CONSEQUENCES OF THAT DISCOVERY. 13 



sion of so noble an instrument an eye which pierces to 

 the regions of the stars has given to astronomical 

 researches a relish and a success unknown before. 

 That "broad and ample road, the galaxy," has been 

 ascertained to be, as the poet conjectured, " powdered 

 with stars." The faces of the moon and the planets 

 furnish as much delight to the observer as the contem- 

 plation of a* rich and most diversified landscape : the 

 satellites which attend some of the planets in their 

 course become discovered ; the magnitudes, distances, 

 orbits, and motions of the bodies constituting the solar 

 system, become correctly appreciated ; the greater 

 accuracy of astronomical observations furnishes new 

 employment for theorists ; these again suggest new 

 occupation for the observer ; their joint labours tend to 

 the perfection of modern astronomy; and theory and 

 practice so illustrate, assist, and confirm each other, that 

 some of the phenomena of the remotest bodies in the 

 planetary system, computed years before their occur- 

 rence, are found, in the event, to happen at the time 

 specified, to within the interval of a clock's beat ! How 

 exquisite a result of so simple an incident as boys playing 

 with spectacle glasses in the shop of an illiterate me- 

 chanic ! 



Nor is this all. The same happy occurrence placed 

 with analogous rapidity in the hands of the natural 

 historian an instrument, the microscope, which has 

 enabled him to explore, with equal gratification and 

 success, many of the minutest objects of creation, whose 

 nature, economy, and uses, might otherwise have been 

 for ever concealed. The " wonders of the microscope," 

 indeed, can scarcely be described without an appearance 

 of hyperbole. I shall only venture upon one sketch of 



