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Wxttimzt.
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Wxttimzt.
Wiltmiwt .
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Pxato somewhere ( in the Timceus , if we recollect aright ) says that God alternately governs and forsakes the world ; in the period of government all goes right , but left to itself the perturbations of the world rise into anarchy , which once . more necessitates the divine interference . One does not-expect to meet in a Christian philosopher this sombre idea of the divine government , yet we meet with it in Sir Isaac Newton , implicitly , if not explicitly . His theory of the perturbations which affect the planets , causing them , to deviate from the perfect ellipse of their orbit round the sun , and which would in time , he thought , become so great as to demand the intervention of the Creator , is Plato ' s theory considered astronomically .
There is something piquant in this juxtaposition , but even more piquant is that advanced by M . Babinet in the new number of the Revue des Deux Mbndes , where , in an article on Astronomie Cosmogonique well worth reading , he . shows us . Lap : lace occupying himself with these very perturbations , so alarming to the mind of Newton , and proving them to be essentially periodic and counteractive , making the planetary path deviate in one direction , and then , by compensation , deviate in another , so as at length to restore thebalance . " Strange ! " exclaims M . Babinet , " a mind essentially religious throws doubt on the wisdom and prescience of the Deity , and a sceptic answers him by proving the world to be subject to laws so wise that the stability of the system runs no risk . "
In comparing the services of these two great geometricians , Newton and Lapeace , we are led to reflect on the large part played by the Age in every great discovery which confers immortality on genius . The same intellectual greatness will not produce the same effect if it appear a few years earlier or sl few years later . The Age must furnish the apropos . Genius coming at a certain juncture and confluence of ideas , produces a result which the blind adoration of mankind attributes solely to Genius—when the stupid envy of mankind does not take the other side of the question , and attribute it solely to the Age . Thus there was profound truth in the boulade of Lagrangb , ¦ " that Newton was \ erj lucky to have a world to explain ; " for it is certain that had Newton lived in the time of Laplace he would have been
reduced to the arduous , but less glorious , occupation of explaining the perturbations , instead of explaining a world . Nevertheless it must not be forgotten that whatever apropos the Age may furnish , the presence of Genius is necessary for that apropos to be seized . Jones will do nothing in the most splendid confluence of ideas struggling for birth . Besides the article just referred to , the Revue contains one of singular interest and importance , by General Daumas , on Le Cheval de Guerre . Our
readers may know , perhaps , that the general has written a work of great value , and of pleasant reading , on the Arabian horses , Les Chevauz du Sahara * in which he proposed the adoption of the Arabian horse for cavalry . In this work he argued that although the Arabs , for various reasons , prize the mare above the stallion , yet for purposes of breeding the stallion is more valuable . A discussion arose between the general and the Inspecteur des Haras , who had traversed Aaia to collect materials for a decision , and who came to the conclusion that the mare was more valuable than the stallion
it being from the mother , not the father , that the preponderance of influence is derived . This question—so important to cattle breeders ^ which has been agitated ever since Abistotj ^ b , the question , namely , whether the father ¦ o r -the mother has the most decided influence on the offspring , is among the most complex problems of the physiology of generation , and consequently carries the largest burden of nonsense of any question debated among physiologists . We cannot congratulate either of the disputants in the present instance upon having mastered even the a , & , c of the matter . Both treat it empirically , and without reference to the known laws of generation . But although the paper by General Daumas is absolutely worthless in a scientific point of view , it deserves to be read for its very great interest , both as . the elucidation of a practical question respecting cavalry horses , and above all as containing a remarkable letter from Abd-el-Kader , showing him to be a thinking and a lettered man , no less than a great chieftain .
