EISE OF ASTRONOMICAL SCIENCE. 5 



heavenly bodies ; they never exceed a certain limit, they mu- 

 tually correct each other, and cannot possibly become dangerous. 

 Tims, by an admirable mechanism worthy of the Supreme Archi- 

 tect of worlds, even the deviations of the planets contribute 

 to the eternal harmony of the spheres. 



When Herschel discovered Uranus, that dim planet, which re- 

 ceives the faint rays of the sun from a distance of 1,600,000,000 

 geographical miles, it was supposed that the utmost limits 

 of our solar system had been attained, and that beyond must 

 begin the vast solitudes which separate the dominions of our 

 sun from those of the nearest fixed star. But Uranus showed 

 perturbations in his path, which could not be accounted for by 

 the attraction of Saturn, and could therefore only be ascribed 

 to an unknown planet. The calculations of Le Verrier deter- 

 mined the position and the mass of this new celestial body ; 

 and scarcely had he pointed out the spot where, according to 

 all probability, it must be revolving through space, than the 

 telescope of the Berlin astronomer Gralle verified the accuracy of 

 his statements, and discovered Neptune, circulating as a star of 

 the eighth magnitude, 2,800,000,000 miles from the sun. 



Truly a splendid triumph of mathematical science, a mag- 

 nificent victory of the human mind, thus to calculate the ex- 

 istence of an unknown world, and to see, as it were by the 

 light of reason, what no human eye had ever beheld ! 



Possibly other planets may still roll beyond Neptune, which 

 perhaps no telescope will ever be able to detect ; but from the 

 perturbations they may cause, their existence will be as evident 

 as if we could follow them on their lustrous path. 



Besides the planets and moons and numerous comets, a vast 

 number of smaller planetary bodies, partly disseminated, partly 

 grouped in annular zones, revolve on elliptic orbits round the 

 sun. When these small planetary bodies come within the 

 sphere of the earth's attraction, they obey its influence, and, 

 darting down, give rise to the phenomena of shooting-stars 

 and meteoric stones. 



On a bright night twenty minutes rarely pass, at any part of 

 the earth's surface, without the appearance of at least one 

 meteor. At certain times (the 12th of August and the 14th 

 of November, when in all probability our earth crosses the 

 orbit of one of those annular zones) they appear in enormous 



