Chapter 11

I remember no other instance of exclusion from a scientific society on the ground of opinion, even if this be one; of which it may be that ignorance had more to do with it than paradoxy. Mr. Frend,[664]a strong anti-Newtonian, was a Fellow of the Astronomical Society, and for some years in the Council. Lieut. Kerigan[665]was elected to the Royal Society at a time when his proposers must have known that his immediate object was to put F.R.S. on the title-page of a work against the tides. To give all I know, I may add that the editor of some very ignorant bombast about the "forehead of the solar sky," who did not know the difference betweenBailly[666]andBaily,[667]received hints which induced him to withdraw his proposal for election into the Astronomical Society. But this was an act of kindness;for if he had seen Mr. Baily in the chair, with his head on, he might have been political historian enough to faint away.

De la formation des Corps. Par Paul Laurent.[668]Nancy, 1834, 8vo.

Atoms, and ether, and ovules or eggs, which are planets, and their eggs, which are satellites. These speculators can create worlds, in which they cannot be refuted; but none of them dare attack the problem of a grain of wheat, and its passage from a seed to a plant, bearing scores of seeds like what it was itself.

ON JOHN FLAMSTEED.

An account of the Rev. John Flamsteed,[669]the First Astronomer-Royal.... By Francis Baily,[670]Esq. London, 1835, 4to. Supplement, London, 1837, 4to.

My friend Francis Baily was a paradoxer: he brought forward things counter to universal opinion. That Newton was impeccable in every point was the national creed; and failings of temper and conduct would have been utterly disbelieved, if the paradox had not come supported by very unusual evidence. Anybody who impeached Newton on existing evidence might as well have been squaring the circle, for any attention he would have got. About this book I will tell a story. It was published by the Admiralty for distribution; and the distribution was entrusted to Mr. Baily. On the eve of its appearance, rumors of its extraordinary revelations got about, and persons of influence applied to the Admiralty for copies. The Lords were in a difficulty: but on looking at the list they saw names, as theythought, which were so obscure that they had a right to assume Mr. Baily had included persons who had no claim to such a compliment as presentation from the Admiralty. The Secretary requested Mr. Baily to call upon him. "Mr. Baily, my Lords are inclined to think that some of the persons in this list are perhaps not of that note which would justify their Lordships in presenting this work."—"To whom does your observation apply, Mr. Secretary?"—"Well, now, let us examine the list; let me see; now,—now,—now,—come!—here's Gauss[671]—who's Gauss?"—"Gauss, Mr. Secretary, is the oldest mathematician now living, and is generally thought to be the greatest."—"O-o-oh! Well, Mr. Baily, we will see about it, and I will write you a letter." The letter expressed their Lordships' perfect satisfaction with the list.

There was a controversy about the revelations made in this work; but as the eccentric anomalies took no part in it, there is nothing for my purpose. The following valentine from Mrs. Flamsteed,[672]which I found among Baily's papers, illustrates some of the points:

"3 Astronomers' Row, Paradise: February 14, 1836.

"Dear Sir,—I suppose you hardly expected to receive a letter from me, dated from this place; but the truth is, a gentleman from our street was appointed guardian angel to the American Treaty, in which there is some astronomical question about boundaries. He has got leave to go back to fetch some instruments which he left behind, and I take this opportunity of making your acquaintance. That America has become a wonderful place since I was down among you; you have no idea how grand the fire at New Yorklooked up here. Poor dear Mr. Flamsteed does not know I am writing a letter to a gentleman on Valentine's day; he is walked out with Sir Isaac Newton (they are pretty good friends now, though they do squabble a little sometimes) and Sir William Herschel, to see a new nebula. Sir Isaac says he can't make out at all how it is managed; and I am sure I cannot help him. I never bothered my head about those things down below, and I don't intend to begin here.

