A Grammar of infinite forms; or the mathematical elements of ancient philosophy and mythology. By Wm. Howison.[587] Edinburgh, 1823, 8vo.
A curius combination of geometry and mythology. Perseus, for instance, is treated under the head, "the evolution of diminishing hyperbolic branches."
The Mythological Astronomy of the Ancients; part the second: or the key of Urania, the words of which will unlock all the mysteries of antiquity. Norwich, 1823, 12mo.
A Companion to the Mythological Astronomy, &c., containing remarks on recent publications.... Norwich, 1824, 12mo.
A new Theory of the Earth and of planetary motion; in which it is demonstrated that the Sun is vicegerent of his own system. Norwich, 1825, 12mo.
The analyzation of the writings of the Jews, so far as they are found to have any connection with the sublime science of astronomy. [This is pp. 97-180 of some other work, being all I have seen.]
These works are all by Sampson Arnold Mackey,[588] for whom see _Notes and Queries_, 1st S. viii. 468, 565, ix. 89, 179. Had it not been for actual quotations given by one correspondent only (1st S. viii. 565), that journal would have handed him down as a man of some real learning. An extraordinary man he certainly was: it is not one illiterate shoemaker in a thousand who could work upon such a singular mass of Sanskrit and Greek words, without showing { 257} evidence of being able to read a line in any language but his own, or to spell that correctly. He was an uneducated Godfrey Higgins.[589] A few extracts will put this in a strong light: one for history of science, one for astronomy, and one for philology:
"Sir Isaac Newton was of opinion that 'the atmosphere of the earth was the sensory of God; by which he was enabled to see quite round the earth:' which proves that Sir Isaac had no idea that God could see through the earth.
"Sir Richard [Phillips] has given the most rational explanation of the cause of the earth's elliptical orbit that I have ever seen in print. It is because the earth presents its watery hemisphere to the sun at one time and that of solid land the other; but why has he made his Oxonian astonished at the coincidence? It is what I taught in my attic twelve years before.