Page:Supplement to the fourth, fifth, and sixth editions of the Encyclopaedia Britannica - with preliminary dissertations on the history of the sciences - illustrated by engravings (IA gri 33125011196181).pdf/39

Rh of military operations; with copious illustrations from the great movements and events of the late continental campaigns.

The Editor cannot conclude this Outline of the contents of the work, without some further mention of those Discourses on the History of the Sciences, from which it derives such peculiar recommendations.

The striking figure used by Lord Bacon, in mentioning the want of a general history of philosophy, to illustrate the nature and magnitude of that want, is known to all the world. Much has been done, since his time, to supply the information on this head which he thought so indispensible to the completion of the Circle of Learning; but very little has been done to furnish it in a form calculated to promote its general diffusion. The brilliant Sketch contained in D’Alembert’s Discourse prefixed to the Encyclopédie, forms but a small part of that celebrated performance; the greater part of it being occupied with a theoretical view of the origin of the sciences, and of their encyclopedical arrangement. Though sufficient for the display of his own various attainments, the scale of his historical notices was much too limited to admit of any satisfactory views of the opinions, even of the small number of “those great lights of the world by whom the torch of science has been successively seized and transmitted.” On the other hand, the works of the professed Historians of Philosophy are much too extensive and minute for general perusal, The proper medium seems to have been attained, in the noble Discourses by Mr Stewart and Mr Playfair, prefixed to these volumes. Nor is this their only excellence in point of plan. Those who are best acquainted with, and most competent to decide upon the merits of the other