e satisfied with the
imperfect while the perfect is attainable--their science, instead of
being, as it is, a fortress of adamant, would be a house of clay, ill
fitted to bear the buffetings of the theologic storms to which it has
been from time to time, and is at present, exposed.'

The fame of Newton has proved to many paradoxists an irresistible
attraction; it has been to these unfortunates as the candle to the
fluttering moth. Circle-squaring, as we shall presently see, has had its
attractions, nor have earth-fixing and earth-flattening been neglected;
but attacking the law of gravitation has been the favourite work of
paradoxists. Newton has been praised as surpassing the whole human race
in genius; mathematicians and astronomers have agreed to laud him as
unequalled; why should not Paradoxus displace him and be praised in like
manner? It would be unfair, perhaps, to say that the paradoxist
consciously argues thus. He doubtless in most instances convinces
himself that he has really detected some flaw in the theory of
gravitation. Yet it is impossible not to recognise, as the real motive
of every paradox-monger, the desire to have that said of him which has
been said of Newton: '_Genus humanum ingenio superavit._'

I remember a curious instance of this which occurred soon after the
appearance of the comet of 1858. It chanced that, while that object was
under discussion, reference was made to the action of a repulsive force
exerted by the sun upon the matter of the comet's tail. On this, some
one addressed a long letter to a Glasgow newspaper, announcing that he
had long ago proved that the sun's attraction alone is insufficient to
account for the planetary motions. His reasoning was amazingly simple.
If the sun's attraction is powerful enough to keep the outer planets in
their course, it must be too powerful for Venus and Mercury close by the
sun; if it only just suffices to keep these in their course, it cannot
possibly be powerful enough to restrain the outer planets. The writer of
this letter said that he had been very badly treated by scientific
bodies. He had announced his discovery to the Royal Astronomical
Society, the Royal Society, the Imperial Academy at Paris, and other
scientific bodies; but they had one and all refused to listen to him. He
had forsaken or neglected his trade for several years in order to give
attention to the new and (as he thought) the true theory of the
universe. He complained in a sp