PHYSICAL AND MATHEMATICAL SCIENCES. 9

those most glorious portions of the visible universe wouldbe contemplated ; and while their real nature was un-known, and no approach as yet made to an apprehensionof the laws and causes of their motions, it was far fromunnatural that that adoration which can properly ori-ginate only out of a perception of causation and design,and rise to the great origin of that design, should havebeen degraded to the character of a grovelling super-stition, and have been transferred to the heavenly bodiesthemselves.

In immediate connection, too, with these last motives,was the application of a knowledge of the stars to thepurposes of astrology. The desire to penetrate the future,one of the most deeply seated in ignorant minds, wasreally gratified as soon as astronomical observation hadreached far enough to notice those periods called cycles,in which the celestial motions and configurations re-curred. The prediction of the future appearances ofthe sky, and, above all, of eclipses, led the ignorant toexpect, and the learned too frequently to keep up theexpectation, that other events also might be predicted.Hence the combination of motives which tended to fosterthe cultivation of astronomy, and to impart to it a sacredcharacter in the early periods of human society. Theappearances of eclipses and of comets were regarded asprognostics of misfortune and public calamities. Theconjunctions and configurations of the planets were con-sidered as influencing the fortunes of states and indi-viduals ; and thus their motions came to be studied,though often with worthier motives, yet very generallywith the view of being made subservient to the predic-tion of future events, and not unfrequently as giving tothe initiated a command over the multitude, and asfurnishing an engine of priestcraft. It is also far fromimprobable that in many cases pretences accordant withpopular superstition were held out merely as an excuseand protection to the real enquirer after knowledge;whose pursuits, if openly avowed, might have met butwith reproach and ridicule, or even with opposition and