A GLANCE AT THE SCIENCES. INTRODUCTION. NATURAL or PHYSICAL SCIENCE is as boundless in its scope as the extent of the universe. It does not confine its researches to the narrow circle within our own observation: it is not content with the investigation of objects presented to the naked eye: it goes with the telescope into the heavens, and descends with the microscope into the atom-every where discovering materials for its consideration. Nor is it absorbed with observations upon the forms and hues of material objects it seeks out the hidden laws of the universe, the principles by which the Architect of the earth and heavens constructs and governs his boundless dominions. We are apt to wrap up the true idea of scientific investigations in a bald and chilling phraseology: we call them studies of nature; but they are, in truth, studies into the ways of God. What is nature, separate from that active and intelligent Being to whom we are indebted for life and light, - that Being who gave us the Bible as well as the Sun, and is as truly the moral as he is the natural Governor of the universe? The true mode of pursuing scientific studies is to regard them as investigations into the works of the Almighty, and every where, as well in the contemplation of the starry firmament as in scrutinizing the more familiar objects of our own globe, to realize the presence of the Creator. In this way, science unseals the volume of Nature's revelation, to the most noble and exalting purposes. "While the telescope," says Dr. Chalmers, "enables us to see a system in every star, the microscope unfolds to us a world in every atom. The one instructs us that this mighty globe, with the whole burden of its people and its countries, is but a grain of sand in the vast field of immensity: the other, that every atom may harbor the tribes and families of a busy population. The one shows us the insignificance of the world we inhabit: the other redeems it from all its insignificance; for it tells us that, in the leaves of every forest, in the flowers of every garden, in the waters of every rivulet, there are worlds teeming with life, and numberless as are the stars of the firmament. The one suggests to us that, above and beyond all that is visible to man, there may be regions of creation which sweep immeasurably along, and carry the impress of the Almighty's hand to the remotest scenes of the universe; the other that, within and beneath all that minuteness which the aided eye of man has been able to explore, there may be a world of invisible beings; and that, could we draw aside the mysterious curtain which shrouds it from our senses, we might behold a theatre of as many wonders as astronomy can unfold; a universe within the compass of a point, so small as to elude all the powers of the microscope, but where the Almighty Ruler of all things finds room for the exercise of His attributes, where He can raise another mechanism of worlds, and fill and animate them with all the evidence of His glory." How interesting, how instructive, is science, while we thus walk its paths in the light of God's image, and with the constant assurance that, while He thus pursues His vast operations, He is still presiding over the beating of our hearts, and that not even the sparrow falls unnoticed to the ground! How comparatively barren and desolate are the works of creation, if the Christian's God is every where invisible, and the whole phenomena of nature are to be resolved into an inscrutable series of causes and consequences! In the course of the following pages, we propose only to present a rapid and distinct outline of Physical Science, as it is now exhibited in the works of learned men. Within the present century, the march of knowledge has been rapid beyond example, and at the same time, the most wonderful discoveries have been |