-----
Plato’s attention to the same celestial science unquestionably enlarged
his notions of the Deity, and enabled him to think the more justly of
the moral attributes of human nature. According to Plato—whose morality,
on the whole, corresponds with the system maintained by Socrates,[8]—the
human soul is a ray from the Divinity. He believed, that this minute
portion of infinite Wisdom, Goodness and Power, was omniscient, while
united with the Parent stock from which it emanated; but, when combined
with the body, that it contracted ignorance and impurity from that
union. He did not, like his master Socrates, neglect natural philosophy;
but investigated many principles which relate to that branch of
knowledge:—and, according to this philosopher, all things consisted of
two principles,—_God_ and _matter_.
-----
Footnote 8:
While Plato followed the morals of Socrates, he cultivated the
metaphysical opinions of Pythagoras. He is said to have founded his
physics on the notions of Heraclitus: it may be presumed,
nevertheless, that he derived that branch of his system from a better
source.
-----
It is evident that Plato believed in the immortality of the soul of man;
but he had, at the same time, very inadequate conceptions of the mode or
state of its existence, when separated from the body. It seems to have
been reserved for the Christian dispensation, to elucidate this great
_arcanum_, hidden from the most sagacious of the heathen
philosophers.[9] It was the difficulty that arose on this subject, the
incapability of knowing how to dispose of the soul, or intellectual
principle in the constitution of our species, after its disentanglement
from the body; a difficulty by which all the philosophers, antecedent to
the promulgation of Christianity, were subjected to unsurmountable
perplexities;—it was this, that rendered even the expansive genius of
Anaxagoras utterly incompetent to conceive of the possibility that the
soul should exist, independent of some union with matter. He therefore
invented the doctrine of the _Metempsychosis_; in order to provide some
receptacle of organised matter for that imperishable intellectual
principle attached to our nature here, after its departure from the
human frame; and to which new vehicle of the vital spirit of its
original but abandoned abode, the extinguished corporeal man, its union
with it should impart the powers and faculties of animal life.
-----
Footnote 9:
“_Reason_, tho’ taught by sense to range on high,
To trace the stars and measure all the sky;
Tho’ fancy, memory, foresight fill her train,
And o’er the beast he lifts the pride of man;
Yet, still to _matter_, _form_ and _space_ confin’d,
Or moral truths or laws that rule mankind,
Could ne’er, _unaided_, pierce the mental gloom,
Explore _new_ scenes _beyond the closing tomb_,
Reach with _immortal_ hope the blest abode,
Or raise one thought of _spirit_ or of GOD.”
_Vision of Columbus_, book VIII.
-----
Cultivating, as Plato did, the mind-expanding science of Astronomy,
faintly even as the true principles of this branch of science were then
perceived,[10] this philosopher could not fail to derive, from the
vastness, beauty and order, manifested in the appearances and
revolutions of the heavenly bodies, a conviction of the perpetual
existence of a great intelligent First Cause. It was, indeed, as the
Abbé Barthelemy justly remarks, the order and beauty apparent through
the whole universe, that compelled men to resort to a First Cause:[11]
This, he observes, the early philosophers of the Ionian school (which
owed its origin to Thales) had acknowledged. But Anaxagoras[12] was the
first who discriminated that First Cause from matter; and not only this
distinguished pupil of Thales,[13] but Anaximander, who, antecedently to
him, taught philosophy at Athens, with Archelaus the master of Socrates,
all treated in their writings of the formation of the universe, of the
nature of things, and of geometry and astronomy.
-----
Footnote 10:
“An inordinate desire to explain and generalise, without facts and
observations, led the ancient philosophers to the most absurd and
extravagant notions; though, in a few cases, they have displayed the
most wonderful ingenuity, and sagaciously anticipated the discoveries
of modern times.”
_New Edinb. Encyclop._ tit. Astronomy.
