Bin LESSON LXXXVI. REMARK. — Let each pupil in the class observe and mention every syllable that is not sounded as each one reads. PRONOUNCE Correctly.—An-gel (pro. ane-gel), not ann-gel: heard (pro. herd), not heerd: de-mands, not dum-ands: com-pli-cate, not com-pli-kit: ex'-quis-ite, not ex'-quis'-ite: ab-so-lute, not ab-ser-lute : hus-bands, not hus-bunds. 1. MIDNIGHT MUSINGS. THE bell strikes One. We take no note of time 5. It is the knell of my departed hours. Where are they? With the years beyond the flood. How much is to be done! My hopes and fears And can eternity belong to me, Poor + pensioner on the bounties of an hour? How poor, how rich, how abject, how august, 15. How complicate, how wonderful is man! 20 Distinguished link in being's endless chain! A beam ethereal, sullied, and absorpt! A worm! a god!—I tremble at myself, O what a miracle to man is man! + Triumphantly distressed! what joy! what dread! What can preserve my life! or what destroy! 'Tis past conjecture; all things rise in proof. 45. Her ceaseless flight, though devious, speaks her nature Unfettered with her gross companion's fall. 50. Even silent night proclaims eternal day. For human weal Heaven husbands all events: YOUNG. QUESTIONS.-What leads us to take "note of time?" What reflections follow, if this warning is "heard aright!" Repeat some of the numerous epithets applied to man. What does one class of these epithets represent man to be? In what light does the other class consider him? In what respect is he a "worm?" How can he be called a "god?" What is the state of the mind during sleep? What does this prove? Point out the instances of antithetic inflections and emphasis in this lesson. Why does "He," in the 16th line, commence with a capital letter? LESSON LXXXVII. REMARK. - Be careful to give a full sound to the vowels. Regard to this rule, will correct the common, flat, clipping way in which many read. UTTER each sound correctly and distinctly.-Ir-reg-u-lar, not irreg-gy-lur, nor ir-reg'lar: un-err-ing, not un-er'n: in-tel-lect-u-al, not in-tel-lect-e-al: cal-cu-la-ting, not cal-ky-la-tin: beau-ti-ful, not beauti-f'l: struct-ure, not struct-er: reg-u-late, not reg-gy-late: chem-ic-al, not chem-ic'l: vis-age, not vis-ij: por-tal, not por-ťl. 1. Phys'-ic-al, a. relating to nature. 2. Pas'-sion-less, a. without feeling. Syl-lo-gis'-tic, a. relating to a syllo- 3. Ra'-tio, n. the relation of two quanti- Phe-nom'-e-na, n. pl. of phenomenon, Re-frac'-tion, n. the turning from a direct course. 6. Par'-al-lax, n. the difference between A-nom'-a-lies, n. irregularities. A-nal'-y-sis, n. separation of any Or'-rer-y, n. an instrument to show the motions of the planets. 7. Op'-tics, n. the science of light. Aus-ter'-i-ty, n. severity, roughness. Cru'-ci-ble, n. a chemical melting pot. E-quiv'-a-lents, n. equals in value. 8. Min-er-al'-o-gy, n. the science of minerals. [mineral. Crys'-tal, n. regular solid of any Hex'-a-gons, n. six-sided figures. Do-dec'-a-gons,n.twelve-sided figures. In'-ci-dence, n. falling on any thing. 9. Cy'-cloid, n. a certain kind of curve. VALUE OF MATHEMATICS. 1. MAN may construct his works by irregular and uncertain rules; but God has made an unerring law for his whole creation, and made it, too, in respect to the physical system, upon principles, which, as far as we now know, can never be understood, without the aid of mathematics. 2. Let us suppose a youth who despises, as many do, these cold and passionless abstractions of the mathematics. Yet, he is +intellectual; he loves knowledge; he would explore nature. and know the reason of things; but he would do it, without aid from this rigid, syllogistic, measuring, calculating science. He seeks indeed, no "royal road to geometry," but, he seeks one not less difficult to find, in which geometry is not needed. He takes the 3. He begins with the mechanical powers. lever and readily understands that it will move a weight. But the principle upon which different weights at different distances are moved, he is forbidden to know; for they depend upon ratios and proportions. He passes to the inclined plane; but quits it in disgust, when he finds its action depends upon the relations of angles and triangles. The screw is still worse, and when he comes to the wheel and axle, he gives them up forever; they are all mathematical! 