LECTURE I.

THE SUN.

“ Sire of the seasons I Monarch of the climesAnd those who dwell in them ! for. near or far,

Our inborn spirits have a tint of thee,

E’en as our outward aspects.”

The progress of astronomical science during the last five-and-twentv or thirty years has been so rapid as almost to approachthe marvellous. This statement is true of astronomy as a.whole; hut it applies with especial force to the advances thathave been made in the study of the Sun’s physical constitutionand condition. Discovery has followed upon discovery, andvictory upon victory, as astronomers have stormed one outlyingfortress after another of the Sun’s hidden secrets, which, untillately, appeared impregnable. At the same time, the more thehorizon of our knowledge widens, the less we seem to know, incontrast with the boundless field of still untrodden truth thateach successive step opens to our view when we turn ourthoughts to the Sun.

It is therefore not only in order to expatiate upon pasttriumphs that we begin our discussion of the Solar system bydrawing the attention of our readers to that great luminary, with-out whose quickening rays and potent sway the Earth would, ina few brief days, or weeks, become a frozen desert, and the wholefamily of planets a wild band of rioters; but we have a stillmore cogent reason for doing so in the intense and increasinginterest which must inevitably attend the study of the Sun formany a year to come. "We can confidently affirm that thismust be the case, when we notice the very remarkable mannerin which this branch of astronomy is linked to other kindred

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