Footnote 11:
“If the petty motions of us mortals afford arguments for the being of
a God, much more may those greater motions we see in the world, and
the phænomena attending them: I mean, the motions of the planets and
heavenly bodies. For these must be put into motion either by one
common mighty Mover, acting upon them immediately, or by causes and
laws of His appointment; or by their respective movers, who, for
reasons to which you can by this time be no stranger,” (referring his
reader to preceding arguments), “must depend upon some Superior, that
furnished them with the power of doing this. And granting it to be
done either of these ways, we can be at no great distance from a
demonstration of the existence of a Deity.”—Wollaston’s _Rel. of Nat.
delineated_, sect. v. head 14th.
Footnote 12:
A disciple of Anaximenes, and preceptor to Socrates. He died 428 years
B. C. in the seventy-second year of his age.
Footnote 13:
Thales, of Miletus in Ionia, was one of the seven sages of Greece: he
was born about six hundred and forty years before the Christian era.
After travelling into other countries, he returned to his own, and
there devoted himself exclusively to the study of nature. Being the
first of the Greeks who made any discoveries in _Astronomy_, he is
said to have astonished his countrymen, by predicting a solar eclipse;
and he instructed them, by communicating the knowledge of geometry and
astronomy, which he had acquired while in Egypt. He died in the
ninety-sixth year of his age,—544 years B. C.
-----
According to Mr. Gibbon, the philosophers of Greece deduced their morals
from the nature of man, rather than from that of God. They meditated,
however, as we are informed by this very ingenious historian, on the
Divine Nature, as a most curious and important speculation; and, in the
profound enquiry, they displayed both the strength and the weakness of
the human understanding. The Stoics and the Platonists endeavoured to
reconcile the interests of reason with their notions of piety. The
opinions of the Academicians and Epicureans, the two other of the four
most celebrated schools, were of a less religious cast: But, continues
Mr. Gibbon, whilst the modest science of the former induced them to
doubt, the positive ignorance of the latter urged them to deny, the
providence of a Supreme Ruler.
Cicero[14] denominated the God of Plato the _Maker_, and the God of
Aristotle the _Governor_, of the world.[15] It is somewhere observed,
that it is no reflection on the character of Plato, to have been unable,
by the efforts of his own reason, to acquire any notion of a proper
creation; since we, who have the advantage of his writings, nay of
writings infinitely more valuable than his, to instruct us, find it
extremely difficult, if not impossible, to conceive how any thing can
first begin to have an existence. We believe the fact, on the authority
of Revelation.
-----
Footnote 14:
Marcus Tullius Cicero—the same that has been already mentioned. He
was, himself, not only one of the most learned and eloquent men, but
one of the greatest philosophers, of antiquity. This illustrious Roman
(whose death occurred forty-three years before the Christian era)
firmly believed in the being of a God. He was likewise a decided
advocate for the doctrine of the soul’s immortality; concerning which,
some fine reasoning will be found in his book on _Old Age_;—a
doctrine, however, by no means confined to Cicero alone, but one
maintained by many of the most eminent among the heathen philosophers,
in the early ages. Plato appears to have been the first who supported
that opinion upon sound and permanent arguments, deduced from truth
and established principles.
Footnote 15:
Cicero himself says, “If any one doubt, whether there be _a God_, I
cannot comprehend why the same person may not as well doubt, whether
there be a sun or not.” [_De Naturâ Deorum_, 2. 2.]
It is observed by Dr. Turnbull, in his annotations on Heineccius’s
_System of Universal Law_, that Polybius as well as Cicero, and indeed
almost all the ancient philosophers, have acknowledged, that a public
sense of Religion is necessary to the well-being and support of civil
society: and such a sentiment of Religion is inseparable from a
reasonable conception of the being and attributes of the Deity.
“Society,” says Dr. Turnbull very truly, “can hardly subsist without
it: or, at least, it is the most powerful mean for restraining from
vice; and for promoting and upholding those virtues by which society
subsists, and without which every thing that is great and comely in
society must soon perish and go to ruin.”—“With regard to private
persons,” continues this learned writer, “he who does not often employ
his mind in reviewing the perfections of the Deity, and in consoling
and strengthening his mind by the comfortable and mind-exalting
reflexions, to which meditation upon the universal providence of an
all-perfect mind, naturally, and as it were, necessarily lead,
deprives himself of the greatest joy, the noblest exercise and
entertainment, the human mind is capable of; and whatever obligations
there may to virtue, he cannot be so firm, steady, and unshaken in his
adherence to it, as he, who, being persuaded of the truth just
mentioned, is daily drawing virtuous strength and comfort from it.”