4. He would investigate the laws of falling bodies, and moving fluids, and would know why their motion is accelerated at different periods, and upon what their momentum depends. But, roots and squares, lines, angles, and curves, float before him in the mazy dance of a disturbed intellect. The very first proposition is a mystery and he soon discovers, that mechanical philosophy is little better than mathematics itself. 5. But he still has his senses; he will, at least, not be indebted to diagrams and equations for their enjoyment. He gazes with admiration upon the phenomena of light; the many-colored rainbow upon the bosom of the clouds; the clouds themselves reflected with all their changing shades from the surface of the quiet waters. Whence comes this beautiful imagery? He investigates and finds that every hue in the rainbow is made by a different angle of refraction, and that each ray reflected from the mirror, has its angle of incidence equal to its angle of reflection; and, as he pursues the subject further, in the construction of lenses and telescopes, the whole family of triangles, ratios, proportions, and conclusions arise to alarm his excited vision. 6. He turns to the heavens, and is charmed with its shining host, moving in solemn procession, "through the halls of the sky," each star, as it rises and sets, marking time on the records of nature. He would know the structure of this beautiful system, and search out, if possible, the laws which regulate those distant lights. But astronomy forever banishes him from her presence; she will have none near her to whom mathematics is not a familiar friend. What can he know of her parallaxes, anomalies, and precessions, who has never studied the conic sections, or the higher order of analysis? She sends him to some wooden orrery, from which he may gather as much knowledge of the heavenly bodies, as a child does of armies from the gilded troopers of the toy shop. 7. But if he can have no companionship with optics, nor astronomy, nor mechanical philosophy, there are sciences, he thinks, which have better taste and less austerity of manners. He flies to chemistry, and her garments float loosely around him. For a while, he goes gloriously on, illuminated by the red lights and blue lights of crucibles and retorts. But, soon he comes to compound bodies, to the composition of the elements around him, and finds them all in fixed relations. He finds that gases and fluids will combine with each other, and with solids only in a certain ratio, and that all possible compounds are formed by nature in immutable proportion. Then starts up the whole doctrine of chemical equivalents, and mathematics again stares him in the face. + 8. Affrighted, he flies to mineralogy; stones he may pick up, jewels he may draw from the bosom of the earth, and be no longer alarmed at the stern visage of this terrible science. But, even here, he is not safe. The first stone that he finds, quartz, contains a crystal, and that crystal assumes the dreaded form of geometry. Crystallization allures him on; but, as he goes, cubes and hexagons, pyramids and dodecagons arise before him in beautiful array. He would understand more about them, but must wait at the portal of the temple, till introduced within by that honored of time and science, our friendly Euclid. + 9. And now, where shall this student of nature, without the aid of mathematics, go for his knowledge, or his enjoyments? Is it to natural history? The very birds cleave the air in the form of the cycloid, and mathematics prove it the best. Their feathers are formed upon calculated mechanical principles; the muscles of their frame are moved by them. The little bee has constructed his cell in the very geometrical figure, and with the precise angles, which mathematicians, after ages of investigation, have demonstrated to be that which contains the greatest economy of space and strength. Yes! he, who would shun mathematics, must fly the bounds of "flaming space," and in the realms of chaos, that where Milton's Satan wandered from the wrath of heaven, he may possibly find some spot visited by no figure of geometry, and no harmony of proportion. But nature, this beautiful creation of God, has no resting place for him. All its construction is mathematical; all its uses, reasonable; all its ends, harmonious. It has no elements mixed without regulated law; no broken chord to make a false note in the music of the spheres. E. D. MANSFIELD. |