AUTHOR'S PREFACE 



TO THE 



SECOND AND THIRD EDITIONS. 



THE twofold aim of the present work (a carefully prepared and 

 executed attempt to enhance the enjoyment of Nature by animated 

 description, and at the same time to increase in proportion to the 

 state of knowledge at the time the reader's insight into the harmo- 

 nious and concurrent action of different powers and forces of Nature) 

 was pointed out by me nearly half a century ago in the Preface to 

 the First Edition. In so doing, I alluded to the various obstacles 

 which oppose a successful treatment of the subject in the manner 

 designed. The combination of a literary and of a purely scientific 

 object the endeavor at once to interest and occupy the imagination, 

 and to enrich the mind with new ideas by the augmentation of 

 knowledge renders the due arrangement of the separate parts, and 

 the desired unity of composition, difficult of attainment. Yet, not- 

 withstanding these disadvantages, the public have long regarded my 

 imperfectly executed undertaking with friendly partiality. 



The second edition of the " Ansichten der Natur" was prepared 

 by me in Paris in 1826; and at the same time two fresh treatises 

 were added one an Essay on the Structure and Mode of Action of 

 Volcanos in different regions of the earth; and the other on the 

 " Vital Power,/' bearing the title "Lebenskraft; oder der rhodische 

 Genius." During my long stay at Jena, Schiller, in the recollec- 

 tion of his youthful medical studies, loved to converse with me on 

 physiological subjects; and the considerations in which I was then 

 engaged on the muscular and nervous fibres when excited by con- 



