The splendid discoveries which have been made with the telescope and microscope have invested them with a philosophical character which can never be attached to any other instrument. It is only, however, in the hands of the astronomer and naturalist that they are consecrated to the great objects of science; their ordinary possessors employ them solely as instruments of amusement, and it is singular to remark how soon they lose their novelty and interest when devoted to this inferior purpose. The solar microscope, the camera obscura, and the magic lantern, are equally shortlived in their powers of entertainment; and even the wonders of the electrical and galvanic apparatus are called forth, at long intervals, for the occasional purposes of instructing the young, or astonishing the ignorant. A serenity of sky very uncommon in our northern climate, is absolutely necessary for displaying the powers of some of the preceding instruments; and the effects of the rest can only be exhibited after much previous preparation. From these causes, but principally from a want of variety in their exhibitions, they have constantly failed to excite, in ordinary minds, that intense and continued interest which might have been expected from the ingenuity of their construction and the splendour of their effects. The pleasure which is derived from the use of musical instruments is of a different kind, and far more intense in its effects, and more general in its influence than that which is obtained from any of the preceding instruments. There are, indeed, few minds that are not alive to the soothing and exhilarating influence of musical sounds, or that do not associate them with the dearest and most tender sympathies of our nature. But the ear is not the only avenue to the heart; and though sorrow and distress are represented by notes of a deep and solemn character, and happiness and gaiety by more light and playful tones, the same kind of feelings may also be excited by the exhibition of dark and gloomy colours, and by the display of bright and aërial tints. The association, indeed, is not so powerful in the one case as in the other, for we have been taught from our infancy, in consequence of the connexion of music and poetry, to associate particular sentiments with particular sounds; but there can be no doubt that the association of colour is naturally as powerful as that of sound, and that a person who has never listened to any other music but that of nature, nor seen any other colours but those of the material world, might have his feelings as powerfully excited through the medium of the eye as through that of the ear.