The Nerves.

Errors in science have almost universally been the offspring of false or imperfect analogies; and it is curious to observe how a single term, used by way of illustration, has engendered an entire theory with all its appendages. Thus the nerves have been called as they really are in appearance, strings; but strings are capable of different degrees of tension, and according to these vibrate with greater or less force. Hence the nervous system was said to be braced or relaxed; its functions depended upon its tone; the sympathies of one nerve with another were owing to similarity of tension, as had been remarked with respect of fiddlestrings; nerves communicated their vibrations to the brain, and excited in that organ tremulous motions which were the immediate cause of sensation; and so forth. It is a pity that all this ingenious and well connected system is overthrown by the single fact, that the nerves always lie unstretched in a soft bed of cellular substance, to which they are attached by innumerable minute threads, so as to be utterly incapable of any motion like the vibrating of a cord.

"

Dr. Aikin's Essays, p. 427, 8vo. 1811.

A Commandment given by the Queen's most excellent Maiestie the Twelfth of Februarie, and 22d of her Highnesses Reigne, and declared by the Lord Chauncellor of England, and other the Lordes of her Maiesties most honourable Privie Counsel in the Starre Chamber, concerning clokes and ruffes of excessive lengthe and depthe.

It is also to be understoode that the saide 12th day of Februarie, in the present yeare 1579, by the Queenes Maiesties expresse commandmente, it was declared and published by the Lord Chauncellor, and other the Lordes of her Maiesties said Counsell, that from the one and twentieth of this moneth, no person shall use or weare such excessive long clokes, being in common sight monstrous, as now of late are begonne to be used; and before two yeere's past hath not been used in this realme. Neither also shoulde any person use or weare such great and excessive ruffes in or about the vppermost parte of their neckes, as had not been used before two yeeres past; but that all persons shoulde in modest and comelie sort leave off such fonde, disguised, and monstrous manners of attyring themselves, as both was unsupportable for charges, and undecent to be

worne.

And this her Maiestie commaunded to bee observed, upon paine of her high indignation, and the paines thereto due, and willed all officers to see the reformation and redresse thereof, to the punishment of any offending in these cases as persons wilfully disobeying or contemning her Maiesties commandment.

Given the 22d yeere of her Highnesses reigne, as is before expressed. God saue the Queene.

Imprinted at London, by Christopher Barker, Printer to the Queene's most excellent Maiestie. Cum privilegio Regiæ Maiestatis. Anno Dom. 1579,

Talents and Genius.

"A man of Talents has a much fairer prospect of good fortune than a man of Genius. There are few instances of Talents being neglected, and fewer still of Genius being encouraged. The world is a perfect judge of Talents, but thoroughly ignorant of Genius. Any art already known, if carried to a great height, is at once rewarded; but the new creations of Genius are not at first understood, and there must be so many repetitions of the effect before it is felt, that most commonly death steps in between Genius and its fame."

Hortus Siccus.

"Darby, a gardener at Hoxton, has a folio paperbook, in which he has pasted the leaves and flowers of almost all manner of plants, which make a pretty show, and are more instructive than any cuts in Herbals." This was in December 1691, and. was probably the origin of the Hortus Siccus among us.

Archælogia, Vol XII. No. 16.

Antiquity of clock-making.

The first clock with wheels which was known in France, was that given to Pepin the Short by Paul I. In 807, the friend and protector of the arts in the east, Haraun-al-Raschid, presented to Charlemagne a clock, of which the historians of the times speak with admiration; these clocks were imitated by the Italians. To Gerbert d'Aurillac, preceptor to Otho III. is attributed the invention of a clock, the movement of which was regulated by a balance. The clock of the Palais was the first which Paris possessed; it was made by Henry de Vic, who was sent for by Charles V. from Germany; that of the church of Lyons by Nicholas Lippius; that of Strasburg, and of Lund, in Sweden, so much praised by Derham, show the rapid progress which the art had made in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and lead us to that perfection to which it arrived about the middle of the last century. The English invented the watch, and repeating penduJums. Peuchet's Dictionnaire universel, &c.

