298 THE WORLD MACHINE 



a seemingly infinitesimal error that the solar system is not 

 absolutely stable and in our own day this has given us just 

 that far glimpse backward which the results of the French 

 mathematician seem to refuse. 



But in his own day theory and computation seemed to unite 

 in exhibiting a celestial mechanism so perfect as to be self- 

 sufficient. So Laplace regarded it. There had grown up in 

 France in the eighteenth century a school of philosophers who 

 had undertaken to explain the universe without the aid or 

 intervention of the antique hypotheses as to the origin of the 

 world. They had swept far beyond Voltaire. The apostle of 

 Newtonianism in France is often thought of nowadays as a very 

 godless man ; as a matter of fact he was a sincere deist, and 

 even whilst he lived he had grown to the generation round him 

 very much out of date. 



When the Scotch philosopher Hume visited France a little 

 while before the outbreak of the Revolution, he chanced to 

 remark one evening at dinner that he had never known an 

 atheist hinted even that he regarded such a class as a myth. 



" Monsieur," replied his host, the amiable Baron d'Holbach, 

 " you are at table with seventeen." 



The ideas of Laplace partook of the spirit of the time. There 

 is a famous old anecdote, oft repeated, of his encounter one day 

 with Napoleon. Laplace seems to us at this distance very much 

 of a time-server, very ready to crook the pregnant hinges ; he 

 changed the dedication of his work from king to consul, from 

 consul back again to king, as the times changed, with a com- 

 placency that was admirably serene. -But for once his courage, 

 or his fondness for saying smart things, got the better of his 

 smug compliance. As the anecdote goes, he had presented 

 Napoleon with a copy of his latest work. The Corsican parvenu 

 bore a deal of resemblance to the gallery-playing potentates of 

 a later day, and loved, like these, to disclose the variety of 

 his aptitudes and interests. He said to Laplace : 



" Monsieur, I have examined your work, and I find therein 

 no room for the existence of God." 



" Sire," replied Laplace, " I find no need for such an 

 hypothesis." 



The work of Laplace was largely done in close association 

 with another great French mathematician, a quiet and simple 



