267 



" 4. Although the quantity of a solar tropical year is 

 a conclusion in astronomy, yet such an unhappy fatality 

 has attended this 'research, for almost two thousand 

 years past, that whoever examines the vast variety of 

 opinions, must see nothing has yet been determined with 

 certainty. So th.it instead of a precise aud established 

 definition, he finds liltle more than this general account, 

 that the quantity of the natural year has been long and 

 much sought after, but with small success : so that it 

 seems at this day to remain among the yet undiscovered 

 secrets of nature. 



" Indeed to know this with ail exactness, one would 

 think no more is needful than to examine the tables of 

 observations. Let us tl>en examine that made by Tycho 

 Brahe, in queeit Elizabeth's time, and that J)y doctor 

 Bradley a hundred and seventy years after. But in Ty* 

 clio's table of twelve terminations, seven of them differ 

 a minute from the other five. And this difference per- 

 plexes the conclusion, and leaves it in a state of uncertain- 

 ty. Proceed we then to Dr. Bradlcy's tables. But thea; 

 leave a latitude of twenty-one minutes. Thus we see 

 how imperfect the knowledge even of the solar tropical 

 year still is, and that no true judgment can be formed 

 concerning it, either from observation or tabular calcu- 

 lation. 



" 5. It requires no small skill, even to determine the 

 distances of the sun's four stations, at the vernal and 

 autumnal equinox, and the summer and winter sol- 

 stice. Nay, it is a question whether this determination 

 likewise must not still be reckoned among the secrets of 

 nature. 



" And if we should correct the tables of these by 

 Dr. Xeil's rule, yet this very correction leaves as four dif- 

 ferent measures according to the majority of Tyrho 

 Brali e's corrections, according to Sir Isaac Newton's, Dr. 

 Halley's, and Dr. Bradley's corrections. So that still we 

 come to no certainty, oven as to the solar stations. We 

 are at attend, like a traveller, who arriving at a place 



VOL. III. N 



