THE NEW SCIENCE AND PROSE 165 



Architecture of the world; and make Creation look a little more 

 mathematical; to discover the Globe of Earth to be only a large 

 work in a kind of pastry, and that the Crust parting by Excess 

 of heat, and dropping Piecemeal into the Liquor enclosed, oc 

 casion 'd the Deluge; and that the Stars, which the Vulgar look 

 upon, as so many Lights hung out in a dark Passage, are really 

 so many populous Countries, containing some Millions of Acres in 

 Terra Firma, are the most ingenious Amusements in the 

 World". 77 It was this making an amusement only out of scientific 

 research which he desired to satirize. But he was possessed of 

 the spirit of wit, so that whatever he wrote was sharp and keen. 

 And yet at bottom he was sensible and tolerant, "the wisest, wit 

 tiest, most sensible man of his age". 



More satirical exploitation awaited the new science on the ap 

 pearance of the famous periodicals of the early eighteenth cen 

 tury. The Tatler has devoted several papers to this humor. Num 

 ber 119, for instance, deals with the new discoveries of the micro 

 scope. It seems to be at the beginning a true appreciation of the 

 work of the investigators, but soon the whole interest is turned in 

 to ridicule by a subtle irony. These glasses have revealed a new 

 world, have "opened a new and inexhaustible Magazine of Rarities, 

 more wonderful and amazing than any of those which astonished 

 our forefathers." "There is not the least particle of matter which 

 may not furnish one of us employment for a whole eternity". 

 Daily great crowds flock to witness the dissection of a mite or to 

 see the skeleton of a flea. No longer can the "opening of a dog, to 

 observe the circulation of the blood" astonish, since it is possible 

 to be "present at the cutting of one of those little animals which 

 we find in the blue of plums". As in satiric verse, the contempt 

 for those men who spend their time with contemptible vermin of 

 nature finds expression here. 



The point of the criticism is made clearer in Tatler 216. "I 

 would not discourage any searches that are made into the most 

 minute and trivial parts of Creation. However, since the world 

 abounds in the noblest fields of speculation, it is methinks, the 

 mark of a little genius to be wholly conversant among insects, rep- 



"Arbuthnot's Wks. vol. II, p. 109. 



