A Budget of Paradoxes Volume I Part 27

The following is some account of the announcement of 1849. The _Athenaeum_ (Feb. 17), giving an account of the meeting of the Astronomical Society in December, 1858, says:

"Dr. Forster of Bruges, who is well known as a meteorologist, made a communication at which our readers will stare: he declares that by journals of the weather kept by his grandfather, father, and himself, ever since 1767, to the present time, _whenever the new moon has fallen on a Sat.u.r.day, the following twenty days have been wet and windy_, in nineteen cases out of twenty. In spite of our friend Zadkiel[691] and the others who declare that we would smother every truth that does not happen to agree with us, we are glad to see that the Society had the sense to publish this communication, coming, as it does, from a veteran observer, and one whose love of truth is undoubted. It must be that the fact is so set down in the journals, because Dr. Forster says it: and whether it be only a fact of the journals, or one of the heavens, can soon be tried. The new moon of March next, falls on _Sat.u.r.day_ the 24th, at 2 in the afternoon. We shall certainly look out."

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The following appeared in the number of March 31:

"The first _Sat.u.r.day Moon_ since Dr. Forster's announcement came off a week ago. We had previously received a number of letters from different correspondents--all to the effect that the notion of new moon on Sat.u.r.day bringing wet weather is one of widely extended currency. One correspondent (who gives his name) states that he has constantly heard it at sea, and among the farmers and peasantry in Scotland, Ireland, and the North of England. He proceeds thus: 'Since 1826, nineteen years of the time I have spent in a seafaring life. I have constantly observed, though unable to account for, the phenomenon. I have also heard the stormy qualities of a Sat.u.r.day's moon remarked by American, French, and Spanish seamen; and, still more distant, a Chinese pilot, who was once doing duty on board my vessel seemed to be perfectly cognizant of the fact.' So that it seems we have, in giving currency to what we only knew as a very curious communication from an earnest meteorologist, been repeating what is common enough among sailors and farmers. Another correspondent affirms that the thing is most devoutly believed in by seamen; who would as soon sail on a Friday as be in the Channel after a Sat.u.r.day moon.--After a tolerable course of dry weather, there was some snow, accompanied by wind on Sat.u.r.day last, here in London; there were also heavy louring clouds. Sunday was cloudy and cold, with a little rain; Monday was louring, Tuesday unsettled; Wednesday quite overclouded, with rain in the morning. The present occasion shows only a general change of weather with a tendency towards rain. If Dr.

Forster's theory be true, it is decidedly one of the minor instances, as far as London weather is concerned.--It will take a good deal of evidence to make us believe in the omen of a Sat.u.r.day Moon. But, as we have said of the Poughkeepsie Seer, the thing is very curious whether true or false.

Whence comes this universal proverb--and a hundred others--while the meteorological observer {323} cannot, when he puts down a long series of results, detect any weather cycles at all? One of our correspondents wrote us something of a lecture for encouraging, he said, the notion that _names_ could influence the weather. He mistakes the question. If there be any weather cycles depending on the moon, it is possible that one of them may be so related to the week cycle of seven days, as to show recurrences which are of the kind stated, or any other. For example, we know that if the new moon of March fall on a Sat.u.r.day in this year, it will most probably fall on a Sat.u.r.day nineteen years hence. This is not connected with the spelling of Sat.u.r.day--but with the connection between the motions of the sun and moon. Nothing but the Moon can settle the question--and we are willing to wait on her for further information. If the adage be true, then the philosopher has missed what lies before his eyes; if false, then the world can be led by the nose in spite of the eyes. Both these things happen sometimes; and we are willing to take whichever of the two solutions is borne out by future facts. In the mean time, we announce the next Sat.u.r.day Moon for the 18th of August."

How many coincidences are required to establish a law of connection? It depends on the way in which the mind views the matter in question. Many of the paradoxers are quite set up by a very few instances. I will now tell a story about myself, and then ask them a question.

So far as instances can prove a law, the following is proved: no failure has occurred. Let a clergyman be known to me, whether by personal acquaintance or correspondence, or by being frequently brought before me by those with whom I am connected in private life: that clergyman does not, except in few cases, become a bishop; but _if_ he become a bishop, he is sure, first or last, to become an arch-bishop. This has happened in every case. As follows:

1. My last schoolmaster, a former Fellow of Oriel, was {324} a very intimate college friend of Richard Whately[692], a younger man. Struck by his friend's talents, he used to talk of him perpetually, and predict his future eminence. Before I was sixteen, and before Whately had even given his Bampton Lectures, I was very familiar with his name, and some of his sayings. I need not say that he became Archbishop of Dublin.

