INTRODUCTION. 3 



those forms of speech, which refer to the ordained course of 

 the celestial bodies. The known laws which rule the celestial 

 sphere excite perhaps the greatest admiration by their sim- 

 plicity, based as they solely are, upon the mass and distri- 

 bution of accumulated ponderable matter and upon its forces 

 of attraction. The impression of the sublime, when it arises 

 from that which is immeasurable and physically great, passes 

 almost unconsciously to ourselves beyond the mysterious 

 boundary which connects the metaphysical with the physi- 

 cal, and leads us into another and higher sphere of ideas. The 

 image of the immeasurable, the boundless, and the eternal, is 

 associated with a power which excites within us a more 

 earnest and solemn tone of feeling, and which, like the 

 impression of all that is spiritually great and morally exalted, 

 is not devoid of emotion. 



The effect which the aspect of extraordinary celestial 

 phenomena so generally and simultaneously exerts upon 

 entire masses of people, bears witness to the influence of 

 such an association of feelings. The impression produced 

 in excitable minds by the mere aspect of the starry vault 

 of heaven is increased by profounder knowledge, and by 

 the use of those means which man has invented to augment 

 his powers of vision, and at the same time enlarge the horizon 

 of his observation. A certain impression of peace and calm- 

 ness blends with the impression of the incomprehensible in 

 the universe, and is awakened by the mental conception of 

 normal regularity and order. It takes from the unfathom- 

 able depths of space and time those features of terror 

 which an excited imagination is apt to ascribe to them. 

 In all latitudes man, in the simple natural susceptibility 

 of his mind, prizes " the calm stillness of a starlit summer 

 night." 



Although magnitude of space and mass appertains more 

 especially to the sidereal portion of cosmical delineation, and 

 the eye is the only organ of cosmical contemplation, our 

 telluric sphere has, on the other hand, the preponderating 

 advantage of presenting us with a greater and a scientifically 

 distinguishable diversity in the numerous elementary bodies 

 of which it is composed. All our senses bring us in contact 

 with terrestrial nature, and while astronomy, which, as the 

 knowledge of moving luminous celestial bodies is most acces- 



B2 



