Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 36.djvu/600

582 time went on, it required to be braced somewhat, and in 1692 Wedelius, Professor of Medicine at Jena, chose as the subject of his inaugural address "The Physiology of the Destruction of Sodom and of the Statue of Salt."

It is a masterly example of "sanctified science." At great length he dwells on the characteristics of sulphur, salt, and thunderbolts; mixes up scriptural texts, theology, and chemistry after a most bewildering fashion; and finally comes to the conclusion that a thunderbolt, flung by the Almighty, calcined the body of Lot's wife, and at the same time vitrified its particles into a glassy mass looking like salt.

By such demonstrations as these of Quaresmio and Wedelius the theological view of the myth seemed fastened upon the world forever.

Not only was this view demonstrated, so far as theologico-scientific reasoning could demonstrate anything, but it was clearly shown, by a continuous chain of testimony from the earliest ages, that the salt statue at Usdum had been recognized as the body of Lot's wife by Jews, Mohammedans, and the universal Christian Church, "always, everywhere, and by all."

Under the influence of teachings like these—and of the winter rains—new wonders began to appear at the salt pillar. In 1661 the Franciscan monk Zwinner published his travels in Palestine, and gave not only all the old myths regarding the salt statue, but a new one, in some respects more striking than any of the old—for he had heard that a dog, also transformed into salt, was standing by the side of Lot's wife.

Even the more solid Benedictine scholars were carried away, and we find in the "Sacred History" by Prof. Metzger, of the Order