64 COSMOS. 



state and prospective development of phenomena constitute 

 the sole objects of direct investigation, which does not venture 

 to depart from the strict rules of induction. But although 

 the incessant effort to embrace nature in its universality may 

 remain unsatisfied, the history of the contemplation of the 

 universe (which will be considered in another part of this 

 work) will teach us how, in the course of ages, mankind has 

 gradually attained to a partial insight into the relative depen- 

 dence of phenomena. My duty is to depict the results of our 

 knowledge in all their bearings with reference to the present. 

 In all that is subject to motion and change in space, the 

 ultimate aim, the very expression of physical laws depend 

 upon mean numerical values; which show us the constant 

 amid change, and the stable amid apparent fluctuations of 

 phenomena. Thus the progress of modern physical science 

 is especially characterised by the attainment and the rectifi- 

 cation of the mean values of certain quantities by means of 

 the processes of weighing and measuring. And it may be said, 

 that the only remaining and widely diffused hieroglyphic 

 characters still in our writing numbers appear to us again, 

 as powers of the Cosmos, although in a wider sense than that 

 applied to them by the Italian School. 



The earnest investigator delights in the simplicity of nu- 

 merical relations, indicating the dimensions of the celestial 

 regions, the magnitudes and periodical disturbances of the 

 heavenly bodies, the triple elements of terrestrial magnetism, 

 the mean pressure of the atmosphere, and the quantity of 

 heat which the sun imparts in each year, and in every season 

 of the year, to all points of the solid and liquid surface of our 

 planet. These sources of enjoyment do not, however, satisfy 

 the poet of nature, or the mind of the inquiring many. To 

 Doth of these the present state of science appears as a blank, 

 now that she answers doubtingly, or wholly rejects as un- 

 answerable, questions, to which former ages deemed they 

 could furnish satisfactory replies. In her severer aspect, and 

 clothed with less luxuriance, she shows herself deprived of 

 that seductive charm with which a dogmatising and symbo- 

 lising physical philosophy knew how to deceive the under- 

 standing and give the rein to imagination. Long before the 

 discovery of the new world, it was believed that new lands in 

 the far West might be seen from the shores of the Canaries 



