06 Notices respecting Neio Books. 



tinction under unfavourable influences. It searches for the causes 

 inherent in their organization, by which; of two similar, yet not 

 identical creatures, the one has tbe power to battle with varied and 

 very different forces, and to maintain a vitality which braves alike 

 the freezing cold of the poles and the feverish warmth of the equator, 

 to spread its individuals over more than half the globe. Whilst the 

 other, distinguished it may be from its congener by some apparently 

 slight and useless difference, — though the mark be an indelible brand 

 by which nature has stamped that member of her flock, and that one 

 only, — is incapable of assuming protean variations, or of enduring 

 even a slight change in the physical conditions under which it first 

 appeared. It enjoys a fleeting existence during a short segment of 

 time, dies out ere it has spread beyond a mere speck on the earth's 

 surface, disappearing never to reappear ; — perchance, if it belonged 

 to some primaeval fauna, never to become known to man with all his 

 research, unless some bony or shelly frame-work gave consistence to 

 its otherwise perishable substance." 



The lecture is full of passages of exceeding force and beauty, and 

 evinces a power of illustration which, without once forsaking the 

 precision of science, is almost poetic. Speaking of the service to be 

 rendered by the naturalist to the designer, the lecturer concludes as 

 follows : — " What is ornamental art but the isolation and embodi- 

 ment in Works of human skill of the beauty that is diffused through 

 all the works of God ? And that beauty lies not merely in the bulk 

 of objects, nor on their surface, but is as manifest in every part and 

 atom composing" them as in the combined whole. It is in itself com- 

 posite ; the combination, not of lesser, but of minuter beauties. To 

 imitate— to approach — we must attempt a like arrangement, in order 

 to obtain the same exquisite result. And how, except through 

 earnest and scientific study, can we attain the knowledge that shall 

 enable us to discover the pathway leading towards perfection ?" 



The fourth lecture, on the Importance of cultivating Habits of 

 Observation, was delivered by Professor Hunt, Keeper of Mining 

 Records. 



In illustration of his subject, he refers to the observation of Thales, 

 that rubbed amber attracted light bodies ; to the discoveries of Gal- 

 vani and CErsted ; to the attempts made to turn magnetism to 

 account as a motive power ; to Faraday's discovery of induced cur- 

 rents ; to the discovery of the planet Neptune ; to the steam-engine : 

 to the researches of Boutigny on the spheroidal condition of bodies ; 

 and to the glass used to protect the plants in the palm-house in Kew 

 Gardens. In his remarks on lightning-conductors, we cannot help 

 thinking that the lecturer, in recoiling from one error, has fallen 

 into another equal and opposite. The author concludes his discourse 

 with the following quotation : — 



" Divine Philosophy ! 

 Not harsh and crabbed as dull fools suppose, 

 But musical as is Apollo's lute, 

 And a perpetual feast of nectar'd sweets 

 Where no crude surfeit reigns." 



