A CELESTIAL MIRROR. 103 



Would he not have been met with the reproach which Horace, 

 in his Ars Poetica, so epigrammatically formulates ? 



"Pictoribus atque poetis 

 Quidlibet audendi semper fuit sequa potestas." 



An equal licence ever was accorded 

 To poet as to painter, that he might 

 The boldest sweeps of fancy still essay 1 



As for men of science, they would not have condescended 

 to honour even with a smile such strange and fantastic words. 



Let us suppose, now, that our poetical astronomer, thus 

 contemned, had addressed his scientific censors in some such 

 language as the following : 



Do not think, illustrious sirs, that it is by a purely poetical 

 licence I call the firmament a mirror in which the earth may 

 be seen reflected. Only, to prevent all equivoque, we must 

 understand one another. The mirror to which I am alluding 

 does not reflect light, but movement. It is in a particular 

 movement of the stars that the true figure of our planet is 

 reflected, is revealed to us. But before the human mind can 

 appreciate this movement, especially before it can discover 

 the cause, we must be prepared to devote ourselves to cen- 

 turies of assiduous effort. In this long interval, philosophers 

 of every class will allow unrestricted scope to their imagination. 



Shall we, then, recall some of these opinions, some of 

 these truly poetical licences ? 



Homer and Hesiod represented the earth as a disc, or as 

 a flat rondel, surrounded on all sides by a winding river which 

 they called the Ocean, and which, in the extreme East, com- 