"I have just received the news of your having written a book about my poor dear man. It's a chance that I heard it at all; for the truth is, the scientific gentlemen are somehow or other become so wicked, and go so little to church, that very few of them are considered fit company for this place. If it had not been for Dr. Brinkley,[673]who came here of course, I should not have heard about it. He seems a nice man, but is not yet used to our ways. As to Mr. Halley,[674]he is of course not here; which is lucky for him, for Mr. Flamsteed swore the moment he caught him in a place where there are no magistrates, he would make a sacrifice of him to heavenly truth. It was very generous in Mr. F. not appearing against Sir Isaac when he came up, for I am told that if he had, Sir Isaac would not have been allowed to come in at all. I should have been sorry for that, for he is a companionable man enough, only holds his head rather higher than he should do. I met him the other day walking with Mr. Whiston,[675]and disputing about the deluge. 'Well, Mrs. Flamsteed,' says he, 'does old Poke-the-Stars understand gravitation yet?' Now you must know that is rather a sore point with poor dear Mr. Flamsteed. He says that Sir Isaac is as crochetty about the moon as ever; and as towhat some people say about what has been done since his time, he says he should like to see somebody who knows something about it of himself. For it is very singular that none of the people who have carried on Sir Isaac's notions have been allowed to come here.

"I hope you have not forgotten to tell how badly Sir Isaac used Mr. Flamsteed about that book. I have never quite forgiven him; as for Mr. Flamsteed, he says that as long as he does not come for observations, he does not care about it, and that he will never trust him with any papers again as long as he lives. I shall never forget what a rage he came home in when Sir Isaac had called him a puppy. He struck the stairs all the way up with his crutch, and said puppy at every step, and all the evening, as soon as ever a star appeared in the telescope, he called it puppy. I could not think what was the matter, and when I asked, he only called me puppy.

"I shall be very glad to see you if you come our way. Pray keep up some appearances, and go to church a little. St. Peter is always uncommonly civil to astronomers, and indeed to all scientific persons, and never bothers them with many questions. If they can make anything out of the case, he is sure to let them in. Indeed, he says, it is perfectly out of the question expecting a mathematician to be as religious as an apostle, but that it is as much as his place is worth to let in the greater number of those who come. So try if you cannot manage it, for I am very curious to know whether you found all the letters. I remain, dear sir, your faithful servant,

"Margaret Flamsteed.

Francis Baily, Esq.

"P.S. Mr. Flamsteed has come in, and says he left Sir Isaac riding cockhorse upon the nebula, and poring over it as if it were a book. He has brought in his old acquaintance Ozanam,[676]who says that it was always his maxim onearth, that 'il appartient aux docteurs de Sorbonne de disputer, au Pape de prononcer, et au mathématicien d'aller en Paradis en ligne perpendiculaire.'"[677]

ON STEVIN.

The Secretary of the Admiralty was completely extinguished. I can recall but two instances of demolition as complete, though no doubt there are many others. The first is in

Simon Stevin[678]and M. Dumortier. Nieuport, 1845, 12mo.

M. Dumortier was a member of the Academy of Brussels: there was a discussion, I believe, about a national Pantheon for Belgium. The name of Stevinus suggested itself as naturally as that of Newton to an Englishman; probably no Belgian is better known to foreigners as illustrious in science. Stevinus is great in theMécanique Analytiqueof Lagrange;[679]Stevinus is great in theTristram Shandyof Sterne. M. Dumortier, who believed that not one Belgian in a thousand knew Stevinus, and who confesses with ironical shame that he was not the odd man, protested against placing the statue of an obscure man in the Pantheon, to give foreigners the notion that Belgium could show nothing greater. The work above named is a slashing retort: any one who knows the history of science ever so little may imagine what a dressing was given, by mere extract from foreign writers. The tract is a letter signed J. du Fan, but this is a pseudonym of Mr. Van de Weyer.[680]The Academician says Stevinus was a man who was notwithout merit for the time at which he lived: Sir! is the answer, he was as much before his own time as you are behind yours. How came a man who had never heard of Stevinus to be a member of the Brussels Academy?

The second story was told me by Mr. Crabb Robinson,[681]who was long connected with theTimes, and intimately acquainted with Mr. W***.[682]When W*** was an undergraduate at Cambridge, taking a walk, he came to a stile, on which sat a bumpkin who did not make way for him: the gown in that day looked down on the town. "Why do you not make way for a gentleman?"—"Eh?"—"Yes, why do you not move? You deserve a good hiding, and you shall get it if you don't take care!" The bumpkin raised his muscular figure on its feet, patted his menacer on the head, and said, very quietly,—"Young man! I'm Cribb."[683]W*** seized the great pugilist's hand, and shook it warmly, got him to his own rooms in college, collected some friends, and had a symposium which lasted until the large end of the small hours.

