. The Adolfo Stahl lectures in astronomy, delivered in San Francisco, California, in 1916-17 and 1917-18, under the auspices of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. computations or the mathematical investigations,without which analytical sifting process the multitudinousobservations of the practical astronomer would sometimeshave little value for the progress of the science. Of this typewere such men as Hansen, Poincare, and Hill, honored fortheir mathematical discoveries, though their names may not befound in the more elementary astronomical text-books. Hillonce stated that the twenty yea
. The Adolfo Stahl lectures in astronomy, delivered in San Francisco, California, in 1916-17 and 1917-18, under the auspices of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. computations or the mathematical investigations,without which analytical sifting process the multitudinousobservations of the practical astronomer would sometimeshave little value for the progress of the science. Of this typewere such men as Hansen, Poincare, and Hill, honored fortheir mathematical discoveries, though their names may not befound in the more elementary astronomical text-books. Hillonce stated that the twenty years of continuous work whichDelaunay had devoted to the lunar theory was undoubtedlythe greatest task one man had ever carried through single-handed ; with the simple, unegotistic certainty of genius headded that he would give second place to the fourteen yearswhich he himself had devoted to the mathematical theory ofthe motions of Jupiter and Saturn. Such men must surelyrank as discoverers. What is it, then, which constitutes a discovery, and howmay it be defined ? Can a distinction be made between Bondsdiscovery of the crepe ring of Saturn (made on a night when. PLATE XXVI. The 37-Ixch Mills Reflector, Santlago, Chile. Astronomical Discovery 115 haze obliterated all but the brighter stars!) and Eulers equa-tion, which gives a remarkable relation between the times, thedistances from the central body, and the length of the arctraversed in a parabolic orbit under the law of gravitation,^ ofthe first importance in certain orbit computations? Canrelative values be assigned to Herschels discovery of Uranus,and to the method of determining stellar velocities in the lineof sight by the Doppler-Fizeau shift of the spectral lines, whichforms one of the most powerful methods of modern astronomy?Such comparisons are futile; the race of discoverers israther to be regarded as a pure democracy, where all haveequal rank. Every advance has its value in contributing toour knowledge of the whole
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