[See the Annotator’s remark on ch. v. b. i. of _Heineccius_.]
-----
Great were, undoubtedly, the improvements in astronomy, made by the
Greek philosophers of early ages, on such of its rudiments as were
handed down to them from those nations by whom it was first
cultivated:[16] Yet it can scarcely be conceived, that, until the
celebrated Euclid of Alexandria,[17] and his followers, had reduced the
mathematics of Thales and others of those philosophers, into regular
systems of arithmetical and geometrical science, the true principles of
astronomy could be ascertained. In fact, seventeen centuries and an half
had elapsed, from the time of that great geometrician, before Copernicus
appeared: when this wonderful genius, availing himself of such remnants
of the ancient philosophy, as the intervening irruptions of the
barbarous nations of the north upon the then civilized world had left to
their posterity, opened to the view of mankind the real system of the
universe.[18]—So vast was the chasm, during which the nobler branches of
physics remained uncultivated and neglected, that, from the age of
Euclid, fourteen centuries passed away, before Roger Bacon, an English
Franciscan friar, began his successful enquiries into experimental
philosophy.—This extraordinary man is said to have been almost the only
_astronomer_ of his age; and he himself tells us, that there were not,
then, more than three or four persons in the world who had made any
considerable proficiency in the _mathematics_!
-----
Footnote 16:
The Greeks derived their knowledge of astronomy from the Egyptians and
Chaldeans. According to Plutarch, the sciences began to unfold
themselves about the time of Hesiod, the Greek poet, who flourished
upwards of nine centuries before the Christian era; but their progress
was very slow, until the time of Thales, which was about three
centuries later. And although this celebrated philosopher of antiquity
rendered himself famous by foretelling an eclipse of the sun, he only
predicted the _year_ in which it was to happen. Even this, it is
remarked by Mr. Vince (in his invaluable work, entitled, _A Complete
System of Astronomy_,) he was probably enabled to do by the _Chaldean
Saros_, a period of 223 lunations; after which, the eclipses return
again nearly in the same order. Philolaus, a disciple of Pythagoras,
lived about four hundred and fifty years before Christ, and is said to
have taught the true solar system,—placing the sun in the centre, with
the earth and all the planets revolving about it; a system which, it
is believed, Pythogaras himself had conceived, and was inclined to
adopt.
However, Hipparchus, who lived between one hundred and twenty-five and
one hundred and sixty years before the Christian era, and whom Mr.
Vince styles “the Father of Astronomy,” was the first person that
cultivated every part of that science. His discoveries, together with
those of Ptolemy, are preserved in the Μεγαλη Σύνταξις, or _Great
Construction_,—Ptolemy’s celebrated work on Astronomy, named by the
Arabs the _Almagest_, and now usually so called.
Footnote 17:
This great philosopher of antiquity, so justly entitled to celebrity
for his mathematical works, flourished three hundred years before the
Christian era. Care should be taken not to confound him with Euclid of
Megara, who lived a century earlier. The latter, as the Abbé
Barthelemi observes, being too much familiarized with the writings of
Parmenides and the Elean school, had recourse to abstractions; “a
method,” says the Abbé, “often dangerous, oftener unintelligible.”
Just after, he adds: “The subtleties of metaphysics calling to their
aid the quirks of logic, _words_ presently took place of _things_, and
students acquired nothing in the schools but a spirit of acrimony and
contradiction.” _Travels of the younger Anacharsis_, vol. iii. chap.
37.
Footnote 18:
That the sun is at rest, and that the planets revolve round him, is an
opinion that appears to have been received of old, by Philolaus,
Aristarchus of Samos, and the whole sect of the Pythagoreans. It is
probable, as Mr. Rowning[18a] observes, that this notion was derived
from them, by the Greeks: But the opinion that the sun stood still in
the centre, while the whole heavens moved around it, was the
prevailing one, until Copernicus, by the establishment of his system,
restored the ancient astronomy of the Pythagorean school.