FINLEYSON AS A PARADOXER.

God's Creation of the Universe as it is, in support of the Scriptures. By Mr. Finleyson.[684]Sixth Edition, 1835, 8vo.

This writer, by his own account, succeeded in delivering the famous Lieut. Richard Brothers[685]from the lunatic asylum, and tending him, not as a keeper but as a disciple, till he died. Brothers was, by his own account, the nephew of the Almighty, and Finleyson ought to have been the nephew of Brothers. For Napoleon came to him in a vision, with a broken sword and an arrow in his side, beseeching help: Finleyson pulled out the arrow, but refused to give a new sword; whereby poor Napoleon, though he got off with life, lost the battle of Waterloo. This story was written to the Duke of Wellington, ending with "I pulled out the arrow, but left the broken sword. Your Grace can supply the rest, and what followed is amply recorded in history." The book contains a long account of applications to Government to do three things: to pay 2,000l.for care taken of Brothers, to pay 10,000l.for discovery of the longitude, and to prohibit the teaching of the Newtonian system, which makes God a liar. The successive administrations were threatened that they would have to turn out if they refused, which, it is remarked, came to pass in every case. I have heard of a joke of Lord Macaulay, that the House of Commons must be the Beast of the Revelations, since 658 members, with the officers necessary for the action of the House, make 666. Macaulay read most things, and the greater part of the rest: so that he might be suspected of having appropriated as a joke one of Finleyson's serious points—"I wrote Earl Grey[686]upon the 13th of July, 1831, informing him that his ReformBill could not be carried, as it reduced the members below the present amount of 658, which, with the eight principal clerks or officers of the House, make the number 666." But a witness has informed me that Macaulay's joke was made in his hearing a great many years before the Reform Bill was proposed; in fact, when both were students at Cambridge. Earl Grey was, according to Finleyson, a descendant of Uriah the Hittite. For a specimen of Lieut. Brothers, this book would be worth picking up. Perhaps a specimen of the Lieutenant's poetry may be acceptable: Brothersloquitur, remember:

"Jerusalem ! Jerusalem! shall be built again!More rich, more grand then ever;And through it shall Jordan flow!(!)My people's favourite river.There I'll erect a splendid throne,And build on the wasted place;To fulfil my ancient covenantTo King David and his race.* * * * * *"Euphrates' stream shall flow with ships,And also my wedded Nile;And on my coast shall cities rise,Each one distant but a mile.* * * * * *"My friends the Russians on the northWith Persees and Arabs round,Do show the limits of my land,Here! Here! then I mark the ground."

"Jerusalem ! Jerusalem! shall be built again!

More rich, more grand then ever;

And through it shall Jordan flow!(!)

My people's favourite river.

There I'll erect a splendid throne,

And build on the wasted place;

To fulfil my ancient covenant

To King David and his race.

* * * * * *

"Euphrates' stream shall flow with ships,

And also my wedded Nile;

And on my coast shall cities rise,

Each one distant but a mile.

* * * * * *

"My friends the Russians on the north

With Persees and Arabs round,

Do show the limits of my land,

Here! Here! then I mark the ground."

ON THEOLOGICAL PARADOXERS.

Among the paradoxers are some of the theologians who in their own organs of the press venture to criticise science. These may hold their ground when they confine themselves to the geology of long past periods and to general cosmogony: for it is the tug of Greek against Greek; and both sides deal much in what is grand when calledhypothesis, petty when calledsupposition. And very often they are not conspicuous when they venture upon things within knowledge;wrong, but not quite wrong enough for a Budget of Paradoxes. One case, however, is destined to live, as an instance of a school which finds writers, editors, and readers. The double stars have been seen from the seventeenth century, and diligently observed by many from the time of Wm. Herschel, who first devoted continuous attention to them. The year 1836 was that of a remarkable triumph of astronomical prediction. The theory of gravitation had been applied to the motion of binary stars about each other, in elliptic orbits, and in that year the two stars ofγVirginis, as had been predicted should happen within a few years of that time—for years are small quantities in such long revolutions—the two stars came to their nearest: in fact, they appeared to be one as much with the telescope as without it. This remarkable turning-point of the history of a long and widely-known branch of astronomy was followed by an article in theChurch of England Quarterly Reviewfor April 1837, written against the Useful Knowledge Society. The notion that there are any such things as double stars is (p. 460) implied to be imposture or delusion, as in the following extract. I suspect that I myself am theSidrophel, and that my companion to the maps of the stars, written for the Society and published in 1836, is the work to which the writer refers:

