It is by a combination of actual phenomena, by an ideal
enlargement of relations in space, and of the amount of active forces, that
we are able to advance into the long sought and indefinitely anticipated
domain of geognosy, which has only within the last half century been based
on the solid foundation of scientific deduction.
It has been acutely remarked, "that notwithstanding our continual employment
of large telescopes, we are less acquainted with the exterior than with the
interior of other planets, excepting, perhaps, our own satellite." They
have been weighed, and their volume measured; and their mass and density are
becoming known with constantly-increasing exactness; thanks to the progress
made in astronomical observation and calculation. Their physical character
is, however, hidden in obscurity, for it is only in our own globe that we
can be brought in immediate contact with all the elements of organic and
inorganic creation. The diversity of the most heterogenous substances,
their admixtures and metamorphoses, and the ever-changing play of the forces
called into action, afford to the human mind both nourishment and enjoyment,
and open an immeasurable field of observation, from which the intellectual
activity of man derives a great portion of its grandeur and power.
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