The great Arab chief first declares that the stallion has greater influence than the mare : " The experience of centuries has established , " ho says , " that the essential parts of the organisation , such as the bones , the tendons , the nerves , and the veins , are always dorived from the stallion . The marc may give the colour and some resemblance to her structure , but the principal , qualities are due to the stallion . " We must content ourselves with the assertion that decisive experiments in the breeding of animals confirm the prevision of physiologists in contradicting this notion . Mother and father participate in the product ; not equally , but indefinitely . Our limits restrict ua to the bare assertion , which would require a volume to demonstrate . Although therefore , as a question of breeding , wo can only award to the stallion such superiority as his relative superiority of vigour may give him ( for if the mare have the superiority of vigour , owing to hor race , health , or ago , ehe will fbe the more preponderant in the offspring ) , wo quite
undorstand the preference of the Arabs for the mare , a preference which makes them sell stallions but never mares , unless under the extremities of compulsion . This preference Abd-el-Kader has admirably explained . Not only is the mare valuable as a producer both of stallions and mares , but she is according to the Emir , more enduring ; she better supports hunger , thirst and the fierce radiance of eastern suns . Like the serpent , her force seems to increase with increase of heat . On the other hand , the stallion has his superiority in certain qualities . He is more rapid , strong , and brave . He has not the serious defect of suddenly stopping during the fight , as the mare will if she espies a stallion . He does not fall when wounded , so soon as the mare . " I have seen a mare whose leg was fractured by a ball , drop , at once to the ground , unable to vanquish her agony . I have seen a stallion whose broken leg was held only by the skin , yet he continued on three legs till he had carried his master from the field , and then he fell . "
Abd-el-Kajxbb adds that when stallions have proved their great qualities it is almost impossible to procure them , so fabulous are the prices asked . They are only sold to great personages , or extremely rich merchants , who pay for them in thirty or forty instalments , sometimes even by an annuity to the seller and his descendants . These indications Avill suffice to pique the reader ' s curiosity . He will find Abd-el-Kader ' s letter remarkable for its masterly style , and its evidence of literary culture ; so that it will interest the reader who is indifferent to the question of horses , Arabian or English . The same Revue contains an article by Gustave Planche on the young poets of France ,
especially on a new manifesto by M . Du Camp , who , imitating the celebrated preface to Cromwell , with which Victor Hugo raised his standard of revolt , attacks all the past , and heralds the " poetry of the present . " " We have not any knowledge of M . Du Camp's writings , nor are we disposed to take Gustave Pi ^ anche as an arbiter ; so that what truth there may lie embedded in the exaggeration of this new Romantic School we cannot even conjecture . It is , however , always suspicious when a poet writes theoretical prefaces . From Wordsworth to " Victor Hugo , such prefaces have been mistakes—mistakes rescued from contempt by the genius or the talent of the poet , and by some grains of truth mixed with the error , but utterly inefficacious in making systematic poetry relished by the public .
Let us , however , assure our friends in France , that in frankly condemning the profuse indulgence of a certain school of modern French writers in magisterial nonsense and flippant exaggeration , we are not ungrateful to the many excellent writers France has produced , and to the eminent ability Frenchmen display in every department . Especially is this eminence seeu in the ordonnance of their scientific writings , and in the grace of their fugitive literature . No one can write such treatises , no one can produce such tales . We write excellent novels , but the tale belongs to France . A very
pleasant illustration of this excellence is seen in M . Edmond About s tale , originally published in the Revue des Deux Mondes , and now reprinted in the Bibliotlieque des Chemins de Fer , wherein a simple story is narrated with an attaching charm and a pervading elegance rare enough even in France . No one should grudge a couple of francs for so delightful a story of Italian life as this Tolla ; and our lady readers in want of a new novel , may with confidence ask for Tolla , not only because it is interesting and unexceptionable , but because the moral tone is thoroughly healthy .
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BAILEY'S PHILOSOPHY OF THE MIND . Letters on the Philosophy of the Human Mind . By Samuel Bailey . First Series . Longman and Co . Any work by the admirable author of the Essays on flic Formation and Puhlication of Opinions must command at once the interest of all philosophical readers ; the union of patient thought with clear exposition , which characterises his writings , has made those writings popular even in England , whero little attention is given to metaphysical speculation . The ^ york before us is tho first of a series of letters on the methods of investigating and speaking of the facts of consciousness—on the abuse of figurative language in philosophy , and the consequent injury to speculation—on tho classification oi mental phenomena—and on the various theories of perception , with other collateral matters . ' . _
Arnusing as well as instructive are the examples of the abuse of figurative language , which Mr . Bailey brings forward , not out of any idle desire to ridicule excellent writers , but out of a laudable desire to put tho student on his guard respecting the fallacies which lurk in this loose kind of language , The danger of talking of " our senses informing ua , " and of " our reason procuring our assent , " or of " the mind furnishing the understanding witn ideas , " is not the simple danger of expressing ourselves with vagueness , it is the danger of strengthening and propagating that tendency to personify tno faculties , and , having personified them , to believe in their separate indopendent existence , which has created so much confusion in philosophy . >» «| arc not content with senses and sensations , but must place an Entity behind them , looking on , receiving their reports ; we are not content with Icchngi we must place behind it an Entity which f eels that we feel . In tln . s train oi speculation a friend of ours conceives that he has made a discovery ol an ultimate beyond the ultimate of the Ego—a something lying deeper than uw Consciousness to which philosophers refer as the basis of all thoug ht , no argues that philosophers do not penetrate dcop enough when they wy t »« i behind the Senses there is tho Ego ; for what is behind tho Kgo ? Ho answers . Tho Nogo ! As the Non Ego requires an Ego for its existence and conelate , so also tho Ego demands a Nego . Which luminous speculation oiu friend is not prepared to illustrate ) in two volumes stout octavo .
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Critics are not the legislators , but the judges ana police of literature . They do not make laws—they interpret and try to enforce them . —Edinburgh Review .
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49 g ? T HE -L BADE R . [ Saturday ,
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), May 26, 1855, page 498, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2092/page/18/
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