little is to be known.

"It is true that I can measure the sun, and compute the distances of the
planets; I can calculate their periodical movements, and even ascertain
the laws by which they perform their sublime revolutions; but with
regard to their construction, to the beings which inhabit them, their
condition and circumstances, what do I know more than the clown?--
Delighting to examine the economy of nature in our own world, I have
analyzed the elements, and given names to their component parts. And
yet, should I not be as much at a loss to explain the burning of fire,
or to account for the liquid quality of water, as the vulgar, who use
and enjoy them without thought or examination?--I remark, that all
bodies, unsupported, fall to the ground, and I am taught to account for
this by the law of gravitation. But what have I gained here more than
a term? Does it convey to my mind any idea of the nature of that
mysterious and invisible chain which draws all things to a common
centre?--Pursuing the track of the naturalist, I have learned to
distinguish the animal, the vegetable, and the mineral kingdoms, and to
divide these into their distinct tribes and families;--but can I
tell, after all this toil, whence a single blade of grass derives its
vitality?--Could the most minute researches enable me to discover the
exquisite pencil that paints the flower of the field? and have I ever
detected the secret that gives their brilliant dye to the ruby and the
emerald, or the art that enamels the delicate shell?--I observe the
sagacity of animals--I call it instinct, and speculate upon its various
degrees of approximation to the reason of man; but, after all, I know as
little of the cogitations of the brute as he does of mine. When I see a
flight of birds overhead, performing their evolutions, or steering
their course to some distant settlement, their signals and cries are
as unintelligible to me as are the learned languages to an unlettered