INTRODUCTION. 27 



and in certain caves, the bones of elephants, hyenas, and 

 lions. An intimate acquaintance with the physical pheno- 

 mena of the universe leads us to regard the products of warm 

 latitudes that are thus found in a fossil condition* in northern 

 regions, not merely as incentives to barren curiosity, but as 

 subjects awakening deep Deflection, and opening new sources 

 of study. 



The number and the variety of the objects I have alluded 

 to, give rise to the question whether general considerations of 

 physical phenomena can be made sufficiently clear to per- 

 sons, who have not acquired a detailed and special know- 

 ledge of descriptive natural history, geology, or mathematical 

 astronomy ? I think we ought to distinguish here between 

 him, whose task it is to collect the individual details of 

 various observations, and study the mutual relations existing 

 amongst them, and him to whom these relations are to be 

 revealed, under the form of general results. The former 

 should be acquainted with the specialities of phenomena, 

 that he may arrive at a generalization of ideas as the result, 

 at least in part, of his own observations, experiments, and 

 calculations. It cannot be denied, that where there is an 

 absence of positive knowledge of physical phenomena, the 

 general results which impart so great a charm to the study of 

 nature cannot all be made equally clear and intelligible to 

 the reader, but still I venture to hope, that in the work 

 which I am now preparing on the physical laws of the 

 universe, the greater part of the facts advanced can be made 

 manifest without the necessity of appealing to fundamental 

 views and principles. The picture of nature thus drawn, 

 notwithstanding the want of distinctness of some of its out- 

 lines, will not be the less able to enrich the intellect, enlarge 

 the sphere of ideas, and nourish and vivify the imagination. 



There is, perhaps, some truth in the accusation advanced 

 against many German scientific works, that they lessen the 

 value of general views by an accumulation of detail ; and do 

 not sufficiently distinguishing between those great results 

 which form, as it were, the beacon lights of science, and the 

 long series of means by which they have been attained. This- 

 method of treating scientific subjects led the most illustrious 

 of our poets* to exclaim with impatience "The Germans 



* Gothe, in Die Aphorismcn uber Naturwissenschaft, bd. L., s. 155. 

 (Werke kleine Ausyabe, von 1833.) 



