SCIENCE OF THE COSMOS. 59 



word history shows that they too had the intimate persua- 

 sion, that, to form a complete idea of the actual condition of 

 things, it was necessary to consider them in their succes- 

 sion. It is not, however, in the definition given by "Verrius 

 Flaccus( 29 ), but in the zoological writings of Aristotle, that 

 the word history presents itself as signifying an exposition 

 of the results of experience and observation. The elder 

 Pliny's physical description of the world bears the title of 

 " Natural History ;" and in his nephew's letters, the nobler 

 appellation of "History of Nature/' The earlier Greek 

 historic writers scarcely separated the description of countries 

 from the relation of events of which they had been the 

 theatre. In their writings, physical geography and history 

 were long gracefully and pleasingly interwoven, until the 

 increasing complexity of political interests, and the agita- 

 tions of civil life, expelled the geographical element from 

 the history of nations, and obliged it to become the subject 

 of a separate study. 



It remains to examine, whether we can hope, by the ope- 

 ration of thought, to reduce the immense diversity of phseno- 

 mena comprehended by the Cosmos, to a unity of principle, 

 similar to that presented by the evidence of what are 

 specially called "rational truths." In the present state of 

 our empirical knowledge at least, we dare not entertain such 

 a hope. Experimental sciences, founded on observation 

 of the external world, cannot aspire to completeness ; the 

 nature of things and the imperfections of our organs are alike 

 opposed to it. We shall never succeed in exhausting the 

 inexhaustible riches of nature, and no generation of men 

 will ever be able to boast of having comprehended all phfle- 

 It is only by distributing them into groups, that 



