Socrates, had he lived in our day, would have been a Christian? Certainly nothing can be more unfair than for the opponents of revelation to claim him as being with them. And here I cannot avoid adding a testimony, wrung from the soul of the sensual but eloquent Rousseau. It is found in the second volume of Emilia.' What prejudices, what blindness, must possess that man who dares to compare the son of Sophroniscus with the son of Mary? What an immense distance between them? Socrates dying without pain, without ignominy, easily supported to the last his character; and if this easy death had not cast a lustre upon his life, it might have been doubted whether Socrates, with all his genius, was any thing but a sophist. (Here the Frenchman is characteristically extravagant.) It may be said he invented morality, but before him others had practised it. He only said what they had done, and made lessons of their examples. Aristides had been just. before Socrates said what justice was. Leonidas had died for his country, before Socrates had made love of country a duty. Sparta was sober, before Socrates had praised sobriety. Before he had defined virtue, Greece abounded with virtuous men. But where did Jesus, among his countrymen, take the pattern of that elevated and pure morality, of which he alone hath given both the precept and example? From the bosom of the most furious fanaticism, the highest Wisdom made herself heard, and the simplicity of the most heroic virtue honored the vilest people upon earth. The death of Jesus, expiring in torments, blasphemed, reviled, execrated by a whole people, is the most fearful death one could dread. Socrates taking the cup of poison, blessed the weeping man who presented it. Jesus, in the midst of a frightful punishment, prayed for his blood-thirsty executioners. Yes! if the life and death of Socrates be that of a philosopher, the life and death of Jesus is that of a God!'

(To be continued.)

GENIUS.

Genius!--oh, didst thou know its fate,
Thou 'dst wish not to possess it
Thou little know'st how envious Hate
And cold Caprice oppress it :

How slow Fame lends her sunny ray,
And oh how fast it fades away!

THE STEED OF THE DESERT.

The Desert Steed! the desert steed,
That never man bestrode,-

He matches 'gainst the wind his speed,
He drinks the streams that mountains feed,
He gallops o'er a fenceless mead,
Where man hath never trod.

Lo! where the reinless chargers stand,
Lords of the boundless plain,—
Lo! where the leader of the band,
With hoofs that iron never spanned,
Spurns high in air the glittering sand,
And shakes his streaming mane!

Yon wild colts crop no clover'd lawn,-
Unpampered, fierce, and free;
On human hand they ne'er shall fawn,
No spur by heel of tyrant worn,
Shail ever lance the desert-born,
Or mar their bondless glee.

Hark! a low, wild, and fiend-like yell,
Upon the wind sweeps by;
The herd have caught its dismal swell,
That fatal cry they know too well;
The mountain wolves, with hunger fell,
A thousand strong, are nigh!

One howling monster, gaunt and gray,
Leads on the phalanx grim :

The desert coursers stand at bay,
Loud rings their shrill and scornful neigh,
A solid circle their array,—

An hundred heels its rim!

They come ! they come! the famished troop,
With white fangs gleaming bare;

Their necks the glossy chargers stoop,
Spurned high above each lifted croup,
The foremost of the savage group
Are whirling through the air.

Short space repelled, the daring pack
Again the charge renew:

Again from launching hoofs sent back,

Maimed, crushed, and stunned from the attack,

They sullenly their course retrack,

And vanish from the view.

The Telescope and the heavens-Copernicus-Kepler-their theories and discoveries-accounting for the movements of the planets by mathematical laws— law of gravitation discovered by Sir Isaac Newton-eclipse of the sun observed 3,000 years ago at Babylon—La Place's discoveries-Bode's discovery of the law of distances-doubts as to another planet-solved by Encke-SaturnHerschel and his Planet-Bouvard of France-Roual's observations—Leverrier's observations and discovery-the lecturer's observation on the same planet -Leverrier again—the planets all circulating in nearly the same plane-supposition of the fixed positions of planets illustrated-final settlemnt of the position of the new planet-renewed observations of Prof. Mitchell.

