250 M. Agass'iz, Rcvherches sur les Pomona Fossiles. 



compensation, when they shall have attained a certain fixed limit j a fact 

 from whence La Place was enabled to draw a sure proof of the harmony 

 and stability of the whole. 



These irregularities, which are the necessary result of the general order 

 which reigns throughout, and which shew the stability of the physical 

 world, will be considered by the moralist as analogous to certain other 

 irregularities, observed by him in the moral world. 



The objection, such as it is, which may be thought to bear upon 

 the astronomical ])art of this volume, does in no degree apply to the 

 remainder, in which the other physical sciences are developed. Meteor- 

 ology, Acoustics, Optics, the laws of Heat and its influence on life. 

 Electricity ordinary and voltaic. Magnetism, and the various sciences with 

 which it is so intimately connected, will be found clearly and concisely 

 explained, and the present state and prospects of each, and the strong indi- 

 cations of uniformity in the cause, especially of many of the latter, set forth. 



The whole of this portion of the volume is quite within the reach of any 

 mind capable of attention, and cannot be understood without giving real 

 pleasure. 



Even to those whose minds, from want of education, arc incapable of 

 mathematical reasoning, or whose habits and dispositions do not lead them 

 to earn the expansion of intellect with which the acquisition of any one 

 abstruse science is accompanied, may nevertheless enjoy the grand and 

 compendious view of human knowledge exhibited in this volume, they may 

 ascend by this royal road, and behold traced out before them those regions 

 where all is grace and beauty, correspondence and symmetry, the work of 

 the greatest energy, directed by the highest wisdom. 



" These formulae," observes Mrs. Somerville, in conclusion, after enu- 

 merating the leading points of connexion between the sciences, daily be- 

 coming more closely united by the common bond of analysis, 



"These formulse, emblematic of omniscience, condense into a few symbols the ira- 

 tnutable laws of the universe. This mighty instrument of humar power, itself 

 originates in the primitive constitution of the human mind, and rests upon a few 

 fundamental axioms, which have eternally existed in Him who implanted them in 

 the breast of man, when he created him after his own image." 



Recherches sur les Poiswns Fossiles, par L. Agassiz, Atr'ihne livraison, 

 1835. {Rapport sur les Poissons Fossiles d6cuuverls depuis la publication 

 de la troisieme Iwraison.J 



In a former number of this Journal we mentioned the visit of M. Agassiz 

 to this city, and the success with which his researches were rewarded ; and 

 we then pro])Osed to ourselves to defer any lengthened notice of his system 

 of classification until the whole of the above work should have appeared : 

 that period has not yet arrived, but as the present fasciculus contains the 

 report of M. Agassiz' labours in this country, we shall lay before our 



