to consolidate these serious dispositions in me. During a long period, Christian faith fully sufficed to all the wants and all the disquiet which such dispositions excite in the mind. To these questions, which I regarded as the only ones meriting man's attention, my paternal religion responded, and I credited these responses; thanks to them, present life seemed clear, and beyond it I saw the future which must follow it lying cloudless. Tranquil about the path I should follow in this world, tranquil about the end whither it would conduct me in the other world; understanding life in its true phases, and death which unites them; understanding myself, knowing God's designs respecting me, and loving him for the goodness of his designs, I was happy with that happiness which a lively and certain faith in a doctrine which resolves all the great questions that can interest man, never fails to give. But in the times when I was born, it was impossible this happiness could last; and the day came when, in the midst of that peaceful edifice of religion which had hospitably sheltered me at my birth, and under whose roof my earlier years had passed away, I heard the tempest of doubt which on every side beat its walls, and made it tremble even to its foundations. My curiosity could not escape from the powerful objections spread like dust in the atmosphere I breathed, by the genius of two centuries of scepticism. Notwithstanding the alarm they caused me, and perhaps because of that alarm, these objections made a strong impression on my

mind.

"In vain my childhood and its poetical impressions, my youth and its religious souvenirs, the majesty, the antiquity, the authority of that creed which I had been taught; in vain all my memory, all my imagination, all my soul were excited, and in revolt against this invasion of an incredulity which wounded them profoundly,―my heart could not defend my

reason.

"The authority of Christianity once questioned by my mind, I felt all of my convictions tremble to their foundations; to consolidate them anew, I was forced to examine the worth of this authority, and with whatever partiality I entered upon this examination, I left it sceptical. Such was the declivity upon which mind had slided, and by degrees it went further and further from the Faith. But this melancholy revolution did not take place in the full sight of my conscience, too many scruples, too many lively and holy affections rendered it too redoubtable, for me to acknowledge to myself the progress it had made. It had been accom

plished silently by an involuntary operation to which I was no accomplice; and long after I had ceased to be a Christian except in the innocence of my intentions, I should have trembled to suspect, I should have deemed myself calumniated, were I told that I was no longer a Christian. But I was too sincere with myself, and I attached too much importance to religious questions, for this blindness about my own opinions longer to subsist after age had strengthened my mind, and the studious and solitary life of the Normal School, fortified the meditative disposition of my mind.

"I shall never forget the December night when the veil which concealed my incredulity from myself was torn asunder. I still hear my footsteps in that narrow and naked chamber, where, long after bed-time, I was wont to walk; I still see that moon half-concealed by the clouds which fitfully lighted the cold tiles of the floor. The hours of the night passed away, and I did not perceive their flight; I anxiously followed my thoughts, which, from depth to depth, descended to the lowest deep of my conscience, and dissipating one after the other, all the illusions which until then had concealed it from my sight, every minute exhibited its wanderings more visibly to me.

"In vain I clung to these last hopes like a shipwrecked mariner to the last planks of his ship; in vain, terrified by the unknown vacuum in which I was about floating, I sought to row myself with them yet once more towards my childhood, my family, my province, towards all that was dear and sacred to me; the inflexible current of my thoughts was the strongest; parents, family, souvenirs, belief, I was obliged to leave them all; the examination became more obstinate and more severe as it approached its term, and it did not cease until it had attained it. I then knew that there was no longer any thing left standing in my mind.

"This was an awful moment; and when towards the morning, I threw myself exhausted on my bed, it seemed to me I felt my first life, so happy and so active, blasted, and behind me open another life, sombre and barren, where henceforward I should live alone, alone with my fatal thought, and which I was tempted to curse. The days which followed this discovery were the saddest I have ever felt. To narrate by what storms they were agitated would lead me too far. Although my mind did not consider its work altogether without some pride, my soul could not accustom itself to a state so ill adapted to human weakness; it endeavored by violent efforts to regain the

shores it had lost; it found amid the ashes of its past belief, sparks which sometimes seemed as though they would rekindle its faith.*

"But convictions overthrown by reason can be rebuilded only by it; and these glimmerings were soon extinguished. If, when I lost my faith I had also become careless of the questions which it solved for me, without doubt this violent state would not have lasted long; fatigue would have overwhelmed with sleep, and my life, like that of a good many others, would have gone to sleep in scepticism. Fortunately, this did not take place; I had never felt more sensibly the importance of the problems than now, after I had lost their solution. I was incredulous, but I detested incredulity; this decided the direction of my life. Unable to bear uncertainty about the enigma of human destiny, having no longer the light of faith to resolve it, I had no instrument left but the light of reason. I therefore resolved to give all the time which might be required, my whole life if necessary, to the solution of this difficulty; such was the path which led me to philosophy, which seems to me to be nothing but the search after this truth." I need scarcely say that M. Jouffroy soon found"Apollyon spread forth his dragon's wings and sped him away, that he saw him no more."