"We have forgotten the name of that Sidrophel who lately discovered that the fixed stars were not single stars, but appear in the heavens like soles at Billingsgate, in pairs; while a second astronomer, under the influence of that competition in trade which the political economists tell us is so advantageous to the public, professes to show us, through his superior telescope, that the apparently single stars are really three. Before such wondrous mandarins of science, how continually musthomunculilike ourselves keep in the background, lest we come between the wind and their nobility."

If thehomunculuswho wrote this be still above ground,how devoutly must he hope he may be able to keep in the background! But the chief blame falls on the editor. The title of the article is:

"The new school of superficial pantology; a speech intended to be delivered before a defunct Mechanics' Institute. By Swallow Swift, late M.P. for the Borough of Cockney-Cloud, Witsbury: reprinted Balloon Island, Bubble year, monthVentose. Long live Charlatan!"

As a rule, orthodox theologians should avoid humor, a weapon which all history shows to be very difficult to employ in favor of establishment, and which, nine times out of ten, leaves its wielder fighting on the side of heterodoxy. Theological argument, when not enlivened by bigotry, is seldom worse than narcotic: but theological fun, when not covert heresy, is almost always sialagogue. The article in question is a craze, which no editor should have admitted, except after severe inspection by qualified persons. The author of this wit committed a mistake which occurs now and then in old satire, the confusion between himself and the party aimed at. He ought to be reviewing this fictitious book, but every now and then the article becomes the book itself; not by quotation, but by the writer forgetting thatheis not Mr. Swallow Swift, but his reviewer. In fact he and Mr. S. Swift had each had a dose of theDevil's Elixir. A novel so called, published about forty years ago, proceeds upon a legend of this kind. If two parties both drink of the elixir, their identities get curiously intermingled; each turns up in the character of the other throughout the three volumes, without having his ideas clear as to whether he be himself or the other. There is a similar confusion in the answer made to the famousEpistolæ Obscurorum Virorum:[687]it is headedLamentationes Obscurorum Virorum.[688]This is not a retort of the writer, throwing back the imputation: the obscure men who had been satirized are themselves made, by name, to wince under the disapprobation which the Pope had expressed at the satire upon themselves.

Of course the book here reviewed is a transparent forgery. But I do not know how often it may have happened that the book, in the journals which always put a title at the head, may have been written after the review. About the year 1830 a friend showed me the proof of an article of his on the malt tax, for the next number of theEdinburgh Review. Nothing was wanting except the title of the book reviewed; I asked what it was. He sat down, and wrote as follows at the head, "The Maltster's Guide (pp. 124)," and said that would do as well as anything.

But I myself, it will be remarked, have employed such humor as I can command "in favor of establishment." What it is worth I am not to judge; as usual in such cases, those who are of my cabal pronounce it good, but cyclometers and other paradoxers either call it very poor, or commend it as sheer buffoonery. Be it one or the other, I observe that all the effective ridicule is, in this subject, on the side of establishment. This is partly due to the difficulty of quizzing plain and sober demonstration; but so much, if not more, to the ignorance of the paradoxers. For that which cannot beridiculed, can beturned into ridiculeby those who know how. But by the time a person is deep enough innegativequantities, andimpossiblequantities, to be able to satirize them, he is caught, and being inclined to become auser, shrinks from being anabuser. Imagine a person with a gift of ridicule, and knowledge enough, trying his hand on the junction of the assertions which he will find in various books of algebra. First, that a negative quantity has no logarithm; secondly, that anegative quantity has no square root; thirdly, that the first non-existent is to the second as the circumference of a circle to its diameter. One great reason of the allowance of such unsound modes of expression is the confidence felt by the writers that √-1 and log(-1) will make their way, however inaccurately described. I heartily wish that the cyclometers had knowledge enough to attack the weak points of algebraical diction: they would soon work a beneficial change.[689]

AN EARLY METEOROLOGIST.

