300 THE ADDRESSES, LECTURES, ETC., OF 



tion of Harcourfc, but was again disregarded ; and now, once more, 

 only a few months since, a philosopher on the other side of the 

 Atlantic brings back to the birthplace of Newton his forgotten 

 and almost despised work of 200 years ago. 



Quoting from Dr. Sterry Hunt's paper : 



"Newton in his Hypothesis imagines ' an ethereal medium 

 much of the same constitution with air, but far rarer, subtler, and 

 more elastic.' * But it is not to be supposed that this medium is 

 one uniform matter, but composed partly of the main phlegmatic 

 body of ether, partly of other various ethereal spirits, much after 

 the manner that air is compounded of the phlegmatic body of air 

 intermixed with various vapours and exhalations.' Newton further 

 suggests in his Hypothesis that this complex spirit or ether, which, 

 by its elasticity, is extended throughout all space, is in continual 

 movement and interchange. * For Nature is a perpetual circula- 

 tory worker, generating fluids out of solids, and solids out of 

 fluids ; fixed things out of volatile, and volatile out of fixed ; 

 subtile out of gross, and gross out of subtile ; some things to 

 ascend and make the upper terrestrial juices, rivers, and the atmo- 

 sphere, and by consequence others to descend for a requital to the 

 former. And as the earth, so perhaps may the sun imbibe this 

 spirit copiously, to conserve his shining, and keep the planets from 

 receding farther from him; and they that will may also suppose that 

 this spirit affords or carries with it thither the solary fuel and 

 material principle of life, and that the vast ethereal spaces between 

 us and the stars are for a sufficient repository for this food of the 

 sun and planets.' ' Thus, perhaps, may all things be originated 

 from ether.' ' : 



If at the time of Newton chemistry had been understood as it 

 now is, and if moreover he had been armed with that most 

 wonderful of all modern scientific instruments, the spectroscope, 

 the direct outcome of his own prismatic analysis, there appears to 

 be no doubt that the author of the laws of gravitation would have 

 so developed his thoughts upon solar fuel, that they would have 

 taken the form rather of a scientific discovery than of a mere 

 speculation. 



Our proof that interstellar space is filled with attenuated matter 

 does not rest however solely upon the uncertain ground of specu- 

 lation. We receive occasionally upon our earth celestial visitors 