See how busy the Moniteur has been translating articles from "The Putnam's Magazine." I really thought, when I saw it, day after day, translating articles, that it seriously contemplated republishing the whole number. The article on the Arctic Exploring Expeditions has been translated into all the newspapers on the conti

nent.

How warmly the Academy of Sciences applauded M. Arago, when he resumed his seat of perpetual secretary to that body, and promised them a memoir on the manner of observing the forms of several planets by the birefrangent telescope! With what lively interest they have listened to M. de Gasparin's disquisitions on the influence of the solar radiation in exciting the phenomena of vegetation; isn't it the cause of the singular contradictions we see; the olive barren

in Agen, where the temperature does not average above 58°, prolific in Dalmatia, where the average temperature does not exceed 56°; the limit of vineyards, 54° on the banks of the Loire, and 50° on the declivities of the Rhine; harvest abundant in England, with a summer temperature of 63, while in Sweden the same happy result is secured with 59°; and the results of a new instrument he has invented to ascertain this radiation he promises to communicate shortly ;-to M. Gaugain's account of the improvement he has introduced into M. Pecket's improved Volta's electroscope-condenser ; retaining the ordinary construction of Volta's original (two gold leaves hung in the interior of a glass recipient to a small metallic mass, which extends to the exterior with a condenser), and adding to it another independent, and larger condenser, which is connected with the battery or machine, and when charged, is used to charge in turn, the small condenser of the electroscope;-the able memoir of M. Joubert de Lamballe on the use of anaesthetic agents, in which he points out the great dangers attending the use of chloroform especially, in consequence of the large mediate communications between the bronchi and the pulmonary organs found in some persons (after death!); that the use of chloroform should be instantly suspended the moment the pulse falls to 55 pulsations per minute; that it should never be used after gunshot wounds which have given the system a violent shock, after great loss of blood, or a chlorotic state carried to a great excess; and that when death has apparently supervened from its use, the patient should be placed horizontally on his back, or obliquely on his side, and receive the shocks of an electrical battery.

Heaven forbid I should weary you with the Turkish question; I allude to it merely to repeat a very witty synopsis of Count Von Nesselrode's circular: "What does the Czar say," asked a stock gambler of one of his confederates, "in his circular to the Porte?" "Le cordon, s'il vous plait!" † I heard somebody say, while talking about China, "The Celestials seem to have taken a powerful dose of Tartar emetic!"

LITERATURE.

AMERICAN.-The Astronomical Journal. On the second day of November, 1849, the first number of the American Astronomical Journal made its appearance, published at Cambridge, Mass. It wore a most forbidding aspect. Consisting of eight small quarto pages, it bore only on the first and last any of the ordinary forms of language. More than six pages were entirely covered with the most absurd looking collocations of figures and letters. Small letters and capitals, Italic and Roman, Greek and English, in parentheses and out of them, adorned in various ways with Arabic numerals, are all strangely mixed and arrayed with dashes and crosses in what might seem inextricable confusion. The Journal has continued, at irregular intervals, to publish similar sheets, until it has poured out upon the world about five hundred pages of apparent unintelligibility.

And of what value is this array of figures, and for whose eyes can it be intended?

To answer the last question first, the journal is purely astronomical, designed for the use of the observatories and astronomers of the whole world, and affording the only convenient mode of communicating observations made in America to the general stock of the world's learning. The subscription list is, of course, too small to pay the expenses of printing, and the balance which amounts to $600 a volume, is met, partly from private resources of the editor, partly by others who recognize their privilege of being able thus to foster science, and give a solid character to the reputation of our country. We may perhaps add that pecuniary sacrifices are not the only ones which the editor has made in behalf of American astronomy. Feeling the importance of such a journal as a record of our contributions to this science, and as a means of increasing their number and value, he has declined offices and honors in foreign lands, that he might return to his native State, to spend his time, his strength, and his fortune in the cause to which he has devoted himself.

The other question, as to the utility of the Journal, may be answered in the words of the editor; words not designed for the public eye, but addressed to a sympathizing friend, and therefore written more directly from his heart. "I felt that to awaken a true zeal for Astronomy and Mathematics in America,-to inspire our own scientific men with self-reliance,

confidence, and intellectual courage,—to give them a voice and rouse them to emulation, both with one another and with the nations of the old world-to render charlatanism conspicuously manifest, without incurring the many disadvantages attendant upon personal crusades-in short, to aid in building up American astronomy, and thus indirectly the other departments of science, was a mission lofty enough to satisfy the most aspiring; patriotic enough for the best citizen."

It must not be supposed that the journal is narrowly American in its aim. It receives contributions to its columns from every civilized country on the globe; never asking a line from any pen, however illustrious, nor publishing one which does not contain a positive addition to the domain of human knowledge. It sends its light to every quarter of the globe, Australia, Africa, both on the Nile and at the Cape; Asia, South America, both coasts of North America, and Europe; its circulation in the latter country being greater than in America.

