It is within these limits alone that the work,
which I now venture to undertake, appertains to the sphere of labor to which
I have devoted myself throughout the course of my long scientific career.
The path of inquiry is not unknown to me, although it may be pursued by
others with greater success. The unity which I seek to attain in the
development of the great phenomena of the universe, is analogous to that
which historical composition is capable of acquiring. All points relating
to the accidental individualities, and the essential variations of the
actual, whether in the form and arrangement of natural objects in the
struggle of man against the elements, or of nations against nations, do not
admit of being
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based only on a 'rational foundation' -- that is to say, of being deduced
from ideas alone.
It seems to me that a like degree of empiricism attaches to the Description
of the Universe and to Civil History; but in reflecting upon physical
phenomena and events, and tracing their causes by the process of reason, we
become more and more convinced of the truth of the ancient doctrine, that
the forces inherent in matter, and those which govern the moral necessity,
and in accordance with movements occurring periodically after longer or
shorter intervals.
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