2. When I was a child, a first cousin of John Bird Sumner[693] married a sister of my mother. I cannot remember the time when I first heard his name, but it was made very familiar to me. In time he became Bishop of Chester, and then, Archbishop of Canterbury. My reader may say that Dr.

C. R. Sumner,[694] Bishop of Winchester, has just as good a claim: but it is not so: those connected with me had more knowledge of Dr. J. B.

Sumner;[695] and said nothing, or next to nothing, of the other. Rumor says that the Bishop of Winchester has _declined_ an Archbishopric: if so, my rule is a rule of gradations.

3. Thomas Musgrave,[696] Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, was _Dean_ of the college when I was an undergraduate: this brought me into connection with him, he giving impositions for not going to chapel, I writing them out according. We had also friendly intercourse in after life; I forgiving, he probably forgetting. Honest Tom {325} Musgrave, as he used to be called, became Bishop of Hereford, and Archbishop of York.

4. About the time when I went to Cambridge, I heard a great deal about Mr.

C. T. Longley,[697] of Christchurch, from a cousin of my own of the same college, long since deceased, who spoke of him much, and most affectionately. Dr. Longley pa.s.sed from Durham to York, and thence to Canterbury. I cannot quite make out the two Archbishoprics; I do not remember any other private channel through which the name came to me: perhaps Dr. Longley, having two strings to his bow, would have been one archbishop if I had never heard of him.

5. When Dr. Wm. Thomson[698] was appointed to the see of Gloucester in 1861, he and I had been correspondents on the subject of logic--on which we had both written--for about fourteen years. On his elevation I wrote to him, giving the preceding instances, and informing him that he would certainly be an Archbishop. The case was a strong one, and the law acted rapidly; for Dr. Thomson's elevation to the see of York took place in 1862.

Here are five cases; and there is no opposing instance. I have searched the almanacs since 1828, and can find no instance of a Bishop not finally Archbishop of whom I had known through private sources, direct or indirect.

Now what do my paradoxers say? Is this a pre-established harmony, or a chain of coincidences? And how many instances will it require to establish a law?[699]

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THE HERSCHEL HOAX.

Some account of the great astronomical discoveries lately made by Sir John Herschel at the Cape of Good Hope. Second Edition. London, 12mo.

1836.

This is a curious hoax, evidently written by a person versed in astronomy and clever at introducing probable circ.u.mstances and undesigned coincidences.[700] It first appeared in a newspaper. It makes Sir J.

Herschel discover men, animals, etc. in the moon, of which much detail is given. There seems to have been a French edition, the original, and English editions in America, whence the work came into Britain: but whether the French was published in America or at Paris I do not know. There is no doubt that it was produced in the United States, by M. Nicollet,[701] an astronomer, once of Paris, and a fugitive of some kind. About him I have heard two stories. First that he fled to America with funds not his own, and that this book was a mere device to raise the wind. Secondly, that he was a protege of Laplace, and of the Polignac party, and also an outspoken man. That after the revolution he was so obnoxious to the republican party that he judged it prudent to quit France; which he did in debt, leaving money for his creditors, but not enough, with M. Bouvard. In America he connected himself with an a.s.surance office. {327} The moon-story was written, and sent to France, chiefly with the intention of entrapping M.

Arago, Nicollet's especial foe, into the belief of it. And those who narrate this version of the story wind up by saying that M. Arago _was_ entrapped, and circulated the wonders through Paris, until a letter from Nicollet to M. Bouvard[702] explained the hoax. I have no personal knowledge of either story: but as the poor man had to endure the first, it is but right that the second should be told with it.

SOME MORE METEOROLOGY.

The Weather Almanac for the Year 1838. By P. Murphy,[703] Esq., M.N.S.

By M. N. S. is meant _member of no society._. This almanac bears on the t.i.tle-page two recommendations. The _Morning Post_ calls it one of the most important-if-true publications of our generation. The _Times_ says: "If the basis of his theory prove sound, and its principles be sanctioned by a more extended experience, it is not too much to say that the importance of the discovery is equal to that of the longitude." Cautious journalist! Three times that of the longitude would have been too little to say. That the landsman might predict the weather of all the year, at its beginning, Jack would cheerfully give up astronomical longitude--_the_ problem--altogether, and fall back on chronometers with the older Ls, lead, lat.i.tude, and look-out, applied to dead-reckoning. Mr. Murphy attempted to give the weather day by day: thus the first seven days of March {328} bore Changeable; Rain; Rain; Rain-_wind_; Changeable; Fair; Changeable. To aim at such precision as to put a fair day between two changeable ones by weather theory was going very near the wind and weather too. Murphy opened the year with cold and frost; and the weather did the same. But Murphy, opposite to Sat.u.r.day, January 20, put down "Fair, Probable lowest degree of winter temperature." When this Sat.u.r.day came, it was not merely the probably coldest of 1838, but certainly the coldest of many consecutive years. Without knowing anything of Murphy, I felt it prudent to cover my nose with my glove as I walked the street at eight in the morning. The fortune of the Almanac was made. n.o.body waited to see whether the future would dement the prophecy: the shop was beset in a manner which brought the police to keep order; and it was said that the Almanac for 1838 was a gain of 5,000l. to the owners. It very soon appeared that this was only a lucky hit: the weather-prophet had a modified reputation for a few years; and is now no more heard of. A work of his will presently appear in the list.

