PRELUDE. 27 



faculties suggest. The physical philosophy of these 

 schools is especially deserving of our study, as 

 exhibiting the character and fortunes of the most 

 memorable attempt at universal knowledge which 

 has ever been made. It is highly instructive to 

 trace the principles of this undertaking; for the 

 course pursued was certainly one of the most 

 natural and tempting which can be imagined; the 

 essay was made by a nation unequalled in fine 

 mental endowments, at the period of its greatest 

 activity and vigour; and yet it must be allowed, 

 (for, at least so far as physical science is concerned, 

 none will contest this,) to have been entirely unsuc- 

 cessful. We cannot consider otherwise than as an 

 utter failure, an endeavour to discover the causes 

 of things, of which the most complete results are 

 the Aristotelian physical treatises ; and which, after 

 reaching the point which these treatises mark, left 

 the human mind to remain stationary, at any rate 

 on all such subjects, for nearly two thousand years. 

 The early philosophers of Greece entered upon 

 the work of physical speculation in a manner which 

 showed the vigour and confidence of the question- 

 ing spirit, as yet untamed by labours and reverses. 

 It was for later ages to learn that man must 

 acquire, slowly and patiently, letter by letter, the 

 alphabet in which nature writes her answers to such 

 inquiries: the first students wished to divine, at a 

 single glance, the whole import of her book. They 

 endeavoured to discover the origin and principle of 



