FOR THE ANTHOLOGY.

Mr. Editor,

Newton to the investigation and difcovery of the law of gravita

to gain fome fmall acquaintance with natural philosophy, and having hitherto enjoyed few advantages for this purpofe, I refolve to devote one evening of every week, ordinarily, through the enfuing feafon, to this pleafing and ufeful study. It is my with to use your publication as the depofitory of fuch reflexions and experiments, as I may occafionally make. They will be extremely fimple, and perhaps hardly worth your notice. If however they fhall not be abfolutely defpicable, I will thank you to infert them, as they will ferve as a fort of journal of my progrefs, and may ftimulate me to perfevere in my refolution. Poffibly alfo a record of this kind may excite a philofophical tafte in fome young perfons, among your readers, who, from this circumftance, may hereafter rife to a refpectable emi

fmith's hammer gave to Pythagoras the first hint of his theory of mufick."

If you fhall look for much order in my ftudies, you will be difappointed. I have many avocations, few books and fewer inftruments, am fometimes ruled rather by caprice than fyftem, and often overcome by laffitude and indolence. Here are fufficient reafons, why I fhould not be very methodical in my new purfuit. I will however engage, life and health being prolonged, to make you a weekly report of fome fort or other; and if cares or pleafures fhould forbid me to ftudy, and thus prevent me from furnishing you with an account of my own obfervations, I will at leaft fend you the obfervations of others. Interfperfed in the pages of old newspapers I frequently find recorded philo.

fophical experiments, which deferve a lefs precarious existence, than what they there fuffer. Some of thefe I fhall henceforth rescue and preserve for you. For although many of your fubfcribers may value the Anthology as a collection of flowers, I, as a philofopher, fhould rather be pleafed with it, as a collection of fads.

Since this is the first evening of my philofophical career, you cannot fuppofe that, after writing this introduction, and I think an introduction is the most difficult of any thing to write, I have any account to give you of my studies. My apparatus is yet in diforder. My books are not collected. I have not even determined with what author to commence, nor what part of the immeafurable field before me I will begin to explore. Accordingly I fend you a piece of aftronomical intelligence, which you must have feen in fundry of our late periodical publications, but which nevertheless I beg you to preserve.

NEW PLANETS.

H. C. S.

Two new planets have lately been difcovered, one by Mr. Piazzi, at Palermo in 1801, which is called after the difcoverer's name, "Piazzi;" the other by Dr. Olbers at Bremen, in 1802, which is called "Pallas."-Dr. Herfchel has difcovered that the real diameter of Piazzi is 162 miles, and that of Pallas 95 miles; of courfe they must be very small indeed, when compared with the other planets; he confiders them of a different fpecies from the known planets; in

their smallness and motion they refemble comets; but in clearness of light they refemble other planets; he fuppofes that many more fuch will hereafter be discovered, and places them under the title of Afteriors. Thefe two new planets are vifible only by glasses, and at certain feafons, hence a writer hazards a conjecture that they are planets belonging to, and revolving round the centre of fome adjacent fyftem, periodically becoming visible to the planets comprifing ours.

Sept. 21. The week has revolved, Mr. Editor, and I am still unprepared for any recondite researches, and of courfe unable to furnish you with any original communications on philofophy. Towards executing my purpose, I find it neceffary that my ftudy should be fitted up in a new ftyle; my book fhelves must be removed to give place to fhelves of a different fize; and where pamphlets and manufcripts have formerly refted, I must now difpofe my tubs, pumps, and retorts. But I have not forgotten my engagement. I fend you an extract from the laft Port Folio which I received (Vol. IV. No. 36. p. 282), a publication, fo interefting for its papers of tafte and elegant criticism, that, after reading it, I am fometimes tempted to abandon my purpose refpecting the external fciences. The extract before you, it feems, is a tranflation from the French, and contains advice to a journalist on the fubject of philofophy.

H. C. S.

PHILOSOPHY.

You poffefs a competent knowledge of geometry and phyficks, to give an exact account of books of this kind; and you have enough of understanding and tafte to speak of them with that art, which ftrips them of their thorns, without loading them with unbecoming flowers.

I would particularly advife you, when you fhall make philofophical extracts, firft to prefent to the reader a kind of historical abridgment of the opinions fuggefted, or of the truths eftablifhed.

For example, is the question of the vacuum under difcuffion? Mention briefly the manner in which Epicurus thought he had proved it; fhew how Gaffendi rendered it more probable; expofe to view the infinite degrees of probability, which Newton has added to this opinion, by his arguments, by his obfervations, and by his calculations.

Is a work on the nature of air under confideration? It is proper, in the first place, to fhew that Ariftotle and all the philofophers knew that it had weight, but were ignorant of the degree of that weight. A great number of ignorant perfons, who are defirous of knowing at least the hiftory of the fciences, men of the world, young students, will learn, with avidity, with what force of reafon, and by what experiments the great Galileo combated the firft errour of Aristotle on the fubject of air; with what art Torecelli weighed it, as we afcertain the weight of any thing in a balance; by what means its elafticity was discovered; and, finally,

how the admirable experiments of Hale and Boerhaave have difcovered effects of air, which we are almoft forced to attribute to properties of matter, unknown until our day.

Does a book, filled with calculations and problems, on the subject of light, make its appearance? How much pleasure will you afford to the publick, by exhibiting the feeble ideas entertained by eloquent and ignorant Greece on the fubject of refraction; the opinion of the Arab Alhazen, the only geometrician of his time, refpecting it; the conjectures of Antonio de Dominis; the fyftem of Defcartes, of which he made an ingenious and geometrical, but falfe application; the difcoveries of Grimaldi, whofe life was but too fhort; finally, the truths established by Newton; truths the most bold and luminous, to which the human mind is capable of attaining ; truths, which open a new world to our view, but which ftill leave a cloud behind them!

Shall a work be compofed on the gravitation of the celeftial bodies, that admirable part of the demonftrations of Newton? Will you not gratify your readers, if you give the hiftory of this gravitation, from Copernicus, who had but a glimpse of it, from Keller, who was bold enough to announce it as if by instinct, to Newton, who has demonftrated to the aftonifhed world, that it preffes upon the fun, and the fun upon it?

Attribute to Defcartes and to Harrot the art of applying algebra to the menfuration of cube, integral, and differential calcula