FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[48]The reader will of course understand these as celestial longitudes, and the latitudes as terrestrial.[49]Mr. William McDonald, of Canada.

[48]The reader will of course understand these as celestial longitudes, and the latitudes as terrestrial.

[49]Mr. William McDonald, of Canada.

Our theory has thus extended itself beyond those limits which we at first had drawn, and our apology must consist in the necessity existing for reconciling the most remarkable phenomena of meteorology to its principles. Yet, after all, what has been said is but an outline of what remains, but this outline is a part of our theory of the weather, and it could not well do without its aid. In some points we may not have correctly interpreted facts; but the facts remain. The numerical elements of the theory may also be in error—we know not; but we think that they are as perfect as the many contingencies on which they depend will permit. What iscertainhowever, is of ample value to compensate for trivial errors. We have hitherto experienced but little courtesy from those intrusted with the keys of knowledge, and cannot consequently anticipate a very lenient verdict. But we now tell them before the world, that they have a duty to perform, and an examination to make, and a decision to come to, “whether these things are so.” Our theory may be called an ingenious speculation, but WE CHALLENGE THE SCIENTIFIC TO PROVE IT—NOTHING ELSE. The theory furnishes them with tests of daily occurrence, to prove or to disprove it. By such a trial we are willing to be judged; but let it be conducted in the spirit recommendedin the opening address before the American Association for the Advancement of Science, to expose all false developments, and to do it generously and without prejudice; and to remember, “that the temple of science belongs to no country or clime. It is the world’s temple, and all men are free of its communion. Let its beauty not be marred by writing names upon its walls.”[50]Thegreatobjection, of friction and resistance of an all-pervading medium, which will be urged against it, we regard as rather the offspring of a bewildered imagination, than of scientific induction. We can discover no such consequences as final ruin to our system through its agency; but even if such were discovered, we may answer, that nature nowhere tells us that her arrangements are eternal; but rather, that decay is stamped with the seal of the Almighty on every created thing. Change may be one of the great laws of matter and motion, and yet matter and motion be indestructible. The earth was called into existence for a specific object, and when that object is accomplished, we are assured that another change awaits her. But when earth, and sun, and planets, are again redissolved into their primitive state, their atoms will still float on the ever-rolling billows of the great ethereal ocean, to be again cast up, on the shore of time, whenever it pleaseth Him to say, “Let there be light.”

FOOTNOTES:[50]Prof. Pierce’s Address, 1853.

[50]Prof. Pierce’s Address, 1853.

Since the author’s arrival in New York for the purpose of publishing his outlines, the third and fourth volume of the Cosmos has been placed in his hands, containing the latest uranological discoveries and speculations. It is now more than twenty years since he began to investigate the subject he has treated of, and fifteen since he first announced to the world, that he had satisfactory evidence of his theory being true. Luckily, perhaps, he has been cut off from the great streams of knowledge; and he may confess that it was with pardonable feelings of gratification that he discovered in 1853, by the acquisition of the two first volumes of the Cosmos, that the philosophic mind of Humboldt had also pondered deeply on the planetary peculiarities of size, density, distance, inclination of axes and eccentricities of orbits, without eliciting any satisfactory relations.

From the tenor of the third and fourth volume of this learned summary of scientific knowledge, it is evident that the question of a medium filling space is more and more occupying the learned world; but the author is unable to discover any consistent theory respecting it. The increasing interest attaching to it, however, is evidently preparing the world for some radical change in preconceived views. The explanation given by this present theory to many prominent phenomena, is so totally contrary to that of the learned world, as to leave it untouched by anything yet advanced. What the fifth volume of the Cosmoswill contain, is not yet known in this country, neither has the author been favored with any glimpse of the progress of science as developed before the British Association; he supposes, however, that he yet stands alone in the position he has defined.

As a question of practical importance, the reader will find in the work cited, the various opinions of the temperature of space. Both Fourier and Poisson regard this as the result of radiated heat from the sun and all the stars, minus the quantity lost by absorption in traversing the regions of space filled with ether.[51]But why should we regard the stars as the source of all motions? Why cannot physicists admit the idea of an infinite space filled (if we may use the expression) with an infinite medium, possessing an unchangeable mean temperature long before the formation of a single star. A star equal to our sun at the distance of Sirius, would give about one million of million times less heat than our present sun, which is only able to give an average temperature to the whole globe—about twenty degrees above freezing—then let us remember that there are only about fifty stars of the first and second magnitude, which give more light (and by analogy heat also) than all the rest of the stars visible. Such labored theories as this of Poisson’s is a lamentable instance of the aberrations of human wisdom.

We would also call the reader’s attention to a late conclusion of Professor Dove, viz.: That differences of temperature in different longitudes frequently exist on the same parallel of latitude, or, in other words, are laterally disposed. This may be thought adverse to the theory, but it should be borne in mind that the annual mean temperature of the whole parallel of latitude should be taken when comparing the temperatures of different years.

Another fact cited in the Cosmos apparently adverse to the theory, is the idea entertained by Sir John Herschel, that thefull-moon dissipates the clouds. This question has been fully examined by Professor Loomis before the American Association, and he concludes that there is not the slightest foundation for the assertion—taking as data the Greenwich observations themselves.

FOOTNOTES:[51]SeeCosmos, p. 41, vol. III.

[51]SeeCosmos, p. 41, vol. III.

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