PORTION OF THE COSMOS. THE PLANETS. 319 



hellenic Pelasgian inhabitants of Arcadia called themselves 

 " Proselenes," because they boasted of having come into 

 the country before the Moon accompanied the Earth. Pre- 

 hellenic and pre-lunar were synonymous. The appearance 

 of a heavenly body was described as a celestial event, as 

 Deucalion's flood was a terrestrial event. Apuleius (Apo- 

 logia, Yol. ii. p. 494, ed. Oudendorp ; Kosmos, Bd. ii. S. 

 439, Anm. 53; Eng. ed. p. Ivii. Note 293) made Deuca- 

 lion's flood extend to the Gsetulian Mountains of Northern 

 Africa. In Apollonius Ehodius who, according to the 

 favourite manner of Alexandrian writers, delighted in imi- 

 tating ancient modes of speech it is said of the early 

 settlement of the Egyptians in the valley of the Nile " As 

 yet not all the heavenly bodies journeyed over the celestial 

 vault \ the children of Danaus had not yet appeared, nor 

 Deucalion's race" ( 522 ) . This important passage elucidates 

 the boast of the Pelasgic Arcadians. 



1 conclude these considerations respecting the distances 

 and dimensions of the planets, with what has been termed a 

 law, although it does not indeed deserve the name, and 

 which Lalande and Delambre have called a play upon num- 

 bers, and others a mnemonic contrivance, or help to the 

 memory. Our meritorious Berlin astronomer, Bode, had 

 been much occupied with this subject, especially at the time 

 of the discovery of Ceres by Piazzi, which discovery, it 

 should be remembered, was in no way effected by means of 

 this supposed law, but was rather occasioned by an error of 

 the press in Wollaston's star- catalogue. If the discovery 

 were to be regarded as the fulfilment of a prophecy, then 

 Kepler's prediction, spoken of above, which is more than a 

 century and a half antecedent to Titius and Bode, ought 



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