Recueil de ma vie, mes ouvrages et mes pensées. Par Thomas Ignace Marie Forster.[690]Brussels, 1836, 12mo.

Mr. Forster, an Englishman settled at Bruges, was an observer in many subjects, but especially in meteorology. He communicated to the Astronomical Society, in 1848, the information that, in the registers kept by his grandfather, his father, and himself, beginning in 1767, new moon on Saturday was followed, nineteen times out of twenty, by twenty days of rain and wind. This statement being published in theAthenæum, a cluster of correspondents averred that the belief is common among seamen, in all parts of the world, and among landsmen too. Some one quoted a distich:

"Saturday's moon and Sunday's fullNever were fine and neverwull."

"Saturday's moon and Sunday's full

Never were fine and neverwull."

Another brought forward:

"If a Saturday's moonComes once in seven years it comes too soon."

"If a Saturday's moon

Comes once in seven years it comes too soon."

Mr. Forster did not say he was aware of the proverbial character of the phenomenon. He was a very eccentric man. He treated his dogs as friends, and buried them with ceremony. He quarrelled with thecuréof his parish, who remarked that he could not take his dogs to heaven with him. I will go nowhere, said he, where I cannot take my dog. He was a sincere Catholic: but there is a point beyond which even churches have no influence.

The following is some account of the announcement of 1849. TheAthenæum(Feb. 17), giving an account of the meeting of the Astronomical Society in December, 1858, says:

"Dr. Forster of Bruges, who is well known as a meteorologist, made a communication at which our readers will stare: he declares that by journals of the weather kept by his grandfather, father, and himself, ever since 1767, to the present time,whenever the new moon has fallen on a Saturday, the following twenty days have been wet and windy, in nineteen cases out of twenty. In spite of our friend Zadkiel[691]and the others who declare that we would smother every truth that does not happen to agree with us, we are glad to see that the Society had the sense to publish this communication, coming, as it does, from a veteran observer, and one whose love of truth is undoubted. It must be that the fact is so set down in the journals, because Dr. Forster says it: and whether it be only a fact of the journals, or one of the heavens, can soon be tried. The new moon of March next, falls onSaturdaythe 24th, at 2 in the afternoon. We shall certainly look out."

The following appeared in the number of March 31:

"The firstSaturday Moonsince Dr. Forster's announcement came off a week ago. We had previously received a number of letters from different correspondents—all to the effect that the notion of new moon on Saturday bringing wet weather is one of widely extended currency. One correspondent (who gives his name) states that he has constantly heard it at sea, and among the farmers and peasantry in Scotland, Ireland, and the North of England. He proceeds thus: 'Since 1826, nineteen years of the time I have spent in a seafaring life. I have constantly observed, though unable to account for, the phenomenon. I have also heard the stormy qualities of a Saturday's moon remarked by American, French, and Spanish seamen; and, still more distant, a Chinese pilot, who was once doing duty on board my vessel seemed to be perfectly cognizant of the fact.' So that it seems we have, in giving currency to what we only knew as a very curious communication from an earnest meteorologist, been repeating what is common enough among sailors and farmers. Another correspondent affirms that the thing is most devoutly believed in by seamen; who would as soon sail on a Friday as be in the Channel after a Saturday moon.—After a tolerable course of dry weather, there was some snow, accompanied by wind on Saturday last, here in London; there were also heavy louring clouds. Sunday was cloudy and cold, with a little rain; Monday was louring, Tuesday unsettled; Wednesday quite overclouded, with rain in the morning. The present occasion shows only a general change of weather with a tendency towards rain. If Dr. Forster's theory be true, it is decidedly one of the minor instances, as far as London weather is concerned.—It will take a good deal of evidence to make us believe in the omen of a Saturday Moon. But, as we have said of the Poughkeepsie Seer, the thing is very curious whether true or false. Whence comes this universal proverb—and a hundred others—while the meteorological observercannot, when he puts down a long series of results, detect any weather cycles at all? One of our correspondents wrote us something of a lecture for encouraging, he said, the notion thatnamescould influence the weather. He mistakes the question. If there be any weather cycles depending on the moon, it is possible that one of them may be so related to the week cycle of seven days, as to show recurrences which are of the kind stated, or any other. For example, we know that if the new moon of March fall on a Saturday in this year, it will most probably fall on a Saturday nineteen years hence. This is not connected with the spelling of Saturday—but with the connection between the motions of the sun and moon. Nothing but the Moon can settle the question—and we are willing to wait on her for further information. If the adage be true, then the philosopher has missed what lies before his eyes; if false, then the world can be led by the nose in spite of the eyes. Both these things happen sometimes; and we are willing to take whichever of the two solutions is borne out by future facts. In the mean time, we announce the next Saturday Moon for the 18th of August."