Ladies and Gentlemen:-In the course of the last lecture, I attempted to give some idea of the power of the Telescope, by unfolding to you the results which have been achieved through its mighty instrumentality. My object was, to convey to your mind some notion of the range which we are permitted to take through space, when carried by this mighty instrument. But it will be remembered that I only moved outward, in one direction. I penetrated from point to point, from object to object, from star to star, from system to system, from cluster to cluster, until the distance became so great that light, upon its tireless wing, almost refused to pass the mighty interval. All this has been accomplished by the science, the skill, and the mechanical ingenuity of man; and it is with this instrument that 1.

has prosecuted his explorations of the vast universe of God. But in all this, we have said nothing of the laws which govern the material universe. We have said nothing of the mighty globes that wheel their mystic flight through space, making the melody of motion, if not the fancied music of the spheres. Are these globes governed by law; or do they sweep through space regardless of any bond uniting them to the centre of the universe? Is it law that reigns, or is it chaotic confusion? For more than 3,000 years the eye gazed upon these far distant and beautiful orbs; it watched their motions through the heavens; it determined, comparatively, their relative distances, and, approximately, their periodic time. But for that entire period, the law regulating these motions was locked upit was a sealed book.

COPERNICUS announced to us, as I have already said, the true system of the Universe; but it was not until the powerful genius of KEPLER was turned to the subject, that any law was evolved by which it was possible to account for and determine with certainty the movements of the planets. After long years of toil and study, this most extraordinary of all the geniuses that ever graced our earth-the first in point of time, and the first in point of talent-revealed to us the laws that govern the Heavenly Bodies. I have only time to announce these laws to-night. Would that I had time to unfold to you the workings of his mighty mind: but its results are all that I can give you. He found that the old idea, that the planets revolved in circles round the sun, was false. This idea had become so stamped the minds of the old astronomers that it resisted every upon investigation that tended to conflict with it. Its grasp had been so fastened upon them, that they could not loose its hold. But KEPLER, by his genius, rose to the true comprehension of the orbits of the planets. He found that these orbs performed their revolutions, not in circles, but in elliptic curves. This was his first grand discovery. The true orbit of the planets was now known; and the next thing to be done, was to discover the law regulating their motions, and by which they could be traced in their journeyings, and their progress marked. He found that if a line were drawn from the Sun, which occupies a point in the centre, out to the planet, that as the planet moves round the Sun, this line will sweep over equal surfaces in equal times.

Here was the second grand discovery, and now it was found possible to trace the planets round the sun, and to account for all their movements. Here, it would seem, that the mind of any man might have remained satisfied, after revealing these two

great truths, that have been continually more and more verified, as we have penetrated into space. It was not so, however, with the mind of KEPLER. Having discovered that all the planets revolve in elliptic curves around the sun, and that the sun occupied the focus of all these revolutions, his mind was so impressed with the beauty of these laws, that the thought occurred to him, that possibly there might be some law uniting all these bright worlds together in one grand system, and that some relation existed between their periodic time and their relative distances, which, if ascertained, would enable him when knowing the one to discover the other. For seventeen years he examined this matter with unremitting attention. He formed every possible hypothesis-he exhausted his ingenuity in attempting to discover this law. At the close of this long period, he reached his final grand result. He demonstrated this truth-that the squares of the periodic time of the planets are always proportioned to the cubes of their distances. Perhaps this language is not familiar to all who hear me. One moment for explanation: The square of a number is produced by multiplying it into itself—thus the square of 4 is 16. the cube of a number is found by multiplying it into itself three times; the fourth power by multiplying the number four times, &c. This is a very simple law, and with its aid, if we know the periodic times of the planets, and know the distance of a single one of them belonging to this mighty brotherhood of worlds, we can in a moment reveal the distances of all the others in succession.-When KEPLER had reached these grand results, nothing more remained to be done. The great problem of the universe had been resolved. But something more was to be accomplished. How was it that the planets were retained in their orbit? What power was it that bound them to the sun? It required the genius of NEWTON, to resolve this great problem. And he, centering all the energies of his mighty mind upon this great idea, from year to year, finally rose to the great truth-finally reached the discovery of the great law of gravitation. Here again I wish it were possible for me to explain the reasonings by which he reached this grand result; but again I am forced to give you only the result. He found this to be true-that every particle of matter in the universe attracts every other particle, and that this attraction increases in a ratio corresponding to the amount of matter contained in the body, and diminishing in a ratio corresponding to the distance between the bodies. Suppose, for instance, two bodies to be located in the heavens, a certain distance apart. The distance between these bodies, we will call 2, and