European Progress in the Acquisition of exact Knowledge.—Its Resemblance to that of Greece.
Discoveries respecting the Air.—Its mechanical and chemical Properties.—Its Relation to Animals and Plants.—The Winds.—Meteorology.—Sounds.—Acoustic Phenomena.
Discoveries respecting the Ocean.—Physical and chemical Phenomena.—Tides and Currents.—Clouds.—Decomposition of Water.
Discoveries respecting other material Substances.—Progress of Chemistry.
Discoveries respecting Electricity. Magnetism, Light, Heat.
Mechanical Philosophy and Inventions.—Physical Instruments.—The Result illustrated by the Cotton Manufacture.—Steam-engine.—Bleaching.—Canals.—Railways.—Improvements in the Construction of Machinery.—Social Changes produced.—Its Effect on intellectual Activity.
The scientific Contributions of various Nations, and especially of Italy.
[366] The Age of Reason in Europe presents all the peculiarities of the Age of Reason in Greece. There are modern representatives of King Ptolemy Philadelphus among his furnaces and crucibles; of Hipparchus cataloguing the stars; of Aristyllus and Timochares, with their stone quadrants and armils, ascertaining the planetary motions; of Eratosthenes measuring the size of the earth; of Herophilus dissecting the human body; of Archimedes settling the laws of mechanics and hydrostatics; of Manetho collating the annals of the old dynasties of Egypt; of Euclid and Apollonius improving mathematics. Analogies between the Age of Reason in Europe and in Greece. There are botanical gardens and zoological menageries like those of Alexandria, and expeditions to the sources of the Nile. The direction of thought is the same; but the progress is on a greater scale, and illustrated by more imposing results. The [367] exploring voyages to Madagascar are replaced by circumnavigations of the world; the revolving steam-engine of Hero by the double-acting engine of Watt; the great galley of Ptolemy, with its many banks of rowers, by the ocean steam-ship; the solitary watch-fire on the Pharos by a thousand light-houses, with their fixed and revolving lights; the courier on his Arab horse by the locomotive and electric telegraph; the scriptorium in the Serapion, with its shelves of papyrus, by countless printing-presses; the "Almagest" of Ptolemy by the "Principia" of Newton; and the Museum itself by English, French, Italian, German, Dutch, and Russian philosophical societies, universities, colleges, and other institutions of learning.
European progress in the acquisition of knowledge. So grand is the scale on which this cultivation of science has been resumed, so many are those engaged in it, so rapid is the advance, and so great are the material advantages, that there is no difficulty in appreciating the age of which it is the characteristic. The most superficial outline enables us to recognize at once its resemblance to that period of Greek life to which I have referred. To bring its features into relief, I shall devote a few pages to a cursory review of the progress of some of the departments of science, selecting for the purpose topics of general interest.
First, then, as respects the atmosphere, and the phenomena connected with it.