Footnote 18a:
In his _Compendious System of Natural Philosophy_.
-----
But after the appearance of Copernicus,[19] succeeded by the ingenious
Tycho Brahe[20] and sagacious Kepler,[21] arose the learned physiologist
Bacon, Viscount of St. Albans,—one of the most illustrious contributors
to the yet scanty stock of experimental philosophy.[22] And soon after,
in the same age and nation, was manifested to the world, in the full
glory of meridian splendour, that great luminary of natural science, who
first enlightened mankind by diffusing among them the rays of
well-ascertained truths; clearly exhibiting to all, those fundamental
principles of the laws of nature, by which the grand, the stupendous
system of the material universe is both sustained and governed:—
“Nature and Nature’s Laws lay hid in night;
God said, Let NEWTON be,—and all was Light.”
Finally, it was reserved for our own age and country to derive dignity
and fame, from having given birth to an illustrious successor and
disciple of that immortal man, in the person of the yet
recently-departed RITTENHOUSE.
-----
Footnote 19:
Nicholas Copernic (usually latinized, by adding the terminating
syllable, us,) that celebrated astronomer, “whose vast genius,
assisted by such lights as the remains of antiquity afforded him,
explained the true system of the universe, as at present
understood,”[19a] was born at Thorn in Royal Prussia, the 19th of
January, 1442. He was alike distinguished for his piety and innocence,
as for his extraordinary genius and discoveries. He died in the
seventy-seventh year of his age.
Footnote 19a:
_Ritt. Orat._
Footnote 20:
This great man was a native of Knudsturp, a province of Scania in
Denmark, and born the 18th of December, 1546, of an illustrious
family. He was the first, who, by the accuracy and number of his
observations, made the way for the revival of astronomy among the
moderns; although, “in theory,” as Rittenhouse has expressed it, “he
mangled the beautiful system of Copernicus.”[20a]—Brahé (for this is
the family-name) died at the age of fifty-five years.
Footnote 20a:
Ibid.
Footnote 21:
John Kepler, a native of Wiel in the duchy of Wirtemberg, in Germany,
became as celebrated for the consequences he drew from the
observations of Tycho, as the latter was for the vast mass of
astronomical materials he had prepared. This eminent, though somewhat
“whimsical”[21a] astronomer, was born the 27th of December, 1571, and
died at the age of fifty-nine years.
Footnote 21a:
_Ritt. Orat._
Footnote 22:
“Before his (Bacon’s) time, philosophy was fettered by forms and
syllogisms. The logics of Aristotle held the human mind in bondage for
nearly two thousand years; a miserable jugglery, which was fitted to
render all truth problematical, and which disseminated a thousand
errors, but never brought to light one useful piece of knowledge.”—Ld.
Woolhousie’s _Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Ld. Kames_.
-----
The objects of a genuine philosophy, are the discovery and promulgation
of the truths which emanate from a knowledge of the laws of nature, in
relation to the material world, and the inseparable influence of those
truths, consequent on an acquaintance with them, in giving a right
direction to the moral faculty of man. The intimate connexion subsisting
between natural and moral science, is indubitable; and it is equally
certain, that the accordant order, fitness and rectitude, which unite
into one glorious plan of wisdom, goodness and power, all portions of
creation, intellectual and sensitive as well as material, must rest on
the same unerring principles. The infinite variety and boundless extent
of nature’s works constitute a sublime system; manifesting a
correspondent perfection in the design, and all-bountiful dispensation
of good in its purposes.[23] The Almighty First Cause has founded this
system on immutable principles; wherein _truth_, in relation to the
moral world, may be considered as its basis,—as _fitness_ is, when
applied to the constitution of the natural world. These are,
respectively, the correlatives of the one and the other: and the unity
of design apparent in the whole system, plainly indicates the connexion
that subsists, in the nature of things, between moral virtue, which is
the result of a right perception of truth, and the fitness and order, to
which all the operations of the material universe conform.[24]—Towards
an investigation of _these_ things, the researches of the great American
philosopher were eagerly directed: such were the objects of his
unwearied pursuit; and such were the views entertained by him, of the
utility and importance of those sublime branches of knowledge, which he
cultivated so ardently and successfully.[25]
Footnote 23:
It is observed by an eminent philosopher of the present day, that “The
more the phænomena of the universe are studied, the more distinctly
their connexion appears, the more simple their causes, the more
magnificent their design, and the more wonderful the wisdom and power
of their Author.” (See _Elements of Chymical Philosophy_, by sir
Humphrey Davy, LLD. Sec. R. S.)
