PHYSICAL CONTEMPLATION OF THE UNIVERSE. 47tf 



the gradual development of the science of the Cosmos are, 

 therefore, of very different kinds; viz., investigations into the 

 structure of languages; the deciphering of ancient inscrip- 

 tions and historical monuments in hieroglyphics and arrow- 

 headed writing; the greater perfection of mathematics,, 

 especially of that powerful analytic calculus by which the 

 form of the earth, the ebb and flow of the sea, and the regions 

 of space are brought within the compass of calculation. To> 

 these aids must be further added the material inventions 

 which have procured for us, as it were, new organs, sharpened 

 the power of our senses, and enabled men to enter into a 

 closer communication with terrestrial forces, and even with the 

 remote regions of space. In order to enumerate only a few 

 of the instruments, whose invention characterises great epochs 

 in the history of civilisation, I would name the telescope,, 

 and its too long delayed connection with instruments of mea- 

 surement ; the compound microscope, which furnishes us with the 

 means of tracing the conditions of the process of development 

 of organisms, which Aristotle gracefully designates as "the for- 

 mative activity the source of being;" the compass, and the differ- 

 ent contrivances invented for measuring terrestrial magnetism 

 the use of the pendulum as a measure of time ; the barometer * r 

 the thermometer ; hygrometric and electrometric apparatuses ; 

 and the polariscope, in its application to the phenomena of 

 coloured polarisation, in the light of the stars, or in luminous 

 regions of the atmosphere. 



The history of the physical contemplation of the universe,, 

 which is based, as we nave already remarked, on a meditative- 

 consideration of natural phenomena, on the connection of great 

 events, and on inventions which enlarge the domain of sen- 

 suous perception, can only be presented in a fragmentary and 

 superficial manner, and only in its leading features. I flatter 

 myself with the hope that the brevity of this mode of treat- 

 ment will enable the reader the more readily to apprehend the 

 spirit in which a picture should be sketched, whose limits it is 

 so difficult to define. Here, as in the picture of nature which 

 is given in the former part of this work, it will be my object 

 to treat the subject not with the completeness of an individual- 

 ising enumeration, but merely by the development of leading 

 ideas, that indicate some of the paths which must be pursued 

 by the physicist in his historical investigations. The know- 



