says: Scientific, Political, and Speculative. Sec-
By HERBERT SPENCER. New York: D. Apple-
1864. 8vo. pp. vii., 362.
r William Herschel communicated to the Royal
er in which he gave an exposition of his famous
the transformation of nebulæ into stars.
"As-
-luminous substance of a highly attenuated nature
ted through the celestial regions, he endeavored
by the mutual attraction of its constituent parts,
a tendency to form itself into distinct aggrega-
lous matter, which in each case would gradually
the continued action of the attractive forces,
lting mass finally acquired the consistency of a
1 became a star. In those instances wherein the
ebulous matter was very extensive, subordinate
action could not fail to be established, around
cent particles would arrange themselves; and
mass would in process of time be transformed
inate number of discrete bodies, which would
me the condition of a cluster of stars. Her-
it various circumstances which appeared to him
rounds for believing that such a nebulous sub-
independently in space. He maintained that
of nebulous stars, and the changes observable
in the great nebula of Orion, could not be satisfactorily ac-
VOL. XCIX. - NO. 204.