fusion occasioned under the different persecutions; we shall certainly find no small difficulty in tracing up a regular succession of diocesan bishops from the present time to that of the apostles; though you inform us that you have seen a regular gradation of the bishops of London from the much esteemed character who now so worthily fills that see, up to the first establishment of Christianity in this nation; which, however, according to Mr. Pennant's History of London, must (I think) have been before the city itself existed. However, not to dispute this matter, I can also assume you that I myself have seen a list or string of popes in the Church of St. Mary Maggiore at Rome, beginning with St. Peter, and carried down to his late holiness, Pius the VIth, for whose portrait there is only one niche left; [a sad omen that he will be the last;] but fortunately, or unfortu nately, poor Madam Pope Joan (whom Mr. D. believes to have been delivered of a bastard whilst she was walking in solemn procession) has no place among her brethren of the Tiara; by which means the succession is interrupted, and the infallibility of the papal chair liable to be disputed.' Much as we lament divisions among Christians, and earnest as we are to promote union with rather than hasty separations from the Established Church, we cannot, for the sake of advancing any fancied unanimity, relinquish the great principle of religious liberty. Mr. D. evinces a commendable zeal in behalf of the Protestant Church of which he is a minister, and laments that congregations of Separatists have broken away from the Church of England: but he seems to forget that the Church of Rome is not less severe in its charge of schism against the Church of England; and that the only principle, which can be adduced in support of the Refor mation and our secession from the Church of Rome, will justify those who allege conscience in excuse for farther separations *. A multitude of sects is a great evil, but it is preferable to spiritual tyranny erected on a pretended infalli bility. We entirely agree with Mr. D. that The Kingdom of Christ is not of this world,-and the less the concerns of this world are mixed up with it the better' for from such a mixture arises much of the arrogance and illiberality existing among Christians. Mr. D. (Vol. ii. p. 434.) offers the following curious argument: For, as the Church of Christ is but one, there cannot be two separate communions in it, without schism and the schism lies on the side of that party which separates; for to separate from a Church established by public authority, which has nothing sinful in its communion, is both disobedience to the supreme authority in the State, and a schism from the true Church.'-How would a Papist turn this artillery against the Protestant Presbyter? We We shall not here state our opinion whether the xxxix Articles be Arminian or Calvinistic: but we must say that Mr. D.'s view of Christian doctrine appears to us preferable to that which is given by Sir R. Hill in his reply. Mr. D. says, The notion of absolute unconditional salvation, independent of human conduct, exists no where but in the heads of Calvinists. God deals with man as a rational creature; and he will judge him as such. He sets life and death before him, and furnishes him with the means of grace, to enable him to make a proper choice. Should he act wisely, he will receive the reward of his promised inheritance, through the merits of a crucified Saviour: should the gifts of divine grace, by which he may be enabled to work out his salvation, be thrown away upon him; he will stand condemned for the neglect. To such a man, there remains only a fearful looking-for of judgment. Such is the Gospel plan of salvation: I am much mistaken, if in the Bible you can find any other. The favour of God is there described, as waiting on the actions of men; and, from the plain letter of Scripture, it is to be proved, that man may be one day an heir of God, and the next day a child of wrath, according to his use or abuse of divine grace.' This doctrine is not to be tolerated by Sir Richard; who maintains the sovereignty of the divine decrees, the invincibility of divine grace, and the impossibility of the final falling of the elect. He contends for a particular Providence, decreeing, planning, guiding every event, whether good or evil; and this, without the smallest impeachment of God's own moral attributes, or even without his having any thing to do with the sin, so far as the act itself is sinful, but as it makes way for the greatest good, in the manifestation of his own glory, and the display of his own infinite perfections.'-If, as he remarks, the command and the power go hand in hand, how can the evil actions of men be necessitated, and the Deity have nothing to do with the sin? Sir Richard makes a distinction between quenching and extinguishing the Spirit; and he thinks that men may act necessarily and yet freely. To retort the accusation on some of our Divines, that they fished in the Lake of Geneva, he accuses his clerical opponent of fishing in the Tiber. Thus wit is blended with divinity; and if these controversialists do not convince, perhaps they have not failed in their attempts to amuse one another. Some other publications on this subject will be found in our Catalogue. Moy. ART. ART. XIII. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London, for the Year 1802. Part II. 4to. 17s. 6d. sewed. Nicol. ASTRONOMICAL and MATHEMATICAL PAPERS, &C. Observations on the tavo lately discovered Celestial Bodies. By William Herschell, LL. D. F. R. S. THE HE surprize of the scientific world on the discovery of two new planets has now subsided: but its curiosity must naturally be awakened by an account of the nature of these stars, from the pen of that astronomer who discovered the Georgium Sidus and the Satellites of Saturn. Such remarks are contained in the present paper; which is drawn up in the manner of a journal, in order that every circumstance, however minute, might be noticed in a case so important. Our concern is with results only; and the first result of Dr. H.'s observations is that the diameter of Ceres (Piazzi's Star) is 161.6 miles, and that of Pallas (Dr. Olber's Star) 110 only. After the journal of the investigations by which the