in theon theof thesystemle pub-ortionssianets,Brahe,vation,of na-his, he:han innius otirnestly

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let. vi. Kepler and Galileo. 87

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presentation of the Trinity; and the sphericalfigure of the universe, which comprehends thewhole, he considered as an image of the SupremeBeing, whose immensity envelops all things.Plato called God the eternal geometer; andKepler, worthy to be the successor of so great amaster, believed that certain properties of num-bers and geometrical figures had a hiddenanalogy to all the operations of nature.

Besides entertaining a number of chimericalideas of this kind, he had also a secret attach-ment to astrology; and in his treatise De StellaNova, has offered a very singular defence of thisfallacious doctrine. He asserts, that all thegreat events and revolutions of the world havean intimate connection with the conjunctionsof the planets, and accounts for their influenceby comparing it with the action of objects uponour senses. " The stars," said he, " act uponterrestrial things in the fame manner as lightacts upon the eye, found upon the ear, or heatand cold upon the sense of feeling.” Fromthis explication, which has nothing to recom-mend it but its novelty, it is easy to perceiveupon what foundation the dreams of astrologersare supported.

But from these absurd reveries, which wereniostly the follies of his youth, he soon passed toobjects more worthy of his attention. His firstG 4 works