•66 Reflcd'iQ}}! on the new Planet, 



anJ gave full fcope to bis ardent imagination, thought he had 

 niade a great difcoverv by fuppoling that the five regular 

 bodies would fit exaftly into the vacaity between the fix 

 planets known at that time; and their difiances indeed, ac- 

 cording to the lated obfcrvations, correipond very well with 

 this rule. But unfortunately, as ha^ been remarked by pro- 

 feflbr Wurm, Euclid and Kature left no regular body for 

 Uranus; and I may add, that none remains for Hera: fo 

 that Kepler's ingenious idea falls at once to the ground. 



Should the queflion propoled on the difcovcry of Uranus 

 be here afked — Why was not this planet difcovered long 

 ago ? vi'e might give the fame anfwer to it as given by Lich- 

 tenberg *, who confidercd it of the fame kmd as that of 

 Lelio's fervant in Leihng's Treafure, who wiflied to know- 

 why his father had returned on a certain day, and not a year 

 fooner or later; which he thout:;ht would have been much 

 lei's incomprehenfible. 



The moll natural way is, as profefior Bode has done in his 

 . Illuftration of Alironomy, to conjecture that this planet, 

 being fmaller than Mars, and at aconfiderablediftance beyoud 

 it, reflccSls too little light from its furface ; and hence it has 

 . efcapcd the keeneft-fighted obfervers. But who knows what 

 the nature of its furface may be ? We are acquainted with 

 celeltidl bodies which exhibit different colours, iliades of red 

 and (rreen ; as for example Mars, and the double (lar y in 

 Andromeda, the light of which incrcafes and dccrcafes; and 

 others which even difappear from our view. 



Kant and Wunfch, in their Cofmologlcal papers, aflcrt 

 therefore that this planet does not exift by itfelf, but that it 

 is incorporated with Jupiter ; which is therefore of greater 

 . fi5?e than it ou^ht to be according to tiie fuppofed rule, and con- 

 . fequently fupplies the place of two planets. Kant afcribes the 

 , fmall fize of Mars, and its want of iatellites, to the fame caufe. 

 But this hypothelis was not necelfary to explain the invifibility 

 of this planet, as it can be done in a much beirer manner, and 

 more agreeable to the laws of nature. How long did Uranus 

 remain concealed from our fight ! And yet it was not only 

 in the heavens, but, as we now know, was feen and ohfcrved 

 30, 30, and 90 years before Herfchel's difcovcry of it, by a 

 French, a German, and an Englifh altronomer. Howjlieu 

 could profciior W^unlch, in the fecond edition ot his Cofmo- 

 locical Converfalions, publilhed in 1791 f, confequenlly tea 

 years after the difcovcry of Uranus, alTc the following quef- 

 ition: " What kind of a body mu(l that be which, tliough 



'■■ Guttiiig. Tafchenbuth, 17 S3. ■}• Vol.! > -^^ 



