PREFACE.

THE lectures contained in the volume here offered to the public were delivered, by invitation, in French, between the 17th of January and the 24th of February, of the present year. One of the halls of the Lowell Institute, in Boston, was placed, for that purpose, at the author's disposal, by the liberality of the Trustee, John A. Lowell, Esq. They were spoken with the help only of a few notes, and were not intended, at the time, for the press. But the publication having been desired by some friends, and requested by the editors of the Boston Daily Traveller, for the columns of that excellent journal, the author determined to write out, the next morning, the lecture of the evening before. These rapid pages, translated, from day to day, by Mr. C. C Felton, Professor in Harvard University, are collected and reprinted in the present volume. Neither time nor circumstances have permitted any important alterations; the only material additions are found in the first lecture, the last part of which did not appear in the journal, and, at the beginning of the eighth, the portion which treats of the marine currents. This subject, although announced in the programme of the course, it was found necessary, for want of time, to pass over in silence. As to the rest, the lectures have retained their original cast, notwithstanding the incongruity which sometimes happens, of bringing several different subjects into the same discourse.

This brief history of the present book will place the reader in a position to form a just opinion of the work, and perhaps will induce him to extend to it some indulgence.

It will, moreover, be readily understood, that oral instruction is naturally clothed in forms appropriate to itself, which are not those of a systematic and didactic exposition, such as is required by a book intended only for reading, or for the silent study of the closet. In the opinion of the author, it should bring out in strong relief, even by venturing a dash of the pencil somewhat bold, the essential traits of the subject, in order to fix and deepen the impression, while the secondary features are thrown into the shade. Truth, far from losing by this mode, will gain the advantage of being grasped in a manner at once more distinct and more correct. For nothing is less indispensable to true science, - may the reader of these pages find it so, - than the scholastic and doctoral robe, which is too often unnecessarily worn.

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This little work is not, then, a treatise on the subject indicated by its title. The author would wish to consider this unforeseen publication only as the forerunner of a more complete work, the materials of which, gradually collected during long years of study, and still daily accumulating, he hopes to arrange, and work out more at leisure, if not in the same form, at least in the same spirit. However, he is confident that the man of science will find, in this first sketch, the traces of serious and matured studies.

Numerous quotations and references were incompatible with the form of these discourses. The facts, properly so called, are drawn from the common domain of science; and as to the results that have been deduced from their combination, the author willingly leaves to men versed in the subject the task of distinguishing those which may be regarded as constituting a progress in knowledge of the creation, and of its relations to man.

There are, however, three names so closely connected with the history of the science to which this volume is devoted, and with the past studies of the author, that he feels bound to mention them here Humboldt, Ritter, and Steffens, are the three great

minds who have breathed a new life into the science of the physical and moral world. The scientific life of the author opened under the full radiance of the light they spread around them, and it is with a sentiment of filial piety that he delights to recall this connection, and to render to them his public homage.

more.

Notwithstanding the praiseworthy care the publishers of this volume have taken to provide it with the maps and drawings necessary to understand the text, the reader will perhaps desire He will find them in the Physical Atlas of Berghaus, the most excellent, and almost the only work of the kind, or in the English publications based on it, by Johnston of Edinburgh, by A. Petermann of London, and others. The explanatory pages give the information necessary for the plates that accompany these sheets. For their execution on stone, the author deems himself happy in having been able to avail himself of the talents of an artist so able and obliging as M. Sonrel.

Besides Prof. Felton, who has read all the proof-sheets, the author returns his sincere acknowledgments to Professors Agassiz, Peirce, and Gray, who have had the goodness to revise portions of them.

Few subjects seem more worthy to occupy thoughtful minds, than the contemplation of the grand harmonies of nature and history. The spectacle of the good and the beautiful in nature, reflecting everywhere the idea of the Creator, calms and refreshes the soul. The view of the hand of Providence, guiding the chariot of human destinies, reässures and strengthens our faith. May these unpretending sheets, launched upon the sea of publicity, reach those who feel the need of both, and by them be kindly received.

CAMBRIDGE, MASS., May 1, 1849.

PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION.

THE marked favor with which the public, here and abroad,* have received this essay, imposed on the author the duty of carefully revising it. But the time of its first appearance is so recent, that no important alterations are to be made. Except a few additions of facts quite recently acquired for science, particularly in the paragraph relating to the sub-marine relief of the basin of the oceans, the work has remained, in substance, what it was. Not so with the translation. The translator, exercising a severer criticism than the reader upon his own work, has carefully revised, improved, and corrected it; and the author seizes this occasion to repeat his thanks for this fresh endeavor to render these sheets more worthy of the public approbation.

If there is any reward worthy of desire to him who communicates his thoughts to his fellow-men, it is that of meeting, in the midst of throngs preöccupied with so many diversified cares, an echo and sympathy. This gratification has not been wanting to the author, and he recalls with gratitude the numerous testimonies he has received from so many quarters. He finds in these manifestations an encouragement to continue his work, and to prepare a second volume, on the Historical Development of Humanity, which he considers as the necessary complement to the present. CAMBRIDGE, July, 1850.

*This volume has been republished in London, by Bentley, and an edition in French is about to appear at Paris. A mutilated edition, called "revised," has also been published by E. Gover, Sen., London, in which many passages, amounting to over thirty pages of the original edition, and essential to the continuity of the argument, or containing conclusions, have been suppressed; additions have been inserted expressing views not advanced by the author; alterations have been made, in exceedingly bad English, all without the least intimation in the preface. Against the two first, the author protests; against the last, the translator.

EXPLANATION OF THE PLATES AND FIGURES

PLATE I. PHYSICAL MAP OF THE WORLD.

THIS map, in Mercator's projection, is intended to enable the eye to seize at a glance the great physical features of the surface of the globe. To this end, each particular is indicated by a different color. The color of the ocean forms a ground which clearly defines and brings out the characteristic forms of the continents. The bands of white lines which cross them indicate the course of the marine currents, according to the Physical Map of Berghaus. The arrows mark their direction. In the continents, three colors distinguish the three principal forms of relief from each other. The green tint marks the low lands; the white, the more elevated parts and the table lands; the brown, the systems of mountains, the borders of the table lands, and the slopes in general. It is easy thus to form by a single glance an idea of the general features of relief of the different countries of the earth. The dotted lines which cross the map are, beginning at the top, the Arctic circle, the tropic of Cancer, and the tropic of Capricorn. The entirely straight line is the Equator. The latitudes are marked in the margin by a line for every 15°. The longitudes in the same way, by 15° East and West from the meridian of Paris. The two winding lines in the northern half of the map are the isothermal lines of zero Centigrade or 32° Fahrenheit, and of 15° Centigrade or 59° Fahrenheit. All the places situated on these lines, having the same mean annual temperature, set in a clear light the difference of climate between the opposite coasts of the continents, while referring it to the true causes. Every letter has been omitted from this little map, which is intended to be a physical picture, and to speak to the eye. The scale, moreover, scarcely allowed their insertion, and the great features which it represents are so well known that there is no need of naming them.