KEPLER'S LAWS. 309 



moderns, from Lucretius and Plutarch down to Kepler, 

 Bouillaud, and Borelli. It is to Newton, however, that 

 we must award the merit of their solution. This great 

 man, like several of his predecessors, conceived the 

 celestial bodies to have a tendency to approach towards 

 each other in virtue of an attractive force, deduced the 

 mathematical characteristics of this force from the laws 

 of Kepler, extended it to all the material molecules of 

 the solar system, and developed his brilliant discovery in 

 a work which, even in the present day, is regarded as 

 the most eminent production of the human intellect. 



The heart aches when, upon studying the history of 

 the sciences, we perceive so magnificent an intellectual 

 movement effected without the cooperation of France. 

 Practical astronomy increased our inferiority. The means 

 of investigation were at first inconsiderately entrusted to 

 foreigners, to the prejudice of Frenchmen abounding in 

 intelligence and zeal. Subsequently, intellects of a supe- 

 rior order struggled with courage, but in vain, against 

 the unskilfulness of our artists. During this period, 

 Bradley, more fortunate on the other side of the Channel, 

 immortalized himself by the discovery of aberration and 

 nutation. 



The contribution of France to these admirable revolu- 

 tions in astronomical science, consisted, in 1740, of the 

 experimental determination of the spheroidal figure of 

 the earth, and of the discovery of the variation of grav- 

 ity upon the surface of our planet. These were two 

 great results ; our country, however, had a right to de- 

 mand more : when France is not in the first rank she 

 has lost her place.* 



* The spheroidal figure of the earth was established by the com- 

 parison of an arc of the meridian that had been measured in France, 