Derby, May 12, 1812.

CURIOSUS.

MR. EMERSON'S DESCRIPTION OF RATIO.

THE following was inserted in the third Number of the Mentor Magazine, page 200, at my request, but as that work was discontinued, it did not receive the wished-for discussion of the Literati. If agreeable to your plan, I will thank you for its insertion in Number VII. ENQUIRER.

June 9, 1812.

Μ. Μ.

Mr. Emerson, at Def. II. Sect. 2. of his Doctrine of Proportion, has defined RATIO " as the quotient or number arising by dividing the former of two homogeneous quantities by the latter; which number may be either whole, fractional, or surd."

1

If this definition of Ratio be just, it will include the

whole doctrine of Proportion universally, whether the quantities be commensurable or incommensurable.

02

The opinion of some of the learned readers of the Enquirer on this matter, would be a real service to the young geometers of the present age, who find so great a difficulty to understand the fifth book of Euclid's Elements.

The following extract, on the same subject, I have presumed to transmit for insertion, to be translated into English, by any of your ingenious correspondents, as not being able thoroughly to understand it, through a limited education. It is taken from page 379, Playfair's Geometry, first edit. Notes on Def. 5, 5, Euclid.

"On ne peut demontrer que de cette maniere, (la réduction à l'absurde) la plupart des propositions qui regardent les incommensurables. L'idee de l'infini entre au moins implicitement dans la notion de ces sortes des quantités; et comme nous n'avons qu'une idée negative de l'infini on ne peut demantrer directement, et a priori, tout ce qui concerne l'infini mathematique."

ARGUMENTS

AGAINST THE EXISTENCE OF TROY.

How is it possible that at the period of civilization when Troy is represented to have existed, a fleet of twelve hundred ships could have been procured on no very pressing emergency; and yet that, several centuries afterwards, when the Grecians were exposed to inevitable destruction, unless averted by the most vigorous resistance, their whole united fleet, after a long preparation, should have amounted only to three hundred and seventy-eight ships! Next we are told, that the army remained nine years inactive, in an enemy's country, when they could procure subsistence only by plundering the whole of that part of Asia Minor; yet by Homer's account, both Patroclus and Achilles could have taken the city in a single day, if it had not been saved both times by the interposition of some of their deities. The site of Troy never has been ascertained even by the ancients. Several of

1

their best geographers were natives of Phrygia, but never could, by the closest investigation, trace any remains of the city, and indeed could find no situation, corresponding in any degree to the description of Homer. Alexander, whose survey of the country may have been supposed to have been the most accurate, built his city in a spot confessed by all to be totally different from Homer's Troy. Mr. Bryant has shown that, until the Grecians had begun to make enquiries, the natives had no tradition even of the name of the city. Modern travellers have differed in a most extraordinary manner in their descriptions of the country. So wide is their discrepancy, that it can be accounted for, charitably, only on the supposition that enthusiasm had blinded their views, and led them to trace simil larity where a child would have discovered the most irreconcileable contrariety. The classical dreams of the romantic Chevalier have obtained little credit, and yet he positively avers that his description is correct. Gell, Morritt, Wood, &c. &c. all assert the merit and accuracy of their respective maps, but all disagree.

What then are we to draw from this farrago of contradiction, misrepresentation, and inaccuracy? That no such city as Troy ever existed. Otherwise it would be difficult to account for the wonderful manner in which every vestige of it disappeared in a few centuries, a circumstance which can only be paralleled by the case of those cities which the righteous wrath of the Almighty had doomed to signal punishment.

But Mr. Bryant's research has not left this question undecided. It appears that very old traditions record, that Homer found in a temple in Egypt a poem, relative to a war against a city called Troy, situated near Memphis, and that he embellished and translated this poem into the Greek language, and laid the scene of action in the opposite shore of Asia Minor. The poem itself affords internal evidence in confirmation of this very curious and insuperable argument. The Mythology which Homer uses was unknown to the Grecians, at the latest period at which the Trojan war can.