the very vehicle and medium of our thought reminds us of the great disadvantages under which we labour, in attempting to discourse definitely about what is not the object of palpable

sensation.

But were we never so fertile and happy in our imaginings, how wild and visionary it would be to presume to people other worlds with creatures of our own imagination! We may, if we like to be absurd, people another planet with sentient and intelligent forms-we can scarcely call them men-that shall combine all the hideous devices of ancient Indian, Egyptian, and Grecian mythologies or we may devise new shapes, beings with three legs, and possessed each of two minds, one of which is active, while the other takes its sleep. But, even if our notions were not necessarily and painfully grotesque, a well disciplined mind would at once recoil from any arbitrary assumptions of the kind, as unphilosophical. The problem is one in which the number of equations is utterly insufficient for the evaluation of all the unknown relations of the quantities involved. And even if the conditions were all ascertained, it by no means follows that we could solve a single one of them.

But the fact is, that modern science has told us a great deal about other worlds; and her intelligence furnishes us with a certain number of conditions which we can exhibit in, at any rate, an approximately explicit form. It is true that the information they afford us is negative. They only strip the possible inhabitants of other worlds of certain habits, or forms, or enjoyments, which obtain among ourselves. They supply no positive intelligence as to their actual mode of existence. They merely restrict it, in certain respects, within certain limits. Thus:

'When we consider the physical peculiarities and probable condition of the several planets, so far as the former are known by observation, or the latter rest on probable grounds of conjecture, three features principally strike us as necessarily productive of extraordinary diversity in the provisions by which, if they be like our earth inhabited, animal life must be supported. These are-first, the difference in their respective supplies of light and heat from the sun; secondly, the difference in the intensities of the gravitating forces which must subsist at their surfaces, or the different ratios, which, on their several globes, the inertia of bodies must bear to their weights; and, thirdly, the difference in the nature of the materials of which, from what we know of their mean density, we have every reason to believe they consist. The intensity of solar radiation is nearly seven times greater on Mercury than on the earth, and on Uranus 330 times less the proportion between the two extremes being that of upwards of 2,000 to one. Let any one figure to himself the condition of our globe, were the sun to be septupled, to say nothing of the greater ratio! or were it diminished to a seventh, or to a 300th of its actual power.

1 Herschel, Outlines of Astronomy, p. 310.

Again, the

intensity of gravity, or its efficacy in counteracting muscular power, and repressing animal activity, on Jupiter is nearly two and a-half times that on the earth, on Mars not more than one-half, on the Moon one-sixth, and on the smaller planets probably not more than one-twentieth: giving a scale of which the extremes are in the proportion of sixty to one. Lastly, the density of Saturn hardly exceeds one-eighth of the mean density of the Earth, so that it must consist of materials not much heavier than cork. Now, under the various combinations of elements so important to life as these, what immense diversity must we not admit in the conditions of that great problem, the maintenance of animal and intellectual existence and happiness, which seems, so far as we can judge by what we see around us in our own planet, and by the way in which every corner of it is crowded with living beings, to form an unceasing and worthy object for the exercise of the Benevolence and Wisdom which presides over all!"

The climate of the Moon is of the most extraordinary kind. Her day is a fortnight long-whence the heat and glare of the side exposed to the Sun, must exceed anything of the kind felt in the desert-and is suddenly succeeded, without the intervention of a moment's twilight, by a corresponding night of the keenest cold. From the small mass of the material of which she is constructed, it follows that muscular force would produce six times the effect that it does with us. But the want of any air, and the probable absence of any fluids, render it impossible that the Moon should be tenanted by any forms of life analogous to our own. Regarded by itself, this ought to present little or no obstacle to a theory of life in other globes. The glorious wisdom and omnipotence of the Creator may doubtless be exhibited on as noble a scale in a world where any atmosphere would drown its denizens as here. What renders it no necessary part of that theory that the Moon should be tenanted, is the fact that the Moon has an obvious use of another kind. The question is, Have the planets any such obvious use for us as our satellite has, and as their satellites would appear, by parity of analogy, to subserve for them? Jupiter's satellites are occasionally, even frequently eclipsed. This phenomenon occasioned to us the discovery of the rate of light; and serves roughly to determine longitude at sea. But will any one contend that this is sufficient, as a final cause of his creation? Such an hypothesis would be as ridiculous as the theory that he is but another and a miniature moon to us. Hanging in resplendent, though very distant radiance over the waters, his dancing gleam may serve to beguile the tedious hours of the mariner, or may lend a silver charm to the brief hour of lovers' converse. And if it lifts the hearts of these to the wise and good Father Who holds all in equipoise, it is well. But has it no other meaning, no more independent reason for existence?

