Summary: The rationalistic empiricism of Francis Bacon, Galileo, Newton and Descartes overthrew the spiritual ethos that had prevailed for more than a thousand years. Indeed the Church had stifled empirical investigation as ungodly for so long, this can be considered an equal and opposite reaction. The revolution was so complete that the spiritual world never recovered its authority. Science and technology however, may be headed down the same path as the medieval churchmen.

The reverence of modern man for rationalism, logic and empiricism has an impressive tradition, one that includes Plato and St. Augustine. Using logic, nothing seemed impossible in the time of the medieval Scholastics. Thomas Aquinas' Summa Contra Gentiles (1259) was considered to have countered all opposing criticisms of the church. The analytical logic of Aristotle, the syllogism and deductive reasoning, served in the Middle Ages as essential tools for the dominance of religion. Though religion was was supplanted by science, or "natural philosophy", the logical methods of both were closely related.

It is hardly surprising that in the hands of empiricists like Galileo, Francis Bacon, and Isaac Newton, these tools were sharpened and used for dethroning spirituality as the purpose of life. Where rational discourse had for so long been the servant of academics, aristocrats and priests, in the scientific revolution it became the master. Not only was there a revolution against spirituality, there was a parting of the ways, and religion had little subsequent influence on the rise of science.