A PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION OF THE UNIVERSE. 



ON THE DIFFERENT DEGREES OF ENJOYMENT OFFERED BY 



THE ASPECT OF NATURE AND THE STUDY 



OF HER LA.WS. 



IN attempting, after a long absence from my country, to 

 unfold a general view of the physical phsenomena of the 

 globe which we inhabit, and of the combined action of the 

 forces which pervade the regions of space, I feel a double 

 anxiety. The matter of which I would treat is so vast, and 

 so varied, that I fear, on the one hand, to approach it in an 

 encyclopaedic and superficial manner, and on the other, to 

 weary the mind by aphorisms presenting only dry and dog 

 matic generalities. Conciseness may produce aridity, whilst 

 too great a multiplicity of objects kept in view at the same 

 time leads to a want of clearness and precision in the 

 sequence of ideas. 

 But nature is the domain of liberty; and to give a lively 



