INTRODUCTION. 



SCIENCE, regarded as the pursuit of truth, must ever .afford 

 occupation of consummate interest, and subject of elevated 

 meditation. The contemplation of the works of creation ele- 

 vates the mind to the admiration of whatever is great and 

 noble; accomplishing the object of all study, which, in the 

 eloquent language of Sir James Mackintosh, " is to inspire 

 the love of truth, of wisdom, of beauty especially of good- 

 ness, the highest beauty and of that supreme and eternal 

 Mind, which contains all truth and wisdom, all beauty and 

 goodness. By the love or delightful contemplation and pur- 

 suit of these transcendent aims, for their own sake only, the 

 mind of man is raised from low and perishable objects, and 

 prepared for those high destinies which are appointed for all 

 those who are capable of them." 



Astronomy affords the most extensive example of the con- 

 nection of the physical sciences. In it are combined the 

 sciences of number and quantity, of rest and motion. In it 

 we perceive the operation of a force which is mixed up with 

 everything that exists in the heavens or on earth ; which 

 pervades every atom, rules the motions of animate and inani- 

 mate beings, and is as sensible in the descent of a rain drop 

 as in the falls of Niagara ; in the weight of the air, as in the 

 periods of the moon. Gravitation not only binds satellites to 

 their planet, and planets to the sun, but it connects sun with 

 sun throughout the wide extent of creation, and is the cause of 

 the disturbances, as well as of the order of nature : since every 

 tremor it excites in any one planet is immediately transmitted 



