A handsome youth, who was ruining himself and his estate as speedily as possible, sat easy and collected next to a young society lady, whose husband would have been shot rather than see her in such company. A pretty marchioness, the daughter of an American millionaire, was plunging greedily and losing as steadily. Countess Lalage smiled with perfect equanimity as she saw her own counters vanishing. She pushed over two small notes with a little sigh. She did not look as if they were the last she had in the world, but they were.Besides the revival of Platonism, three causes had conspired to overthrow the supremacy of Aristotle. The literary Renaissance with its adoration for beauty of form was alienated by the barbarous dialect of Scholasticism; the mystical theology of Luther saw in it an ally both of ecclesiastical authority and of human reason; and the new spirit of passionate revolt against all tradition attacked the accepted philosophy in common with every other branch of the official university curriculum. Before long, however, a reaction set in. The innovators discredited themselves by an extravagance, an ignorance, a credulity, and an intolerance worse than anything in the teaching which they decried. No sooner was the Reformation organised as a positive doctrine than it fell back for support on the only model of systematic thinking at that time to be found. The Humanists were conciliated by having the original text of Aristotle placed before them; and they readily believed, what was not true, that it contained a wisdom which had eluded mediaeval research. But the great scientific movement of the sixteenth century contributed, more than any other impulse, to bring about an Aristotelian reaction. After winning immortal triumphs in every branch of art and literature, the Italian intellect threw itself with equal vigour into the investigation of physical phenomena. Here Plato could give little help, whereas Aristotle supplied a methodised description of the whole field to be explored, and contributions of extraordinary value towards the under372standing of some, at least, among its infinite details. And we may measure the renewed popularity of his system not only by the fact that Cesalpino, the greatest naturalist of the age, professed himself its adherent, but also by the bitterness of the criticisms directed against it, and the involuntary homage offered by rival systems which were little more than meagre excerpts from the Peripatetic ontology and logic.
