48 COSMOS. 



therefore, begin with the description of the heavenly bodies, 

 and with a geographical sketch of the universe, or I would 

 rather say, a true map of the world, such as was traced by the 

 bold hand of the elder Herschel. If, notwithstanding the 

 smallness of our planet, the most considerable space and the 

 most attentive consideration be here afforded to that which 

 exclusively concerns it, this arises solely from the dispropor- 

 tion in the extent of our knowledge of that which is accessible 

 and of that which is closed to our observation. This subordina- 

 tion of the celestial to the terrestrial portion is met with in 

 the great work of Bernard Yarenius,* which appeared in the 

 middle of the seventeenth century. He was the first to dis- 

 tinguish between general and special geography, the former of 

 which he subdivides into an absolute, or properly speaking, 

 terrestrial part, and a relative or planetary portion, according 



* Geographia Generalis in qua affectiones generates telluris expli- 

 cantur. The oldest Elzevir edition bears date 1650, the second 1672, 

 and the third 1681; these were published at Cambridge, under New- 

 ton's supervision. This excellent work by Varenius is, in the true 

 sense of the words, a physical description of the earth. Since the work 

 Hist aria Natural de las Indias, 1590, in which the Jesuit Joseph de 

 Acosta sketched in so masterly a manner the delineation of the New 

 Continent, questions relating to the physical history of the earth have 

 never been considered with such admirable generality. Acosta is richer 

 in original observations, while Varenius embraces a wider circle of ideas, 

 since his sojourn in Holland, which was at that period the centre of vast 

 commercial relations, had brought him in contact with a great number of 

 well-informed travellers. Generalis sive Universalis Geographia dicitur 

 qua* tellurem in genere considerat atque affectiones eocplicat, non habita 

 particularium regionum ratione. The general description of the earth by 

 Varenius (Pars Absoluta, cap. i. xxii.) may be considered as a treatise 

 of comparative geography, if we adopt the term used by the author him- 

 self (Geographia. Compurativa, cap. xxxiii. XL.), although this must be 

 understood in a limited acceptation. We may cite the following amongst 

 the most remarkable passages of this book ; the enumeration of the 

 systems of mountains ; the examination of the relations existing between 

 their directions and the general form of continents (pp. 66, 76, Ed. 

 Cantab., 1681); a list of extinct volcanoes, and such as were still in a 

 state of activity ; the discussion of facts relative to the general distribution 

 of islands and archipelagoes (p. 220) ; the depth of the ocean relatively 

 to the height of neighbouring coasts (p. 103); the uniformity of kvel 

 observed in all open seas (p. 97); the dependence of currents on the 

 prevailing winds; the unequal saltness of the sea; the configuration of 

 shores (p. 139); the direction of the winds as the result of differences of 

 temperature, &c. We may further instance the remarkable considera- 



