By SIR DAVID BREWSTER, K.G.H.
_A New Edition, Illustrated with upwards of 80 Woodcuts._
The author of this volume passes under review “the principal phenomena
of nature and the leading constructions of art which bear the impress
of a supernatural character,” and more especially “those singular
illusions of sense by which the most perfect organs either fail to
perform their functions or perform them faithlessly, and where the
efforts and the creations of the mind predominate over the direct
perceptions of external nature.”
These are themes full of interest and worthy of the labour bestowed
upon them by the philosophic author. It is lamentable to think how
many minds rest contented with the most unphilosophical apology for
ignorance, by designating the acts they do not examine, wonders or
mysteries,--while to the mass of men, such acts are inexplicable,
except on some theory of superhuman agency, as absurd as it is
erroneous. The Letters of Sir David Brewster will disabuse both
classes. To the first, he furnishes philosophical data for explaining
many hitherto puzzling appearances--to the last, he supplies the means
of escape from absurdities calculated to retain them in mental slavery.
The eye and the ear are of course the great organs of deception,
and accordingly optical illusions occupy a considerable portion of
the volume. The illusions depending on the ear succeed, and after
these, we are treated with amusing descriptions of feats of strength,
of mechanical automata, and of some of the more popular wonders of
chemistry. Under each of these divisions, anecdotes of the most
interesting kind illustrate the author’s explanations, and no subject,
in itself grave and important, was ever on the whole treated in a more
amusing manner.