370 RELIGIOUS VIEWS. 



analogy of all cases previously conceived, had, at 

 first, supposed them to be, but transverse to the 

 path of the ray. Here, though the step from the 

 known to the unknown was comparatively small, 

 when made conjecturally it was made in a direc- 

 tion very wide of the truth. How impossible then 

 must it be to attain in this manner to any con- 

 ception of a law which shall help us to under- 

 stand the whole government of the universe ! 



3. Still, however, in the laws of the luminiferous 

 ether, and of the other fluid, (if it be another 

 fluid) by which galvanism and magnetism are 

 connected, we have something approaching nearly 

 to mechanical action, and, possibly, hereafter to 

 be identified with it. But we cannot turn to 

 any other part of our physical knowledge, with- 

 out perceiving that the gulf which separates it 

 from the exact sciences is yet wider and more 

 obscure. Who shall enunciate for us, and in 

 terms of what notions, the general law of chemical 

 composition and decomposition? sometimes in- 

 deed we give the name of attraction to the affinity 

 by which we suppose the particles of the Various 

 ingredients of bodies to be aggregated ; but no 

 one can point out any common feature between 

 this and the attractions of which alone we know 

 the exact effects. He who shall discover the 

 true general law of the forces by which elements 

 form compounds, will probably advance as far 

 beyond the discoveries of Newton, as Newton 