Such is the thought which will, again and again, steal over us, in spite of all the labored and devious lucubrations of our

learned author. It is utterly unworthy of an enlarged and philosophical line of thought, to limit our conceptions of other life to the forms around us. It was utterly unnecessary, therefore, that The Essay' should drag us tediously through such false assumptions as that Intelligence. . . . implies a history of intellectual development;' or such unhappy mistakes as that moral and religious progress has been far more extensively aimed at than a progress in abstract and general knowledge;' and has been, in many nations, and in a very great measure, really effected.' These labored premisses were, we repeat it, unnecessary in order to establish the conclusion (falsely, however, deduced from them) that Jupiter and Saturn can have no inhabitants analogous to men. It is not because it would be too bold an assumption to speak of the conscience of an inhabitant of Jupiter,' that we do not speculate concerning such matters, but simply because it is needless, and, in the absence of all data, unphilosophical. It is worthy of the author of a moral and metaphysical Euclid, to assume that When we attempt to extend our sympathies to the inhabitants of ' other planets and other worlds, and to regard them as living like us under a moral government, we are driven to suppose them to be, in all essential respects, human beings like our'selves;' but the assumption is untrue. What proof have we of this? 'In all the attempts which have been made, with whatever licence of hypothesis and fancy, to present to us descriptions and representations of the inhabitants of other 'parts of the universe.' Marvellous indeed! Because absurd ' attempts have been made,' we are driven' to be absurd and unphilosophical also! We beg leave to say, 'speak for yourself, oh author,' for as he himself immediately afterwards observes, There is no more wisdom or philosophy in believing 'such assemblages of beings to exist in Jupiter or Sirius, with' out evidence, than in believing them to exist in the island of Formosa, with the like absence of evidence.'

6

'Since we know nothing about the inhabitants of Jupiter, true science requires that we say and suppose nothing about 'them.' Most true, with the single exception of their existence, and the very few conditions which we do know respecting its possible modes. Thus a most unnecessary array of false argument is collected to establish a conclusion which, nobody denies, and which has no reference to the single topic of discussion.

We trust there may be nothing more than inadvertence in the meagre and not over-reverent phraseology, which in exalting the worth and dignity of man, and man's world, can speak of our Blessed Saviour as a special Messenger (!) whom in the

fulness of time, God sent upon the earth in the form of a man,' and in the typographical distinctions which speak of God's revealing His purpose. . by a Divine messenger, preceded by prophetic announcements of his coming.' But this sort of inadvertence is always to be regretted; and we cannot but deplore that so very learned and pious a man as our author shows himself to be, should rarely suffer any symptoms to betray that he considers Christian privileges, Christian tempers, Christian hopes, to be the only perfect 'glory and worship,' wherewith man is crowned; and Christianity, rather than intellectual 'dignity,' or even moral progress,' to be the normal condition of humanity. Everywhere we meet with a supreme reverence for MAN. He is honoured with all the distinctions which initial types, emphatic collocation, and wearisome repetition can bestow. MAN... is an intelligent, moral, religious, and spiritual creature. Man and Mankind.'- Man is capable of, &c.'Man has occupied his thoughts.'-'Man is also capable of, &c.''He is, &c.' Perhaps man, &c.'; and, finally, Man is naturally, and reasonably, the greatest object of interest to man,' and to none apparently more so than to the author. Indeed, if there be such a religion as Anthropolatry, we conceive our essayist to be its Hierophant. And it would appear throughout his book, as if he were uneasy under an unconfessed, and perhaps unconscious feeling of humiliation, at so dignified a creature as man being made the tenant of so mean a globe as He seems to deem it necessary to adduce every consideration which may mitigate the apparent disproportion. And the whole book seems based on this idea-if it can be said, indeed, to have any settled idea whatever. It conveys to one the impression of a somewhat rambling and verbose apology for the residence of the noblest of created existences in one of the smallest of the many mansions which he eyes.

