The moon hoax : $b or, A discovery that the moon has a vast population of human beings — John Locke — John Shaqi
The moon hoax : $b or, A discovery that the moon has a vast population of human beings
John Locke · en
"HERSCHEL'S GREAT DISCOVERIES.--We are too much pleased with the
remarks of the sensible, candid, and scientific portions of the public
press upon the extracts which we have published relative to these
wonders of the age, to direct our attention very severely to-day to
that sceptical class of our contemporaries to whom none of these
attributes can be ascribed. Consummate ignorance is always incredulous
to the higher order of scientific discoveries, because it cannot
possibly comprehend them. Its mental thorax is quite capacious enough
to swallow any dogmas, however great, that are given upon the authority
of names; but it strains most perilously to receive the great truths
of reason and science. We scarcely ever knew a very ignorant person
who would believe in the existence of those myriads of invisible
beings which inhabit a drop of water, and every grain of dust, until
he had actually beheld them through the microscope by which they are
developed. Yet these very persons will readily believe in the divinity
of Matthias the prophet, and in the most improbable credenda of
extravagant systems of faith. The _Journal of Commerce_, for instance,
says it cannot believe in these great discoveries of Dr. Herschel, yet
it believes and defends the innocence of the murderer Avery. These
who in a former age imprisoned Galileo for asserting _his_ great
discoveries with the telescope, and determined upon sentencing him to
be burnt alive, nevertheless believed that Simon Magus actually flew in
the air by the aid of the devil, and that when that aid was withdrawn
he fell to the ground and broke his neck. The great mechanical
discoverer, Worcester, obtained no credence for his theories in his
day, though they are now being continually demonstrated by practical
operation. Happily, however, those who impudently and ignorantly deny
the great discoveries of Herschel, are chiefly to be found among those
whose faith or whose scepticism, would never be received as a guide for
the opinions of other men. From among that portion of the public press
whose intelligence and acquirements render them competent judges of the
great scientific questions now before the community, we extract the
following frank declarations of their opinions."--_New York Sun_, Sep.
1, 1835.
"No article, we believe, has appeared for years, that will command
so general a perusal and publication. Sir John has added a stock of
knowledge to the present age that will immortalize his name, and place
it high on the page of science."--_Daily Advertiser._
"DISCOVERIES IN THE MOON.--We commence to-day the publication of an
interesting article which is stated to have been copied from the
_Edinburgh Journal of Science_, and which made its first appearance
here in a contemporary journal of this city. It appears to carry
intrinsic evidence of being an authentic document."--_Mercantile
Advertiser._