Page:Sir William Herschel, his life and works (1881).djvu/74

52 being perhaps the most important. The whole field was open. What was perhaps more remarkable, there was in England, during lifetime, no astronomer, public or private, whose talents, even as an observer, lay in the same direction.

It hardly need be said that as a philosopher in his science, he had then no rival, as he has had none since. His only associates even, were Author:John Michell and Author:Alexander Wilson (1714-1786).

Without depreciating the abilities of the astronomers of England, his cotemporaries, we may fairly say that stood a great man among a group of small ones.

Let us endeavor to appreciate the change effected in the state of astronomy not only