NOTES TO PRECEDING SECTION. 



1 (p. J*.)— The " Margarita philosophica" of the Carthu- 

 «i»n prior of Freiburg, Gregorius Reisch, first appeared un- 

 der the title of " Aepitome omnis Philosophic, alias Mar- 

 garita philosophica tractans <3e omni genere scibili," vide 

 the Heidelberg edition of 1486, and that of Strasburg of 

 1504. In the Freiburg edition of that year, and in the 

 twelve following editions, which appeared in the short in- 

 terval till 1535, the first part of the title was omitted. This 

 work exercised a great influence on the diffusion of mathe- 

 matical and physical knowledge at the beginning of the 16th 

 century ; and Chasles, the learned author of the " Aperfu 

 historique des m^thodes en g6om6trie" (1837), has shown 

 now important is Reisch's Encyclopedia for the mathemat- 

 ical history of the middle ages. I have endeavoured, by 

 means of a passage of the " Margarita philosophica," and 

 which only occurs in the edition of 1513, to unravel the im- 

 portant relations of Hylacomilus (Martin Waldseemiiller) 

 the geographer of St. Di6, who first (1507) named the New 

 Continent America, with Amerigo Vespucci, with Reng 

 King of Jerusalem and Duke of Lorraine, and with the cel- 

 ebrated editions of Ptolemy of 1513 and 1522. Vide my 

 '* Examen critique de la g6ographie du nouveau Continent, et 

 des progres de I'astrononiie nautique aux 15e et 16e siecles," 

 torn. iv. pp. 99—125. 



3 (p. 17.)— Ampere, "Essai sur la Phil, des Sciences," 

 1834, p. 25. Whewell's Inductive Philos., vol. ii. p. 277 ; 

 Fark's Pantology, p. 87. 



3 (p. 17.) — All changes of state in the material world are 

 reduced to motions. Aristot. Phys. ausc. iii. 1 and 4, pp. 

 200—201 ; Bekker, viii. 1, 8, and 9, pp. 250, 262, 265; De 

 g«ner. et corr. ii. 10, p. 336 ; Pseudo- Aristot. de mundo, cap. 

 ▼i. p. 398. 



•* (p. 19.) — Respecting the question raised by Newton of 

 the difference between mass-attraction and that a# mole- 

 cules, vide Laplace's " Exposit. du syst. du monde," p. 384, 

 and in the " Supplement au livre x. de la m6canique eel." 

 pp. 3, 4. — (Kant's Metaphysical Elements of Natural Phi- 

 losophy, in collective Works, 1839, vol. v. p. 309 ; Peclet's 

 Physique, 1838, torn. i. pp. 59—63.) 



6 (19.) — Poisson, in Conn, des terns pour I'ann^e 1836, 

 pp. 64 — 66 ; Bessel, in Poggendorff 's Annalen der Physik, 

 vol. XXV. p. 417 ; Encke, in £erlia Academy's Transactions, 

 1826, p. 257: Mitscherlich's Man. of Chemistry, 1837, vol. 

 i. p. 352. 



6 (p. 19.) — Compare Otfried Miiller'n Dorians, vol. i. p. 

 365. 



7 (p. 19.) — " Geographia generalis in qua affectiones gen- 

 erates telluris explicantur." The oldest Amsterdam edition 

 (Elzevir) is of 1650 ; the second of 1672, and the third of 

 1681, were edited by Newton. This all-important work of 

 Varenius is a Physical Geography in its proper sense. 

 Since the excellent description of the New Continent by 

 the Jesuit, Joseph da Acosta (Historia natural de las Indias, 

 1590), never had the telluric phenomena been so generally 

 contemplated. Acosta is richer in individual observations ; 

 Varenius embraces a greater circle of ideas— his residence 

 in Holland, then the centre of the Commerce of the world, 

 having connected him with many intelligent travellers. 

 *' Generalis sive universalis Geographia dicitur, quae tellu- 

 rem in genere considerat atque affectiones explicat, non 

 habita particularium regionum ratione." Varenius's Uni- 

 versal Geography ( Pars absoluta, cap. i . — xxii .) is altogeth- 

 er a comparative one, although the author uses the term 

 Geographia comparativa (cap. ixxiii.— xl.) in a much more 

 restricted meaning. The remarkable parts are the enu- 

 meration of mountain- systems and reflections, or the rela- 

 tions of their directions with the whole continents (pp. 66- 

 76, ed. Cantab. 1681); the list of the active and extinct 

 volcanoes ; the conjunction of results on the division of isl- 

 ands and island groups (p. 220) ; on the depth of the ocean 

 compared with the height of the coast (p. 103) ; on the 

 equal levels of the surface of all open seas (p. 97) ; on the 

 currents as dependent on the prevailing winds, the unequal 

 saltness of the sea, and the configuration of the coasts (p. 

 139) ; the directions of the wind as resulting from differ- 

 ences of temperature, <fec. Excellent likewise are the con- 

 siderations on the general equinoctial current, from east to 

 west, as the cause of the gulf-stream which begins at Cape 

 St. Augustine and breaks forth between Cuba and Florida 

 (p. 140). The directions of tlie current along the Western 

 African coast, between Cape Verd and the island of Fer- 

 nando Po in the gulf of Guinea, are most accurately de- 



scribed. Varenius considers sporadic islets to be " the ele- 

 vated ocean-bed ;"— " magna spiritum inclusorum vi, sicut 

 aliquando montes e terra protrusos esse quidam scribunt" 

 (p. 215). The edition of 1681, by Newton (auctior et emen- 

 datior), unfortunately has no additions by this great man. 

