THE ASTRONOMICAL VIEW OF NATURE. 



359 



the book was almost completely forgotten on the Con- 

 tinent.^ No real progress has indeed been made in the 

 explanation of physical phenomena by the application of 



1822). His ' Elements of Mechani- 

 cal Philosophy' (Edinb., 1804) be- 

 tray, according to Dugald Stewart, 

 "a strong and avowed leaning to 

 the theory of Boscovich" (Works 

 by Hamilton, vol. v. p. 107). The 

 theory probably found favour, 

 among other reasons, because it 

 seemed to give support to the pre- 

 valent corpuscular theory of light, 

 which Euler opposed, as he did 

 simple action at a distance. In 

 the Scotch school of philosophy, 

 of which Dugald Stewart was the 

 most popular exponent, Boscovich 

 was well known. Stewart refers to 

 him frequently (Works by Hamilton, 

 vol. ii. pp. 50, 107, 110, 343; vol. 

 iii. p. 233 ; vol. v. p. 93 sqq. ; vol. 

 vii. p. 173 sqq.) He quotes Priest- 

 ley, Robison, and James Hutton as 

 followers of Boscovich, whilst his 

 own adherence is certainly very 

 qualified, and he makes a very 

 pertinent remark in his Introduc- 

 tion to the ' Elements of the Philo- 

 sophy of the Human Mind' (1792) : 

 "I cannot help taking this oppor- 

 tunity of remarking that if physical 

 inquirers should think of again em- 

 ploying themselves in speculations 

 about the nature of matter, instead 

 of attempting to ascertain its sen- 

 sible properties and laws (and of 

 late there seems to be such a ten- 

 dency among some of the followers 

 of Boscovich), they will soon involve 

 themselves in an inextricable laby- 

 rinth, and the first principles of 

 physics will be rendered as mys- 

 terious and chimerical as the pneu- 

 matology of the schoolmen " (vol. 

 ii. p. 50). Boscovich seems to have 

 been fond of tracing mathematical 

 curves to represent all kinds of pro- 

 cesses, such as the intellectual ad- 

 vancement of the age, and he shows 



graphically that this was declining 

 (Dugald Stewart's quotation in his 

 ' Dissertation,' W^orks, vol. i. p. 499). 

 1 When Fechner published the 

 first edition of his ' Atomenlehre ' 

 (lsted.,Leipzig,1855; 2nd ed., 1864), 

 he does not seem to have known of 

 Boscovich's treatise (see p. 229 of 

 the 2nd edition), and it was simi- 

 larly unknown to the Dutch meteor- 

 ologist Buys Ballot, whose curves 

 of the attracting and repelling 

 forces of matter agree almost ex- 

 actly with those of Boscovich (see 

 ' Fortschritte der Physik,' 1849, p. 

 1 sqq. ; also Rosenberger's ' Ge- 

 schichte der Physik,' vol. iii. p. 536 

 sqq.) In French scientific literature 

 the treatise of Boscovich is mostly ig- 

 nored the ' Grande Encyclopedic ' 

 does not even give its title. In 

 fact, French science does not con- 

 sider itself beholden to the cele- 

 brated Jesuit for what I call the 

 astronomical view of matter. See 

 St Venant in ' Comptes Rendus,' 

 vol. 82, p. 1223: " Plusieurs auteurs, 

 soit anglais, soit allemands, dans 

 ses ceuvres qui sont du reste d'une 

 haute portee, . . . se sont pris a 

 condamner vivement, sous le nom de 

 tMorie de Boscovich, non pas son 

 idee capitale de reduction des atomes 

 h. des centres d'action de forces, 

 mais la loi meme, la loi physique 

 generale des actions fonctions des 

 distances mutuelles des particules 

 qui les exercent reciproquement les 

 unes sur les autres. Et ils attri- 

 buent ainsi au celebre religieux 

 I'erreur grave oil sont tombes, sui- 

 vant eux, Navier, Poisson et nos 

 autres savants, createurs, il y a un 

 demi-si^cle, de la mecanique mole- 

 culaire ou interne. Or cette loi 

 blamde, cette loi qui a ^te mise en 

 oeuvre aussi par Laplace, &c., et 