How many coincidences are required to establish a law of connection? It depends on the way in which the mind views the matter in question. Many of the paradoxers are quite set up by a very few instances. I will now tell a story about myself, and then ask them a question.

So far as instances can prove a law, the following is proved: no failure has occurred. Let a clergyman be known to me, whether by personal acquaintance or correspondence, or by being frequently brought before me by those with whom I am connected in private life: that clergyman does not, except in few cases, become a bishop; butifhe become a bishop, he is sure, first or last, to become an arch-bishop. This has happened in every case. As follows:

1. My last schoolmaster, a former Fellow of Oriel, wasa very intimate college friend of Richard Whately[692], a younger man. Struck by his friend's talents, he used to talk of him perpetually, and predict his future eminence. Before I was sixteen, and before Whately had even given his Bampton Lectures, I was very familiar with his name, and some of his sayings. I need not say that he became Archbishop of Dublin.

2. When I was a child, a first cousin of John Bird Sumner[693]married a sister of my mother. I cannot remember the time when I first heard his name, but it was made very familiar to me. In time he became Bishop of Chester, and then, Archbishop of Canterbury. My reader may say that Dr. C. R. Sumner,[694]Bishop of Winchester, has just as good a claim: but it is not so: those connected with me had more knowledge of Dr. J. B. Sumner;[695]and said nothing, or next to nothing, of the other. Rumor says that the Bishop of Winchester hasdeclinedan Archbishopric: if so, my rule is a rule of gradations.

3. Thomas Musgrave,[696]Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, wasDeanof the college when I was an undergraduate: this brought me into connection with him, he giving impositions for not going to chapel, I writing them out according. We had also friendly intercourse in after life; I forgiving, he probably forgetting. Honest TomMusgrave, as he used to be called, became Bishop of Hereford, and Archbishop of York.

4. About the time when I went to Cambridge, I heard a great deal about Mr. C. T. Longley,[697]of Christchurch, from a cousin of my own of the same college, long since deceased, who spoke of him much, and most affectionately. Dr. Longley passed from Durham to York, and thence to Canterbury. I cannot quite make out the two Archbishoprics; I do not remember any other private channel through which the name came to me: perhaps Dr. Longley, having two strings to his bow, would have been one archbishop if I had never heard of him.

5. When Dr. Wm. Thomson[698]was appointed to the see of Gloucester in 1861, he and I had been correspondents on the subject of logic—on which we had both written—for about fourteen years. On his elevation I wrote to him, giving the preceding instances, and informing him that he would certainly be an Archbishop. The case was a strong one, and the law acted rapidly; for Dr. Thomson's elevation to the see of York took place in 1862.

Here are five cases; and there is no opposing instance. I have searched the almanacs since 1828, and can find no instance of a Bishop not finally Archbishop of whom I had known through private sources, direct or indirect. Now what do my paradoxers say? Is this a pre-established harmony, or a chain of coincidences? And how many instances will it require to establish a law?[699]

THE HERSCHEL HOAX.

Some account of the great astronomical discoveries lately made by Sir John Herschel at the Cape of Good Hope. Second Edition. London, 12mo. 1836.