THE GREAT PYRAMIDS.

Letter from Alexandria on the evidence of the practical application of the quadrature of the circle in the great pyramids of Gizeh. By H. C.

Agnew,[704] Esq. London, 1838, 4to.

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Mr. Agnew detects proportions which he thinks were suggested by those of the circ.u.mference and diameter of a circle.

THE MATHEMATICS OF A CREED.

The creed of St. Athanasius proved by a mathematical parallel. Before you censure, condemn, or approve; read, examine, and understand. E. B.

REVILO.[705] London, 1839, 8vo.

This author really believed himself, and was in earnest. He is not the only person who has written nonsense by confounding the mathematical infinite (of quant.i.ty) with what speculators now more correctly express by the unlimited, the unconditioned, or the absolute. This tract is worth preserving, as the extreme case of a particular kind. The following is a specimen. Infinity being represented by [infinity], as usual, and f, s, g, being finite integers, the three Persons are denoted by [infinity]^{f}, (m [infinity])^{s}, [infinity]^{g}, the finite fraction m representing human nature, as opposed to [infinity]. The clauses of the Creed are then given with their mathematical parallels. I extract a couple:

"But the G.o.dhead of the Father, of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost, is all one: the glory equal, the Majesty co-eternal.

"It has been shown that [infinity]^f, [infinity]^g, and (m [infinity])^s, together, are but [infinity], and that each is [infinity], and any magnitude in existence represented by [infinity] always was and always will be: for it cannot be made, or destroyed, and yet exists.

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"Equal to the Father, as touching his G.o.dhead: and inferior to the Father, touching his Manhood."

"(m [infinity])^s is equal to [infinity]^f as touching [infinity], but inferior to [infinity]^f as touching m: because m is not infinite."

I might have pa.s.sed this over, as beneath even my present subject, but for the way in which I became acquainted with it. A bookseller, _not the publisher_, handed it to me over his counter: one who had published mathematical works. He said, with an air of important communication, Have you seen _this_, Sir! In reply, I recommended him to show it to my friend Mr.----, for whom he had published mathematics. Educated men, used to books and to the converse of learned men, look with mysterious wonder on such productions as this: for which reason I have made a quotation which many will judge had better have been omitted. But it would have been an imposition on the public if I were, omitting this and some other uses of the Bible and Common Prayer, to pretend that I had given a true picture of my school.

[Since the publication of the above, it has been stated that the author is Mr. Oliver Byrne, the author of the _Dual Arithmetic_ mentioned further on: E. B. Revilo seems to be obviously a reversal.]

LOGIC HAS NO PARADOXERS.

Old and new logic contrasted: being an attempt to elucidate, for ordinary comprehension, how Lord Bacon delivered the human mind from its 2,000 years' enslavement under Aristotle. By Justin Brenan.[706]

London, 1839, 12mo.

Logic, though the other exact science, has not had the sort of a.s.sailants who have cl.u.s.tered about mathematics. There is a sect which disputes the utility of logic, but there are no special points, like the quadrature of the circle, which {331} excite dispute among those who admit other things.

The old story about Aristotle having one logic to trammel us, and Bacon another to set us free,--always laughed at by those who really knew either Aristotle or Bacon,--now begins to be understood by a large section of the educated world. The author of this tract connects the old logic with the indecencies of the cla.s.sical writers, and the new with moral purity: he appeals to women, who, "when they see plainly the demoralizing tendency of syllogistic logic, they will no doubt exert their powerful influence against it, and support the Baconian method." This is the only work against logic which I can introduce, but it is a rare one, I mean in contents. I quote the author's idea of a syllogism:

"The basis of this system is the syllogism. This is a form of couching the substance of your argument or investigation into one short line or sentence--then corroborating or supporting it in another, and drawing your conclusion or proof in a third."

On this definition he gives an example, as follows: "Every sin deserves death," the substance of the "argument or investigation." Then comes, "Every unlawful wish is a sin," which "corroborates or supports" the preceding: and, lastly, "therefore every unlawful wish deserves death,"