ours.

The most valuable portion of this remarkable volume, is the two chapters on Geology; and, perhaps, the most original part of it is a chapter on The Nebulæ. It is not our intention to present our readers with an abstract of the very excellent geo. logical sketch here displayed, for there is nothing new in the facts or the inferences deduced from them. We ought, however, to make one significant exception. It is, we believe, in this treatise, that geology has been made to contribute analogies, for the first time, to the consideration of the question before us. And though the argument is highly ingenious, and is not without its force, we conceive that it will scarcely be reproduced. For it appears to us to have very little weight, as compared with that steady and cumulative reasoning which our author endeavours to overthrow; and which he has scarcely met with any

other real analogy than the geological. But let him state it for himself:

'When Geology tells us that the earth, which has been the seat of human life for a few thousand years only, has been the seat of animal life for myriads, it may be, millions of years, she has a right to offer this, as an answer to any difficulty which astronomy, or the readers of astronomical books, may suggest, derived from the consideration that the Earth, the seat of human life, is but one globe of a few thousand miles in diameter, among millions of other globes, at distances millions of times as great.'

There is certainly a great degree of plausibility in this analogy, and it is forcibly put at considerable length, and in divers forms, by our author. Valeat quantum. But after all we do not know, even concerning our own earth, that it was untenanted by intelligent, moral, and religious beings in the bygone ages of its existence. That we find no remains in human form, may render it extremely improbable that such are to be found; may render it unlikely that man ever walked this globe before the creation of Adam. Indeed, the spirit of Scripture would seem to negative the supposition with more of certainty than the revelations of geology. But we must earnestly protest against the unwarranted assumption that, because we find no remains like unto our own, therefore no sentient and intellectual creatures can have preceded us. We must here quote our author against himself:

'Not only does the analogy of creation not point to any such entire resemblance of similar parts, as is thus assumed, but it points in the opposite direction. Not entire resemblance, but universal difference is

1 The above argument, as applied to the religious thinker, involves precisely the same fallacy as the Answer from the Microscope;' enhancing, in fact, the (socalled) religious difficulty, while it has considerable force as an analogy in removing a philosophical or intellectual one. Geology has a right to offer the above as an answer to any analogy the astronomer may assert, or any difficulty he may raise on the supposed waste of space-just as the microscope offers her discoveries as a confirmation of such analogy-but neither can offer the least help to a man laboring under the difficulty, 'How can I believe all I am told of man, when I find him occupying so infinitesimal a part of Space?' It is a sort of argumentum ad hominem to say to him, 'You do manage to believe the same under the same difficulty with regard to Time,' but this argument can only raise fresh scruples in his mind. We admit the force of the analogy as against a probable Plurality of Worlds, and leave it to pair off with the Microscopic Analogies. There seems to be some difficulty in apprehending exactly what is the religious difficulty. Is it that he for whom Christ died should inhabit so minute a home? Then his ephemeral existence as a tenant even there does but increase the difficulty. Is it that he should inhabit so minute a home among all other homes? Then certainly Geology may offer her analogies from time, to neutralise the suggestion from space that there are any other homes. The objection very likely enters different minds in different forms, and probably not without some confusion of thought. To us it does not appear formidable; but, if any, it would assume rather the former shape. And thus it would be of nearly the same force when the Plurality of Inhabited Worlds was disproved.