This is a curious hoax, evidently written by a person versed in astronomy and clever at introducing probable circumstances and undesigned coincidences.[700]It first appeared in a newspaper. It makes Sir J. Herschel discover men, animals, etc. in the moon, of which much detail is given. There seems to have been a French edition, the original, and English editions in America, whence the work came into Britain: but whether the French was published in America or at Paris I do not know. There is no doubt that it was produced in the United States, by M. Nicollet,[701]an astronomer, once of Paris, and a fugitive of some kind. About him I have heard two stories. First that he fled to America with funds not his own, and that this book was a mere device to raise the wind. Secondly, that he was a protégé of Laplace, and of the Polignac party, and also an outspoken man. That after the revolution he was so obnoxious to the republican party that he judged it prudent to quit France; which he did in debt, leaving money for his creditors, but not enough, with M. Bouvard. In America he connected himself with an assurance office.The moon-story was written, and sent to France, chiefly with the intention of entrapping M. Arago, Nicollet's especial foe, into the belief of it. And those who narrate this version of the story wind up by saying that M. Aragowasentrapped, and circulated the wonders through Paris, until a letter from Nicollet to M. Bouvard[702]explained the hoax. I have no personal knowledge of either story: but as the poor man had to endure the first, it is but right that the second should be told with it.

SOME MORE METEOROLOGY.

The Weather Almanac for the Year 1838. By P. Murphy,[703]Esq., M.N.S.

By M. N. S. is meantmember of no society.. This almanac bears on the title-page two recommendations. TheMorning Postcalls it one of the most important-if-true publications of our generation. TheTimessays: "If the basis of his theory prove sound, and its principles be sanctioned by a more extended experience, it is not too much to say that the importance of the discovery is equal to that of the longitude." Cautious journalist! Three times that of the longitude would have been too little to say. That the landsman might predict the weather of all the year, at its beginning, Jack would cheerfully give up astronomical longitude—theproblem—altogether, and fall back on chronometers with the older Ls, lead, latitude, and look-out, applied to dead-reckoning. Mr. Murphy attempted to give the weather day by day: thus the first seven days of Marchbore Changeable; Rain; Rain; Rain-wind; Changeable; Fair; Changeable. To aim at such precision as to put a fair day between two changeable ones by weather theory was going very near the wind and weather too. Murphy opened the year with cold and frost; and the weather did the same. But Murphy, opposite to Saturday, January 20, put down "Fair, Probable lowest degree of winter temperature." When this Saturday came, it was not merely the probably coldest of 1838, but certainly the coldest of many consecutive years. Without knowing anything of Murphy, I felt it prudent to cover my nose with my glove as I walked the street at eight in the morning. The fortune of the Almanac was made. Nobody waited to see whether the future would dement the prophecy: the shop was beset in a manner which brought the police to keep order; and it was said that the Almanac for 1838 was a gain of 5,000l.to the owners. It very soon appeared that this was only a lucky hit: the weather-prophet had a modified reputation for a few years; and is now no more heard of. A work of his will presently appear in the list.

THE GREAT PYRAMIDS.

Letter from Alexandria on the evidence of the practical application of the quadrature of the circle in the great pyramids of Gizeh. By H. C. Agnew,[704]Esq. London, 1838, 4to.

Mr. Agnew detects proportions which he thinks were suggested by those of the circumference and diameter of a circle.

THE MATHEMATICS OF A CREED.

The creed of St. Athanasius proved by a mathematical parallel. Before you censure, condemn, or approve; read, examine, and understand.E. B. Revilo.[705]London, 1839, 8vo.

This author really believed himself, and was in earnest. He is not the only person who has written nonsense by confounding the mathematical infinite (of quantity) with what speculators now more correctly express by the unlimited, the unconditioned, or the absolute. This tract is worth preserving, as the extreme case of a particular kind. The following is a specimen. Infinity being represented by ∞, as usual, andf,s,g, being finite integers, the three Persons are denoted by ∞f, (m∞)s, ∞g, the finite fractionmrepresenting human nature, as opposed to ∞. The clauses of the Creed are then given with their mathematical parallels. I extract a couple:

I might have passed this over, as beneath even my present subject, but for the way in which I became acquainted with it. A bookseller,not the publisher, handed it to me over his counter: one who had published mathematical works. He said, with an air of important communication, Have you seenthis, Sir! In reply, I recommended him to show it to my friend Mr.——, for whom he had published mathematics. Educated men, used to books and to the converse of learned men, look with mysterious wonder on such productions as this: for which reason I have made a quotation which many will judge had better have been omitted. But it would have been an imposition on the public if I were, omitting this and some other uses of the Bible and Common Prayer, to pretend that I had given a true picture of my school.

