LEVERRIER, URI3AIN JEAN JOSEPH, a French astronomer of great celebrity, was b. at St. Lb, in the department of Manche, Mar. 11, 1811. He was admitted into the poly technic in 1831. and was subsequently employed for some time as an engineer in con nection with the tobacco board. In 1836 lie published Memoires stir les Combinations du Phosphore avec l'Hydrogene et avec Orygene. His Tables de 3lercure, and several memoirs on "the secular inequalities," opened to him the door of the academy in 1846; and at the instigation of Arago he applied himself to the examination of the disturbances in the motions of the planets, from which the existence of an undiscovered planet could lie inferred; and, as the result of his laborious calculations, directed the attention of astronomers to the point in the heavens where, a few days afterwards, the planet Nep tune was actually discovered, the same thing being also, by a remarkable coincidence, done about the same time, and independently, by the English astronomer Adams (q.v.).
For this Leverrier was rewarded with the grand cross of the legion of honor, a profes sorship of astronomy in the facility of sciences at Paris, and various minor honors. When the revolution of 1848 broke out, Leverrier sought distinction as a democratic politician; the department of La Manche chose him in May, 1849, to be a member of the legislative assembly, where he at once became counter-revolutionary; and in 1852 Louis Napoleon made him a senator. In 1854 Lcverrier was apnoin:ed to the director ship of the observatory of Paris, an office which, save during an int?rval of three years (1870-73), he held till his death, Sept. 23,1877.