SEQUEL TO THE EPOCH OF NEWTON. 453 



different forms, bad been, that it was true ; nor bad tbe most persever 

 ing cross-examiuation been able to establish any thing of contradiction 

 or prevarication. The same question was also to be put to the Earth 

 and the Ocean, and we must briefly notice the result. 



According to the Newtonian principles, the form of the earth must 

 be a globe somewhat flattened at tbe poles. This conclusion, or at 

 least the amount of the flattening, depends not only upon the existence 

 and law of attraction, but upon its belonging to each particle of the 

 mass separately ; and thus the experimental confirmation of the form 

 asserted from calculation, would be a verification of tbe theory in its 

 widest sense. The application of such a test was the more necessary 

 to the interests of science, inasmuch as the French astronomers had col- 

 lected from their measures, and had connected with their Cartesian 

 system, the opinion that the earth was not oblate but oblong. Dominic 

 Cassini had measured seven degrees of latitude from Amiens to Per- 

 pignan, in 1701, and found them to decrease in going from south to 

 north. The prolongation of this measure to Dunkirk confirmed the 

 same result. But if the Newtonian doctrine was true, the contrary 

 ought to be the case, and the degrees ought to increase in proceeding 

 towards the pole. 



The only answer which the Newtonians could at this time make to 

 the difficulty thus presented, was, that an arc so short as that thus 

 measured, was not to be depended upon for the determination of such 

 a question ; inasmuch as the inevitable errors of observation might 

 exceed the differences which were the object of research. It would, 

 undoubtedly, have become the English to have given a more complete 

 answer, by executing measurements under circumstances not liable to 

 this uncertainty. The glory of doing this, however, they for a long 

 time abandoned to other nations. The French undertook the task 

 with great spirit. 40 In 1733, in one of the meetings of the French 

 Academy, when this question was discussed, De la Condamine, an ar- 

 dent and eager man, proposed to settle this question by sending mem- 

 bers of the Academy to measure a degree of the meridian near the equa- 

 tor, in order to compare it with the French degrees, and offered himself 

 for the expedition. Maupertuis, in like manner, urged the necessity of 

 another expedition to measure a degree in the neighborhood of the 

 pole. The government received the applications favorably, and these 

 remarkable scientific missions were sent out at the national expense. 



« Bailly, iii. 11. 