[Since the publication of the above, it has been stated that the author is Mr. Oliver Byrne, the author of theDual Arithmeticmentioned further on: E. B. Revilo seems to be obviously a reversal.]

LOGIC HAS NO PARADOXERS.

Old and new logic contrasted: being an attempt to elucidate, for ordinary comprehension, how Lord Bacon delivered the human mind from its 2,000 years' enslavement under Aristotle. By Justin Brenan.[706]London, 1839, 12mo.

Logic, though the other exact science, has not had the sort of assailants who have clustered about mathematics. There is a sect which disputes the utility of logic, but there are no special points, like the quadrature of the circle, whichexcite dispute among those who admit other things. The old story about Aristotle having one logic to trammel us, and Bacon another to set us free,—always laughed at by those who really knew either Aristotle or Bacon,—now begins to be understood by a large section of the educated world. The author of this tract connects the old logic with the indecencies of the classical writers, and the new with moral purity: he appeals to women, who, "when they see plainly the demoralizing tendency of syllogistic logic, they will no doubt exert their powerful influence against it, and support the Baconian method." This is the only work against logic which I can introduce, but it is a rare one, I mean in contents. I quote the author's idea of a syllogism:

"The basis of this system is the syllogism. This is a form of couching the substance of your argument or investigation into one short line or sentence—then corroborating or supporting it in another, and drawing your conclusion or proof in a third."

On this definition he gives an example, as follows: "Every sin deserves death," the substance of the "argument or investigation." Then comes, "Every unlawful wish is a sin," which "corroborates or supports" the preceding: and, lastly, "therefore every unlawful wish deserves death," which is the "conclusion or proof." We learn, also, that "sometimes the first is called the premises (sic), and sometimes the first premiss"; as also that "the first is sometimes called the proposition, or subject, or affirmative, and the next the predicate, and sometimes the middle term." To which is added, with a mark of exclamation at the end, "but in analyzing the syllogism, there is a middle term, and a predicate too, in each of the lines!" It is clear that Aristotle never enslaved this mind.

I have said that logic has no paradoxers, but I was speaking of old time. This science has slept until our own day: Hamilton[707]says there has been "no progress made inthegeneraldevelopment of the syllogism since the time of Aristotle; and in regard to the fewpartialimprovements, the professed historians seem altogether ignorant." But in our time, the paradoxer, the opponent of common opinion, has appeared in this field. I do not refer to Prof. Boole,[708]who is not aparadoxer, but adiscoverer: his system could neither oppose nor support common opinion, for its grounds were not in the conception of any one. I speak especially of two others, who fought like cat and dog: one was dogmatical, the other categorical. The first was Hamilton himself—Sir William Hamilton of Edinburgh, the metaphysician, not Sir WilliamRowanHamilton[709]of Dublin, the mathematician, a combination of peculiar genius with unprecedented learning, erudite in all he could want except mathematics, for which he had no turn, and in which he had not even a schoolboy's knowledge, thanks to the Oxford of his younger day. The other was the author of this work, so fully described in Hamilton's writings that there is no occasion to describe him here. I shall try to say a few words in common language about the paradoxers.

Hamilton's great paradox was thequantification of the predicate; a fearful phrase, easily explained. We all know that when we say "Men are animals," a form wholly unquantified in phrase, we speak ofallmen, but not of all animals: it issome or all, some may be all for aught the proposition says. This some-may-be-all-for-aught-we-say, ornot-none,is the logician'ssome. One would supposethat "all men are some animals," would have been the logical phrase in all time: but the predicate never was quantified. The few who alluded to the possibility of such a thing found reasons for not adopting it over and above the great reason, that Aristotle did not adopt it. For Aristotle never ruled in physics or metaphysicsin the old timewith near so much of absolute sway as he has ruled in logicdown to our own time. The logicians knew that in the proposition "all men are animals" the "animal" is notuniversal, butparticularyet no one dared to say thatallmen aresomeanimals, and to invent the phrase, "someanimals areallmen" until Hamilton leaped the ditch, and not only completed a system of enunciation, but applied it to syllogism.

My own case is as peculiar as his: I have proposed to introduce mathematicalthoughtinto logic to an extent which makes the old stagers cry:

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