260 On the Fall of Stones from the Clouds. 



wished, however, that the author had contrived to make us a little' 

 more acquainted with the opinions of foreign writers on the sub- 

 ject of aerolites, particularly the English and Germans. He 

 aeems to us to have hit upon a happy idea, in the division of his 

 work into sections, which refer to the aera at which such and 

 such opinions prevailed. TIuis, he shows us how much down to 

 the sixth aera the puljlic opinion varied as to the reality of the 

 phaenomenon of aerolites, and how much in early times the 

 marvellous accounts of the falls of stones were exaggerated by 

 •uperstition, frequently becoming- religious and accredited my- 

 steries. When the sciences began once more to flourish, their 

 followers were so much prejudiced against phajnomena which 

 seemed to them so much at variance with the laws of nature, 

 that they disdain to pay any attention to tliem ; whereas the 

 historians of that time have recorded a fact of the kind, of which 

 the Emperor Maximilian was an eye witness*. But at a period 

 when every thing which could not be accounted for by reason 

 passed for an invention of superstition, the learned sought to 

 annihilate by specious reasoning, the rcaHty of a fact which the 

 authority of ages could not make them believe, because they 

 could not conceive it. Nevertheless, in the midst of those dis* 

 putes, which the great name of Gassendi f could not terminate, 

 there fell a great quantity of stones at Luce in 1/68, in the very 

 heart of France ; and notwithstanding this fact, the evidence 

 of which is indisputable, the Academy of Sciences persisted ii> 

 regarding it as one of those popular prejudices which were un* 

 worthy the notice of men of science. New falls of stones which 

 took place in India attracted the attention of the learned, but 

 still without triumphing over prejudice ; and it required no les$ 

 than the great quantity of aerolites which fell at I'Aigle, and at 

 the very gates of Paris, to convince every one finally of the reality 

 of this singular phenomenon. From the above time (1803) 

 observations have been so much multiplied, that there is no 

 fact at present better supported. This phsenomenon is even so 

 common, and so frequent, that on seeing it recur at periods sd 

 near each other, we are still more inclined to regard them aj, 

 formed in our atmosphere. However the case may be, it is 

 easy to perceive, from the rapid sketch which we have drawn, 

 that the history of aerolites is connected with that of our errori^ 

 and our prejudices, and that it is even interwoven with the hia* 

 tory of the world. 



* On the 7th of November 1499, near Ensishcira, an aerolite fell neas 

 this prince at the moment when at the head of his army he was about to 

 give battle to the French army. 



t Gassendi gave an account of the aerolite vyhich fell on the S7th o§ 

 iii»veva.ber 16HJ on Mouut Vaisor in Piovence^ 



XLII. 0?» 