diameters of the new planets are determined, follow observations made with the view of ascertaining whether they had comas and satellites; and it appears that the new planets have the former but not the latter. The comas, much less than those which comets have, extend two or three diameters from the disk. Beyond these points, Dr. H.'s paper seems to have but little interest for the curious inquirer. The remaining part of it is principally occupied with the discussion of this (at best) idle question, Are the new stars, planets or comets?' and, as if the word planet contained an inherent and necessary signification, the Doctor lays down six conditions to which a star must be subject, in order to be intitled to that appellation. What person, in any degree imbued with astronomical science, having learnt that these new stars agreed with Venus, Mars, Mercury, &c. in the great circumstance of revolving round the sun, would have hesitated one moment in calling them planets? The reasons which Dr. H. alleges, to prove that Pallas and Ceres are not planets, are not more philosophical, and they are much less amusing, than those by which Scrub proves the existence of a plot. "Ay, Sir, a plot, a horrid plot.-First, it must be a plot because there's a woman in't; secondly, it must be a plot because there's a priest in't; thirdly, it must be a plot because there's French gold in't; and fourthly, it must be a plot, because I don't know what to make on't." (Beaux Stratagem.) Having excluded the new stars from the rank of planets, Dr. H. more easily shews that they cannot be called comets :but, in this age of nomenclatures, are the new stars to be without a name? 9. a name? By no means; Dr. H. gives them the name of We are decidedly adverse to this unnecessary invention of A Method of examining Refractive and Dispersive Povers, by Prismatic Reflection. By William Hyde Wollaston, M. D. F.R.S.-The very ingenious method, a description of which forms the subject of this paper, was suggested to the author, according to his own declaration, by a consideration of Newton's prismatic eye-glass; the principle of which depends on the reflection of light at the inner surface of a dense refracting medium. The principle of Dr. W.'s method is nearly as follows: If a ray pass out of one medium into a rarer; then, by increasing the angle of incidence in the denser medium to a certain extent, the ray is at length reflected, and the object ceases to be seen by refraction. Now the angle of incidence, at which this reflection takes place, depends on the difference of the densities of the mediums. Take, then, a prism, of which the refracting power is known, and the refracting power of a rarer medium may be ascertained by viewing in it an object through the prism, just at the point where the visual ray is about to be reflected, or no longer refracted.-Setting out on this foundation, Dr. W. has constructed a very simple instrument; which, used with a square prism, determines at once the refractive power of the medium placed in contact with the prism. With a diagram, the construction of the instrument may be very easily understood. The mode by which Dr. W. examines the refractive powers of mediums and substances, besides its facility, has advantages above the ordinary methods. It has enabled him to determine the refractive powers of perfectly opaque substances, and those of mediums which have a variable density. He suggests that it may be useful in examining the purity of essential oils; and he shews 5 shews that the method for ascertaining refractive powers may be commodiously employed in determining the dispersion of light caused by different bodies. The reasonings and contrivances of Dr. W., designed to ascertain the refractive and dispersive powers of substances, have afforded us much pleasure and instruction: but a passage towards the latter end of his paper excited our surprize. He affirms that a beam of white light is separable by refraction into four colours: the fact is remarkable, and for several reasons highly interesting: yet the following extract contains almost the entire proof of it that the author has given : I cannot conclude these observations on dispersion, without remarking that the colours into which a beam of white light is saparable by refraction, appear to me to be neither 7, as they usually are seen in the rainbow, nor reducible by any means (that I can find) to 3, as some persons have conceived; but that, by employing a very narrow pencil of light, 4 primary divisions of the prismatic spectrum may be seen, with a degree of distinctness that, I believe, has not been described nor observed before. If a beam of day-light be admitted into a dark room by a crevice of an inch broad, and received by the eye at the distance of 10 or 12 feet, through a prism of flint glass, free from veins, held near the eye, the beam is seen to be separated into the four following colours only, red, yellowish green, blue, and violet.'— The position of the prism in which the colours are most clearly divided, is when the incident light makes about equal angles with two of its sides. I then found that the spaces AB, BC, CD, DE, occupied by them, were nearly as the numbers 16, 23, 36, 25. Since the proportions of these colours to each other have been supposed by Dr. Blair to vary according to the medium by which they are produced, I have compared with this appearance, the coloured images caused by prismatic vessels containing substances supposed by him to differ most in this respect, such as strong but colourless nitric acid, rectified oil of turpentine, very pale oil of sassafras, and Canada balsam, also nearly colourless. With each of these, I have found the same arrangement of these 4 colours, and in similar positions of the prisms, as nearly as I could judge, the same propor tions of them.' We do not think that the mere result of this experiment satisfactorily establishes the fact just stated. On the Oblique Refraction of Iceland Crystal. By William Hyde Wollaston, M.D. F.R. S.-According to the hypothesis of Huygens, light proceeding from a luminous centre is propagated by vibrations of an highly elastic fluid. In common cases, the incipient undulations are supposed to be spherical: but in the Iceland crystal, light appeared to that philosopher to |