first principle of things, yet may we every where see plain signatures of the hand of a Divine Architect.

All vegetables are composed of water and earth, principles which strongly attract each other and a large portion of air, which strongly attracts when fixed, but strongly repels when in an elastic state. By the combination, action, and re-action of those few principles, all the operations in vegetables are effected.

The particles of air distend each ductile part, and invigorate their sap, and meeting with the other mutually attracting principles, they are, by gentle heat and motion, enabled to assimilate into the nourishment of the respective parts. Thus nutrition is gradually advanced, by the nearer and nearer union of these principles, till they arrive at such a degree of consistency, as to form the several parts of vegetables. And at 1ngth, by the flying off of the watery vehicle, they are compacted into hard sub

stances.

But when the watery particles again soak into and disunite them, then is the union of the parts of vegetables dissolved, and they are prepared by putrefaction to appear in some new form, whereby the nutritive fund of nature can never be exhausted.

All these principles are in all the parts of vegetables. But there is more oil in the more exalted parts of them. Thus seeds abound with oil, and consequently with sulphur and air. And indeed, as they contain the rudiments of future vegetables, it was necessary they should be stored with principles that would both preserve them from putrefaction, and also be active in promoting germination and vegetation.

And as oil is an excellent preservative against cold, so it abounds in the sap of the more northern trees. And it is this by which the ever-greens are enabled to keep their leaves all the winter.

Leaves not only bring nourishment from the lower parts within the attraction of the growing fruit, (which like young animals is furnished with proper instruments to suck it thence) but also carry off the re dundant watery fluid, while they imbibe the dew and rain, which contain much salt and sulphur: for the air is full of acid and sulphureous particles; and the various combinations of these are doubtless very serviceable in promoting the work of vegetation. Indeed so fine a fluid as the air,

is a more proper medium, wherein to prepare and combine the more exalted piinciples of vegetables, than the gross watery fluid of the sap. And that there is plenty of these particles in the leaves is evident, from the sulphureous exudations often found on their edges. To these refined aerial particles, not only the most racy, generous taste of fruits, but likewise the most grateful odours of flowers, yea and their beautiful colours, are probably owing.

In order to supply tender shoots with nourishment, nature is careful to furnish, at small distances, the young shoots of all sorts of trees, with many leaves throughout their whole length: which, as so many jointly acting powers, draw plenty of sap to them.

The like provision has nature made, in the corn, grass, and reed-kind: the leafy spires, which draw nourishment to each joint, being provided long before the stem shoots: the tender stems would easily break and dry up, so as to prevent their growth, had not these scabbards been provided, which both support and keep them in a supple and ductile state.

The growth of a young bud to a shoot, consists in the gradual dilatation and extension of every part till it is stretched out to its full length. And the capillary tubes still retain their hollowness, notwithstanding their being extended, as we see melted glass tubes remain hollow, though drawn out to the finest thread.

But

The pith of trees is always full of moisture while the shoot is growing, by the expansion of which, the tender ductile shoot is distended in every part. when each year's shoot is fully grown, then the pith gradually dries up. Mean time nature carefully provides for the growth of the succeeding year, by preserv ing a tender ductile part in the bud, replete with succulent pith. Great care is likewise taken to keep the parts between the bark and wood always supple with slimy moisture, from which ductile matter the woody fibres, vesicles, and buds are formed.

The great variety of different substances in the same vegetable, proves, that there are peculiar vessels for conveying different sorts of nutriment. In many vegetables some of those vessels are plainly seen full of milky, yellow, or red nutriment.

Where a secretion is designed to compose an hard substance, viz. the kernel or

seed

seed of hard stone fruits, it does not immediately grow from the stone, which would be the shortest way to convey nourishment to it. But the umbilical vessel fetches a compass round the concave of the stone, and then enters the kernel near its cone. By this artifice the vessel being much prolong ed, the motion of the sap is thereby retarded, and a viscid nutriment conveyed to the seed, which turns to an hard substance.

Let us trace the vegetation of a tree, from the seed to its full maturity. When the seed is sown, in a few days it imbibes so much moisture, as to swell with very great force, by which it is enabled both to strike its roots down, and to force its stem out of the ground. As it grows up, the first, second, third, and fourth order of lateral branches shoot out, each lower order being longer than those immediately above them, not only as shooting first, but because inserted nearer the root, and so drawing greater plenty of sap. So that a tree is a complicated engine, which has as many different powers as it has branches. And the whole of each yearly growth of the tree is proportioned to the whole of the nourishment they attract.

