Chap. L] INERT10i\. 9 



long ago apparent to the bright genius of those 

 ancient philosophers, it was at variance with the 

 common sense of mankind, and was therefore dis- 

 carded as a fanciful delusion until, in the sixteenth 



Vesta, of a round foi'm, and ordained perpetual fire to be kept in 

 the middle of it. 



' The Egyptians were early observers of the heavens ; and from 

 them, probably, this philosophy was spread abroad among other 

 nations ; for from them it was, and the nations about them, that 

 the Greeks, a people of themselves more addicted to the study of 

 philology than of nature, derived their first, as well as soundest 

 notions of philosophy : and in the vestal ceremonies we may yet 

 trace the ancient spirit of the Egyptians ; for it was their way to 

 deliver their mysteries, that is, their philosophy of things above 

 the vulgar way of thinking, under the veil of religious rites and 

 hieroglyphic symbols. 



' It is not to be denied but that Anaxagoras, Democritus, and 

 others, did now and then start up, who would have it that the earth 

 possessed the centre of the world, and that the stars of all sorts 

 were revolved towards the west about the earth, quiescent in the 

 centre, some at swifter, others at a slower, rate, 



' However, it was agreed on both sides that the motions of the 

 celestial bodies were performed in spaces altogether free and void 

 of resistance. The whim of solid orbs was of later date, introduced 

 by Eudoxus, Calippus, and Aristotle ; when the ancient philosophy 

 began to decline, and to give place to the new prevailing fictions 

 of the Greeks.' — Newton's System of the World. 



It has been said that the Druidical ruins in Britain show that 

 their builders knew of the true arrangement of the solar system ; 

 but, as far as I am aware, this idea is not supported by suflficiently 

 reasonable arguments to allow of its being regarded as more than a 

 vague conjecture. It must, however, be admitted that the ignorance 

 which subsequently prevailed throughout the country is not a valid 

 argument against antecedent knowledge ; for we see that the degene- 

 racy of knowledge in Rome was such, that the successors of Numa 

 Pompilius imprisoned Galileo and others for asserting the truths 

 which formed the basis of the ceremonies for the celebration of which 

 the temple of Yesta, in the same city, was built by that ' wise king.' 



