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relating to the Construction of the Heavens. 
the nature and construction of the other. This end I propose 
to obtain by assorting them into as many classes as will be 
required to produce the most gradual affinity between the 
individuals contained in any one class with those contained in 
that which precedes and that which follows it : and it will 
certainly contribute to the perfection of this method, if this 
connection between the various classes can be made to appear 
so clearly as not to admit of a doubt. This consideration will 
be a sufficient apology for the great number of assortments 
into which I have thrown the objects under consideration ; 
and it will be found that those contained in one article, are so 
closely allied to those in the next, that there is perhaps not so 
much difference between them, if I may use the comparison, 
as there would be in an annual description of the human figure, 
were it given from the birth of a child till he comes to be a 
man in his prime. 
The similarity of the objects contained in each class will 
seldom require the description of more than one of them, and 
for this purpose, out of the number referred to, the selected 
one will be that which has been most circumstantially ob- 
served ; however, those who wish either to review any other 
of the objects, or to read a short description of them, will find 
their place in the heavens, or the account of their appearance 
either in the catalogues I have given of them in the Philos. 
Trans, or in the Connoissance des Temps for 1784, to which in 
every article proper references will be given for the objects 
under consideration. 
If the description I give should sometimes differ a little from 
that which belongs to some number referred to, it must be 
remembered that objects which had been observed many 
