THE TECHNOLOGIST. [August 1, 1864. 



8 OX THE PHYSICAL SCIENCES WHICH FORM 



tlie astronomer as compared with his brother philosophers, because he is 

 only a spectator, and not an actor, on the field which be cultivates, let 

 us remember that the ever-changing spectacle which he witnesses is one 

 which not only demands for its full appreciation the whole intellect of 

 man, but far surpasses in grandeur the sights which open to the eyes of 

 other students, even though they are free to add to the glories which 

 God has made to shine forth from all His works, every hidden grace 

 which human weakness can bring to view. 



This superhuman character of astronomy was recognised from the 

 first. As a bare scientific truth, it was implied in the declaration of the 

 great Greek mechanician Archimedes, that if he had a jdace whereon to 

 stand he could move the world. The tov <ttu, the whereon to stand, 

 has not been found. The greatest practical mathematician of antiquity 

 incidentally proclaimed that, though man is free elsewhere to compel 

 Nature to teach him the mysteries she seeks to conceal, and to submit to 

 his interference with her, there is one territory of hers, and that her 

 vastest, where she brooks no interference, and he cannot stretch her on 

 the rack, or torture her secrets from her. We have no standing-place 

 among the stars, no liberty to lay finger on them, i "What we know of 

 them they have told us, spontaneously revealing at all epochs more than 

 we are able or willing to receive. This -thought, which was latent in the 

 Greek philosopher's utterance, and in part proclaimed in the cpiestion 

 already quoted as addressed to Job, was announced in all its fulness by 

 the inspired Hebrew king — "The heavens declare the glory of God: and 

 the firmament sheweth His handiwork. Day unto day uttereth speech, 

 and night unto night sheweth knowledge." 



Unconstrained and spontaneous though the revelations of astronomy 

 thus are, their value to industrial science cannot easily be overrated. 

 Our modes of measuring space and time, and in connection with both 

 the art of navigation, are applications to the most useful purposes of 

 truths which astronomy offers freely to all who have capacity enough to 

 receive them. The phenomena, in truth, of which Registrative Science 

 takes cognizance, are in great part furnished by this liberal giver, who 

 has also taught us laws regulating many of the forces with which Direc- 

 tive Science deals. It is sufficient on this head to refer to the laws of 

 gravitation. 



Astronomy, further, is related to the Experimental Transformational 

 Sciences in a very curious way. If imaginative men, needlessly fearing 

 that the progress of physical science will prove fatal to poetry, rejoice 

 that the sun is as dazzling to us as to our forefathers, and that we no 

 more than they can wreathe our hands in the golden manes of his fiery 

 coursers ; at least we can watch with more exultiug delight the sparks 

 which their pawing feet strike out of the starry pavement, and can see 

 other than ruinantic reasons why they rejoice to run their race. 



Daily the conviction deepens among those who have studied the 

 matter, that with a few exceptions all the physical powers which man 



