introduction: 



nature, another is then seen growing with an 

 equal growth — a system of unproven, and, in 

 part, entirely mistaken empirical knowledge. 

 Embracing but few particulars, this kind of 

 empiricism is the more presuming, because of 

 its utter ignorance of the facts by which it is 

 assailed. Shut up within itself, it is unchan- 

 ging in its axioms, and arrogant, like every thing 

 else that is restricted ; whilst enlightened nat- 

 ural science, inquiring, and therefore doubting, 

 goes on separating the firmly established from 

 the merely probable, and perfects itself daily 

 through the extension and correction of its 

 views. 



The crude heap of physical dogmas which 

 one age transmits to and forces upon another, 

 is not merely injurious because it cherishes in- 

 dividual errors, because it obstinately presents 

 indifferently observed facts for acceptance ; it 

 does more than this, it opposes every thing like 

 grand or comprehensive views of the fabric of 

 the universe. Instead of investigating the me- 

 dium point about which, despite the apparent 

 unfettered aspect of nature, all phenomena os- 

 cillate within narrow limits, it takes cognizance 

 of the exceptions only to the law ; it seeks for 

 other wonders in phenomena and forms than 

 those of regulated and progressive develop- 

 ment. It is ever disposed to presume the train 

 of natural sequence interrupted, to overlook in 

 the present all analogy with the past, and, tri- 

 fling with the subject, to discover the cause of 

 some fancied disturbance now in the depths of 

 the vault of heaven, now in the interior of the 

 globe we inhabit. It leads away from that com- 

 parative geognosy which Ritter's great and 

 masterly work has shown can only acquire any 

 thing like completeness when the whole mass 

 of facts, which have been collected in all the 

 climates of the earth, comprehended at a glance, 

 stands marshalled at the disposal of the combi- 

 ning intellect. 



It is one of the objects of these discourses 

 upon nature, to correct a portion of the errors 

 which have sprung from rude and imperfect 

 empiricism, and continue to live on among the 

 upper classes of society, associated frequently 

 with distinguished literary tastes and acquire- 

 ments, and thereby to increase the relish for 

 nature by giving a clearer, a deeper, insight into 

 her constitution. The want of such an enno- 

 bled relish for nature is generally felt ; for a 

 peculiar character of the age we live in, is pro- 

 claimed in the tendency among all the educated 

 classes to enhance the pleasures of existence 

 by adding to the store of ideas. The lively in- 

 terest which is taken in these prelections bears 

 vv^itness to the prevalence of such a disposition. 



I cannot, therefore, yield any place in my 

 mind to the solicitude to which either a certain 

 narrowness of understanding, or a kind of sen- 

 timental dulness, appears to lead — the solici- 

 tude, namely, that nature loses aught of her 

 magic, of her charms in respect of mysterious- 

 ness and grandeur, by inquiries into the inti- 

 mate constitution of her forces. The forces of 

 nature, indeed, only operate magically, in the 

 legitimate sense of the word, shrouded, as it 

 were, in the gloom of some mysterious power, 

 when their workings lie beyond the bounda- 

 ries of generally ascertained natural conditions. 

 The observer who determines the diameters of 



the planets with a heliometer, or a prism of 

 double refracting sparC^"), who measures the 

 meridian altitudes of the same star for a series 

 of years, who discovers telescopic comets 

 amidst thickly aggregated nebulous spots, does 

 not, probably, feel his fancy more excited than 

 the descriptive botanist, whilst he is counting 

 the divisions in the calyx and corolla of a flow- 

 er, or is ascertaining, in the structure of a moss, 

 the state of distinctness or coalescence of the 

 teeth that surround the seed capsule ; but meas- 

 urements of angles, and the development of 

 numerical relations, the careful observation of 

 the Individual, prepares the mind for the loftier 

 knowledge of nature as a whole, and leads to 

 the discovery of the laws that rule the universe. 

 To the natural philosopher, who, like Young, 

 and Arago, and Fresnel, measures the undula- 

 tions of unequal length, the interferences of 

 which strengthen or weaken the ray of light ; 

 to the astronomer, who, by the space-piercing 

 power of his telescope, studies the satellites of 

 Uranus on the outermost verge of our system, 

 or, like Herschel, South, and Struve, detects 

 glimmering points of brighter light in the col- 

 oured double stars ; to the initiated eye of the 

 botanist, who perceives the circular movements 

 of the sap-globules so conspicuous in the Charas, 

 in almost all vegetable cells, and who finds unity 

 of formation, in other words, enchainment of 

 forms, in species and natural families — these 

 cultivated intellects surely look into the depths 

 of heaven, as they survey the flower-clad sur- 

 face of the earth, with a grander eye, than the 

 observer whose intellectual vision is not yet 

 sharpened by any apprehension of the enchain- 

 ment of phenomena. We cannot, therefore, as- 

 sent to the proposition of the eloquent Burke, 

 M'hen he says, that " out of the uncertainty of 

 the nature of things alone, do admiration and 

 the feeling of sublimity arise." 



Whilst vulgar sense conceives the stars in- 

 laid in a crystalline vault, the astronomer actu- 

 ally extends the bounds of space ; for if he cir- 

 cumscribes the cluster of stars, of which our 

 sun is one, it is only that he may show others 

 and others, a countless multitude of groups of 

 suns, the infinite depths of space, till vision fails, 

 still studded with astral systems like our own. 

 The feeling of the sublime, in so far as it seems 

 to spring from the simple contemplation of in- 

 finite space, is closely allied to that rapt mood 

 of the mind which, in the realm of the spiritual, 

 in abstract converse with our own conscious- 

 ness, arises from the meditation of the endless 

 and the free. Upon this affinity, this relation- 

 ship of sensuous impressions, depends the ma- 

 gic, the feeling of infinitude, which we experi- 

 ence when we are gazing over the shoreless 

 ocean, surrounding some isolated mountain 

 peak, or are penetrating the depths of heaven- 

 ly space with the telescope, and resolving neb- 

 ulous specks into their constituent stars ; no- 

 thing impresses the cultivated imagination more 

 powerfully than spectacles like these. 



One-sided treatment of the physical sciences, 

 endless accumulation of the raw material, might 

 indeed appear to countenance the now almost 

 superannuated objection, that scientific knowl- 

 edge must of necessity chill the feelings, quench 

 the creative light of fancy, and so interfere with 

 the enjoyment of nature. But he who counte- 



