Page:Jesuit Education.djvu/677

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APPENDIX I.
657

the Variétes Sinologiques, whose scholarly character has been frequently attested to by the foremost orientalists. Father Zottoli was engaged for thirty years in writing a gigantic Chinese dictionary. The ablest of his pupils are now completing this work. (See Kölnische Volkszeitung, Wochenausgabe, January 1, 1903.)

Some readers may be surprised at the list of Jesuit writers – we have enumerated only a small fraction of the number of scholars that well deserve to be known better than is the case –, and ask why so little is said about them in works that treat of the history of the various sciences. It is not because their works are not of great importance for science. The explanation may be found in a remarkable utterance of the celebrated Kepler, the prince of astronomers: "Alas for prejudice and hatred! If a Jesuit writes anything, it is completely ignored by the adherents of Scaliger." Allusion is made to the famous controversy on chronology between the Protestant Scaliger and the Jesuit Petavius (see page 160). The same may be said of many another scientific discussion. Kepler himself, though a Protestant, was not afraid of being a friend of Jesuit scholars, nor of asking their opinion on many of the important questions which he was investigating. (See Johann Kepler, der Gesetzgeber der neueren Astronomie, by Adolph Müller, S. J., Professor of astronomy in the Gregorian University in Rome [Herder, 1903]; see especially chapters 12 and 17, and page 166.)

Chapter VIII.

The Recent Educational Troubles in France.

On page 265 it is said that the non-Catholic view of the Jesuits is not based on historical facts, but