360 
THE PLEASURES AND ADVANTAGES 
inseparably connected with the study of every branch 
of natural philosophy. “ To the natural philosopher 
there is no natural object unimportant or trifling. 
From the least of nature’s works he may learn the 
greatest lessons. The fall of an apple to the ground 
may raise his thoughts to the laws which govern 
the revolutions of the planets in their orbits ; or the 
situation of a pebble may afford him evidence of the 
state of the globe he inhabits, myriads of ages ago, 
before his species became its denizens. . . .Accustomed 
to trace the operation of general causes, and the ex- 
emplification of general laws, where the uninformed 
and unenquiring eye perceives neither novelty nor 
beauty, he walks in the midst of wonders : every 
object which falls in his way elucidates some prin- 
ciple, affords some instruction, and impresses him 
with a sense of harmony and order ; while the observ- 
ation of the calm, energetic regularity of nature, 
the immense scale of her operations, and the cer- 
tainty with which her ends are attained, tends, irre- 
sistibly, to tranquillise and re-assure the mind, and 
render it less accessible to repining, selfish, and 
turbulent emotions. And this it does, not by de- 
basing our nature into weak compliances and abject 
submission to circumstances, but by filling us, as 
from an inward spring, with a sense of nobleness 
and powerwhich enables us to rise superior to them ; 
by showing us our strength and innate dignity, and 
by calling upon us for the exercise of those powers 
and faculties by which we are susceptible of the 
comprehension of so much greatness, and which 
form, as it were, a link between ourselves and the 