 There is no mention of the spheroidal flattened figure of the 

 earth, although Richer's pendulum experiments were pub 

 lished nine years before the Cambridge edition, but New 

 ton's " Principia mathematica philosophise naturalis" was 

 only communicated in manuscript to the Royal Society in 

 1686. There is much uncertainty about the native country 

 of Varenius. According to Jocher, he was born in Eng- 

 land ; according to the " Biographic Universelle" (torn, 

 ilvii. p. 495), in Amsterdam : hut the dedication of the 

 Universal Geography to the burgomasters of this city show? 

 that both assertions are equally false. Varenius expressly 

 says that he had fled to Amsterdam, *' his native town hav- 

 ing been burnt to ashes and completely destroyed in the 

 long war." These words appear to refer to Northern Ger- 

 many, and the ravages of the 30 Years' War. Varenius 

 likewise remarks, in the dedication of his " Descriptio Reg- 

 ni Japonicae" (Amst. 1649) to the Hamburg Senate, that he 

 had made his first studies at the Hamburg Gymnasium. It 

 is probably incontrovertible that this acute geographer was 

 a German, and, moreover, of Liineburg. (Witten's M6m. 

 Theol. 1685, p. 2142 ; Zedler's Universal Lexicon, 1745, 

 part xlvi. p. 187.) 



8 (20.)— Charles Ritter's Geography in relation to Nature 

 and the History of Man, or general comparative geography. 



9 (20.) — KotTfiog, in its original and proper meaning, sig- 

 nified ornament (for men, women, and horses) ; figuratively, 

 order, tvralia, and ornament of speech. The ancients unan- 

 imously assure us that Pythagoras was the first to employ 

 this word in the sense of order of the world, or world itself. 

 Not having written himself, the earliest proofs are in the 

 fragments of Philolaus (Stob. Eclog. pp. 360, 460 ; Heeren's 

 Philolaos, by Boeckh, pp. 62, 90). We do not cite Timaeus 

 of Locrus, his authenticity being doubtful. Plutarch (de 

 plac. phil. ii. 1) decidedly says that Pythagoras was the 

 first to call the whole universe Cosmos, by reason of the or- 

 der observed therein : (likewise Galen, hist. phil. p. 429). 

 In its new meaning, the word passed from the philosophical 

 school to the poets of nature and the prosaists. Plato con- 

 tinues to call the celestial bodies Uranos ; but he still styles 

 the order of the world Cosmos : and, in the Timaeus (p. 30, 

 B.), the universe is called a soul-endowed animal (Kofffioi 

 i,ioov efiif/vxov) . Compare, on the immaterial world-arran- 

 ging spirit, Anaxagoras Claz. (ed. Shaubach, p. Ill) and 

 Plutarch (op, cit. ii. 3). With Aristotle (de Caelo, i. 91>, 

 Cosmos is, " World and its Arrangement ;" is is also con- 

 sidered as specially divisible into the sublunary world, and 

 the higher above the moon (Meteor, i. ii. 1, and i. iii. 13, 

 pp. 339, a, and 340, b, Bekk.). The definition of Cosmos, 

 cited by me in the text, is from the " Pseudo- Aristoteles de 

 Mundo," (cap. ii. p. 391), namely: icoa/xjf tan avanjua i^ 

 ov^avov Kai y^j /cat rwv Iv Tovroti irepiexoi^ivtav (pvaeuiv. 

 AtycTat it Kqi tTipo)! KoayLOif) twv SXiav Td\ii re Kai 6iaK6a' 

 (trjaii, Ito dcu}v re Kat 6ta Otiov 0ugarTO//fv»;. Most passages 

 of the Greek writers, on Cosmos are collected — 1. In Rich- 

 ard Bentley's polemical pamphlet against Charles Boyle 

 (Opuscula philologica, 1781, pp. 347, 445 ; Dissertation upon 

 the Epistles of Phalaris, 1817, p. 254) on the historical ex- 

 istence of Zaleucus, the Locrian legislator : 2. In Noeke's 

 excellent Sched. crit. 1812, pp. 9—15 : and 3. In Theop. 

 Schmidt ad Cleom. cycl. theor. met. I. i. pp. ix. 1, 99. The 

 closer meaning of Cosmos was likewise used in the plural 

 (Plut. i. 5), as, either every star (celestial body) was so 

 called (Stob. i. p. 514 ; Plut. ii. 31), or many singular sys- 

 tens (world-islands) were assumed in infinite space, each 

 having a sun and moon (Anaxag. Claz. fragm. pp. 89, 93, 

 120 ; Brandis's History of Graeco- Roman Philosophy, voL i. 

 p. 252). As each group became a Cosmos, the universe rd 

 Ttdv receives a higher signification distinct from Cosmos 

 (Plut. ii. 1). The last word is used for the Earth only a 

 long time after the Ptolemaic age. Bockh has communica- 

 ted inscriptions in praise of Trajan and Hadrian (Corp. 

 Insc. Graec. torn. i. Nos- 334, 1306), wherein Koaixog is used 

 for oiKOVfiivrj, just as we often understand by world only 

 the earth. The above-mentioned strange threefold division 

 of space into Olympus, Cosmos, and Uranos, (Stob. i. p. 

 488; Philolaos, pp. 94—102) refers to the different regions 

 which surround the hearth of the universe, the Pythagorean 