-----
Footnote 24:
On looking into Maclaurin’s Account of Sir Isaac Newton’s
Philosophical Discoveries, since penning the above, the writer of
these Memoirs was much gratified by the perusal of the following
passage, in the last chapter of that valuable work; wherein its author
treats “Of the Supreme Author and Governor of the Universe, the True
and Living God.” The writer is induced to add it in a note, to his own
reflections on the same subject, such as he has ventured to offer them
in the text; presuming that the authority of so eminent a philosopher
as Mr. Maclaurin will give weight to what he has himself advanced; so
far, at least, as there may appear to be some coincidence of sentiment
on the subject.
“The plain argument for the existence of the Deity, obvious to all and
carrying irresistable conviction with it, is from the evident
contrivance and fitness of things for one another, which we meet with
throughout all parts of the universe. There is no need of nice and
subtle reasonings in this matter: a manifest contrivance immediately
suggests a contriver. It strikes us like a sensation; and artful
reasonings against it may puzzle us, but it is without shaking our
belief. No person, for example, that knows the principles of optics,
and the structure of the eye, can believe that it was formed without
skill in that science; or that the ear was formed, without the
knowledge of sounds:”—“All our accounts of nature are full of
instances of this kind. The admirable and beautiful order of things,
for final causes, exalt our idea of the Contriver: the unity of design
shews him to be One. The great motions in the system, performed with
the same facility as the least, suggest his Almighty Power; which gave
motion to the earth and the celestial bodies, with equal ease as to
the minutest particles. The subtilty of the motions and actions in the
internal parts of bodies, shews that His influence penetrates the
inmost recesses of things, and that He is equally active and present
every where. The simplicity of the laws that prevail in the world, the
excellent disposition of things, in order to obtain the best ends, and
the beauty which adorns the works of nature, far superior to any thing
in art, suggest His consummate Wisdom. The usefulness of the whole
scheme, so well contrived for the intelligent beings that enjoy it,
with the internal disposition and moral structure of those beings
themselves, shew His unbounded goodness. These are arguments which are
sufficiently open to the views and capacities of the unlearned, while
at the same time they acquire new strength and lustre from the
discoveries of the learned. The Deity’s acting and interposing in the
universe, shew that He governs it, as well as formed it; and the depth
of His counsels, even in conducting the material universe, of which a
great part surpasses our knowledge, keeps up an inward veneration and
awe of this great Being, and disposes us to receive what may be
otherwise revealed to us, concerning Him.”
Footnote 25:
Mr. Cotes, in his preface to the second edition of Sir Isaac Newton’s
_Principia_, exposes the folly of those depraved dreamers in
philosophy, “the sordid dregs of the most impure part of mankind,” who
strive to maintain, that the constitution of the world is not derived
from the will of God, but from a certain necessity of nature; that all
things are governed by _fate_, not by Providence; and that matter, by
_necessity of nature_, has existed always and every where, and is
infinite and eternal. He then adds:—“We may now, therefore, take a
nearer view of nature in her glory, and contemplate her in a most
entertaining manner: and withal, more zealously than ever, pay our
worship and veneration to the Creator and Lord of the Universe; _which
is the principal advantage of philosophy_. He must be blind who, from
the most excellent and most wise structure of the creatures, does not
presently see the infinite wisdom and goodness of their Creator: and
he must be mad, who will not own those attributes.”
