The triumphal Chariot of Friction: or a familiar elucidation of the origin of magnetic attraction, &c. &c. By William Pope.[[604]] London, 1829, 4to.
Part of this work is on a dipping-needle of the author's construction. It must have been under the impression that a book of naval magnetism was proposed, that a great many officers, the Royal Naval Club, etc. lent their names to the subscription list. How must they have been surprised to find, right opposite to the list of subscribers, the plate presenting "the three emphatic letters, J. A. O." And how much more when they saw it set forth that if a square be inscribed in a circle, a circle within that, then a square again, &c., it is impossible to have more than fourteen circles, let the first circle be as large as you please. From this the seven attributes of God are unfolded; and further, that all matter was moral, until Lucifer churned it into physical "as far as the third circle in Deity": this Lucifer, called Leviathan in Job, being thus the moving cause of
chaos. I shall say no more, except that the friction of the air is the cause of magnetism.
Remarks on the Architecture, Sculpture, and Zodiac of Palmyra; with a Key to the Inscriptions. By B. Prescot.[[605]] London, 1830, 8vo.
Mr. Prescot gives the signs of the zodiac a Hebrew origin.
THE JACOTOT METHOD.
Epitomé de mathématiques. Par F. Jacotot,[[606]] Avocat. 3ième edition, Paris, 1830, 8vo. (pp. 18).
Méthode Jacotot. Choix de propositions mathématiques. Par P. Y. Séprés.[[607]] 2nde édition. Paris, 1830, 8vo. (pp. 82).
Of Jacotot's method, which had some vogue in Paris, the principle was Tout est dans tout,[[608]] and the process Apprendre quelque chose, et à y rapporter tout le reste.[[609]] The first tract has a proposition in conic sections and its preliminaries: the second has twenty exercises, of which the first is finding the greatest common measure of two numbers, and the last is the motion of a point on a surface, acted on by given forces. This is topped up with the problem of sound in a tube, and a slice of Laplace's theory of the tides. All to be studied until known by heart, and all the rest will come, or at least join on easily when it comes. There is much truth in the assertion that new knowledge
hooks on easily to a little of the old, thoroughly mastered. The day is coming when it will be found out that crammed erudition, got up for examinations, does not cast out any hooks for more.
Lettre à MM. les Membres de l'Académie Royale des Sciences, contenant un développement de la réfutation du système de la gravitation universelle, qui leur a été présentée le 30 août, 1830. Par Félix Passot.[[610]] Paris, 1830, 8vo.