sect, in.] * DISSERTATION SECOND. 101 



tions of his own genius, and ascribe to philosophy a per- 

 fection which it may be destined never to attain. He 

 knew, that from what it had not yet done, he could con- 

 clude nothing against what it might hereafter accomplish. 

 But after his method has been followed, as it has now been, 

 with greater or less accuracy, for more than two hundred 

 years, circumstances are greatly changed ; and the impe- 

 diments, which, during all that time, have not yielded in 

 the least to any effort, are perhaps never likely to be re- 

 moved. This may, however, be a rash inference ; Bacon, 

 after all, may be in the right ; and we may be judging un- 

 der the influence of the vulgar prejudice, which has con- 

 vinced men, in every age, that they had nearly reached 

 the farthest verge of human knowledge. This must be left 

 for the decision of posterity ; and we should rejoice to 

 think, that judgment will hereafter be given against the 

 opinion which at this moment appears most probable. 



SECTION III. 



MECHANICKS. 



1. Theory of Motion. 



Before the end of the sixteenth century, mechanical 

 science had never gone beyond the problems which treat 

 of the equilibrium of bodies, and had been able to resolve 

 these accurately, only in the cases which can be easily 

 reduced to the lever. Guido Ubaldi, an Italian mathema- 

 tician, was among the first who attempted to go farther 

 than Archimedes and the ancients had done in such in- 



] • I 