-----
The enlightened part of the people have, in every civilized nation and
in all ages, very rationally valued themselves on their great men. It is
both useful and proper to commemorate the renown of such as have
approved themselves, in an eminent degree, Benefactors of Mankind. The
Life, therefore, of so distinguished a Philosopher as RITTENHOUSE, must
be expected to interest the feelings, as well as the curiosity, of the
good and the wise, not only of our own country but of foreign nations.
With respect to the usefulness and importance of that majestic science,
which was the favourite study and principal object of the pursuit of our
philosopher, during a life of ordinary extent but of very extraordinary
attainments and character, something may with propriety be said, with a
view to an illustration of the subject. And among other evidence, which,
it is presumed, may not be unaptly adduced on the occasion, the
Memorialist will cite in the first place, as well as occasionally
afterwards, the sentiments of a distinguished foreign astronomer, whose
abilities and erudition rendered him eminently qualified to decide, in a
discussion of this nature: He shall be made to speak for himself, though
not in his own tongue; the great work from which the quoted extracts are
made, being written in French.
Among the numerous and important advantages, then, resulting from
astronomy, noticed by the celebrated Lalande (in the preface to his
book, entitled _Astronomie_,) he remarks that it is well known, that
besides the tendency of this science to dissipate many vulgar errors and
prejudices,[26] cosmography and geography cannot go on, but by its
means: that the discovery of the satellites of Jupiter has given greater
perfection to our geographical and marine charts, than they could have
attained by ten thousand years of navigation and voyages;[27] and, that
when their theory shall become still better known, the method of
determining the longitude at sea will be more exact and more easy.
-----
Footnote 26:
“A man would deceive himself,” says Lalande, “in believing he could
be a philosopher, without the study of the natural sciences. To be
wise, not by weakness, but by principles, it is necessary that, to
be able to reflect and think with vigour, we be freed from those
prejudices which deceive the judgment, and which oppose themselves
to the development of reason and of genius. Pythagoras would not
have any disciples, who had not studied Mathematics: over his door
was to be read, that “no one was to enter, unless he were a
geometrician.”—Morals would be less sure, and less attractive for
us, if they were to be founded on ignorance or on error.
“Ought we,” he asks, “to consider as of no importance the advantage of
being freed from the misfortunes of ignorance? Is it possible to
observe, without a feeling of compassion and even of shame, the
stupidity of those, who formerly believed, that by making a great
vociferation, during an eclipse of the Moon, they furnished relief to
the sufferings of that (imagined) goddess; or, that these eclipses
were produced by enchantment?”
“Cum frustra resonant æra auxiliaria Lunæ.”
Met. iv. 333.
Reyas, in the dedication of his Commentaries on the Planisphere to the
Emperor Charles V. mentions a curious historical fact, in illustration
of the effects of that superstition, derived from ignorance, which
astronomy has banished from the civilized world. It is thus related by
Lalande:—“Christopher Columbus, when commanding the army which
Ferdinand, king of Spain, had sent to Jamaica, some short time after
the discovery of that island, experienced so great a scarcity of
provisions, that no hope remained of saving his army, which he
expected to be soon at the mercy of the savages. An approaching
eclipse of the moon furnished this able man with the means of
extricating himself from his embarrassment: he let the chief of the
savages know, that if they should not, in a few hours, send him all he
asked for, he would oppress them with the greatest calamities; and
that he would begin by depriving the moon of her light. At first, they
contemned his menaces; but, when they saw that the moon began, in
reality, to disappear, they were seized with terror; they carried all
they had to the general, and came themselves to implore forgiveness.”
Comets were formerly, even in civilized nations, another great cause
of consternation among the people; and one, also, which a knowledge of
astronomy has at length divested of its terrors, by removing the
source of those superstitious errors, a grossly mistaken notion of the
nature of those phænomena. “We are sorry to find,” says Lalande, “such
strange prejudices, not only in Homer [Iliad iv. 75.] but even in the
most beautiful poem of the sixteenth century; whereby means are
furnished of perpetuating our errors—
“Qual con le chiome sanguinose orrende
Splender Cometa suol per l’aria adusta,
Che i regni muta e i feri morbi adduce,
E ai purpurei tiranni infausta luce.”
_Tasso’s Jerus. del._