But wherever it goes it sends back honor upon the United States. It is acknowledged to be fully equal to the European Journal, the Astronomische Nachrichten. Yet that publication is supported in great part by the Danish government, and its editor receives a munificent salary from the same source. The European governments, indeed, have circulated our American Journal by means of their official couriers, so willing are they to foster this chief of sciences;-while our government have politely declined forwarding it through the despatch bags of the United States Legations, even when addressed to national institutions, and sent as gifts, either of the editor, or of the Smithsonian Institute. It seems to us reasonable that this courtesy should be shown by the United States to the Astronomers of the Continent who are in the pay of their governments, and that they should have every possible facility given them of availing themselves at the earliest moment of the aid of American observers.

By the immediate publication of new discoveries which is done in extra circulars, the Journal stimulates to new observations; and the publication of these observations leads to new analytical research. This has been the constant process by which astronomy has multiplied its triumphs, from the time when Galileo issued his Nuncius Sidereus, announcing the discovery of Jupiter's moons, down to the time of the last discovery of a new

But

asteroid, or an unknown comet. never have those triumphs multiplied more rapidly than during the last few years. The measurement of the distance of the fixed stars; the discovery of the new planet Neptune; of twenty additional planets between Mars and Jupiter; of the fluidity of Saturn's ring; these and many other less brilliant achievements have been crowded into the last fifteen years. Nor has our country taken a small share in the labor; received a small share of the honor. The taunt that our learning is superficial is no longer heard. We have men able to do any work that human thought can do ;-and we have private citizens willing to do for our astronomers, what kings and emperors have done for those of the world. The telescope at Cambridge, Mass., is fully equal to any in the world. Its power may be in some measure judged of, from the fact that it could discern the lines on this printed page at a distance of three miles, and read across the North River. The telescope at Cincinnati, and at Washington are also first class instruments.

The Journal not only stimulates to new observation and research, but it calls new men into the field. More than one instance has already occurred in which the modesty of good mathematicians had kept them in the secrecy of idle retirement, wholly unconscious of their ability to serve Science, until the open columns of this paper tempted them to write, and brought them into usefulness and incipient fame.

If these were the only advantages of the publication of the Astronomical Journal, it would be one of our most useful and important periodicals, and we would earnestly hope that the editor might not be forced to relinquish the work for which he has made such large sacrifices.

But we believe that in proportion as one science is advanced, all others receive a healthy impulse. The connection between Astronomy and the Mathematics is particularly close; the former is dependent on the latter for its theories, the latter upon the former for its stimulus and reward. The one lies at the foundation of all physical sciences, the other is the noblest of the superstructures.

And the chief worth of these sciences is in the power and elevation which they give to the student's mind, the reverence and awe, the faith and hope with which they inspire him. These diviner sentiments of our nature are fed by all intellectual culture, except in rare and unhealthy cases. And what intellectual culture may compare with that given by astronomy? Where is the logic that can

compare with that of mathematics? On all other subjects each single argument may be reduced by terseness of language to a single paragraph. But in mathematics a single argument may fill a volume. Yet each letter in a mathematical formula has had condensed into it the meaning of a whole phrase; and a single line contains more than can be expressed in a page of ordinary language. With all this wonderful condensation of meaning and of argument, the sentences of mathematical writers are sometimes necessarily of great length. In the first number of the Astronomical Journal we find, for instance, a single sentence occupying nearly two pages quarto, without any pause in it longer than a comma, and containing in it only one single verb. If we were to attempt to express in ordinary language all that is told in this algebraic sentence, we should fill a volume and then find it wholly unintelligible. Whereas in its present form it is to the eye of the astronomer as grand and comprehensive as

an oration.

Now if language is an instrument of thought, and the power of a writer or thinker is in proportion to the perfection of the language with which he is acquainted, what must be the effect of familiarity with such a language as that of the calculus upon the mind of those that use it? We have at least abundant evidence that, in their own peculiar department, it gives them marvellous power and marvellous accuracy. To hear a man assert unconditionally as one of the writers in this Journal does assert, that Saturn's rings are fluid; that a body which has been subjected to telescopic observation for two hundred years without a suspicion of its want of solidity is a collection of streams of some liquid,-rivers running in open space, rivers without a bed, without a source, without an end, chasing into themselves and into each other for ever; to hear a man make such an assertion, we might be excused for hesitating to believe it. But when we remember that mathematical reasoning is of all reasoning least liable to error, and remember that every ship that sails depends upon astronomical calculations for its guidance and is not disappointed; when we reflect that from three observations of a heavenly body its whole orbit may be accurately known; when we behold eclipses taking place in precise accordance with prediction; when we recollect also the splendid triumphs of the calculus in the science of optics, we must yield our prepossessions to his demonstrations, and confess his right to declare that to be fluid, which is, to all appearance, as solid as the earth itself.