But leaves also are so necessary to promote its growth, that nature provides small, thin expansions, which may be called primary leaves to draw nourishment to the buds and young shoots, before the leaf is expanded. These bring nutriment to them in a quantity sufficient for their small demand: a greater quantity of which is afterward provided, in proportion to their need, by the greater expansion of the leaves. A still more beautiful apparatus we find in the curious expansions of biossoms and flowers, which both protect and convey nourishment to the embryo fruit and seeds. But as soon as the calix is formed into a small fruit, containing a minute, seminal tree, the blossom falls off, leaving it to imbibe nourishment for itself, which is brought within the reach of its function, by the adjoining leaves.

Let us proceed to make some additional reflections upon the vegetable kingdom.

All plants produce seeds: but they are entirely unfit for propagation, till they are impregnated. This is performed within the flower, by the dust of the antheræ falling upon the moist stigmata, where it bursts and sends forth a very subtile matter, which is absorbed by the style, and conveyed down to the seed. As soon as this

operation is over, those organs wither and fall. But one flower does not always contain all these: often the male organs are on one, the female on another. And that nothing may be wanting, the whole apparatus of the antheræ and stigmata is in all flowers contrived with wonderful wisdom. In most, the stigmata surround the pistil, and are of the same height. But where the pistil is longer than the stigmata, the flowers recline, that the dust may fall into the stigmata, and when impregnated rise again; that the seeds In other not fall out. may flowers the pistil is shorter, and there the flowers preserve an erect situation. Nay, when the flowering season comes on, they become erect though they were drooping. before. Lastly, when the male flowers are placed below the female, the leaves are very small and narrow, that they may not hinder the dust from flying upwards like smoke : and when in the same species one plant is male, and the other female, there the dust is carried in abundance by the wind from the male to the female. We cannot also without admiration observe, that most flowers expand themselves when the sun shines, and close when either rain, clouds, or evening is coming on, lest the genital dust should be coagulated, or otherwise rendered useless. Yet when the impreg nation is over, they do not close, either upon showers, or the approach of evening.

For the scattering of seed, nature has provided numberless ways. Various berries are given for food to animais: but while they eat the pulp, they sow the seed. Either they disperse them at the same time or if they swallow them, they are returned with interest. The misletoe always grows on the other trees; because the thrush that eats the seeds of them, casts them forth with his dung. The junipers also, which fill our woods, are sown in the same manner. 'The cross-bill that lives on fir-cones, and the haw-finch which feeds on pine-cones, sow many of those seeds, especially when they carry the cone to a stone or stump, to strip off its scales. Swine likewise and moles, by throwing up the earth, prepare it for the reception of seeds.

The great Parent of all, decreed that the whole earth should be covered with plants. In order to this he adapted the nature of each to the climate where it grows. So that some can bear intense heat, others intense cold. Some love a moderate warmth. Many delight in dry, others

in moist ground. The Alpine plants love mountains whose tops are covered with eternal snow. And they blow and ripen their seeds very early, lest the winter should overtake and destroy them. Plants which will grow no where else, flourish in Siberia, and near Hudson's Bay. Grass can bear almost any temperature of the air: in which the good Providence of God appears; this being so necessary all over the globe, for the nourishment of cattle.

Thus neither the scorching sun nor the pinching cold hinders any country from having its vegetables. Nor is there any soil which does not bring forth some. Pond-weed and water-lilies inhabit the waters. Some plants cover the bottom of rivers and seas: others fill the marshes. Some clothe the plains: others grow in the driest woods, that scarce ever see the sun. Nay, stones and the trunks of trees are not void, but covered with liver

wort.

The wisdom of the Creator appears no where more than in the manner of the growth of trees. As the roots descend deeper than those of other plants, they do not rob them of nourishment. And as their stems shoot up so high, they are easily preserved from cattle. The leaves falling in autumn guard many plants against the rigour of winter: and in the summer afford both them and us a defence against the heat of the sun. They like wise imbibe the water from the earth, part of which transpiring through their leaves, is insensibly dispersed, and helps to moisten the plants that are round about. Lastly, the particular structure of trees contributes very much to the propagation of insects. Multitudes of these lay their eggs upon their leaves, where they find both food and safety.

Many plants and shrubs are armed with thorns, to keep the animals from destroying their fruits. At the same time these cover many other plants under their branches, so that while the adjacent grounds are robbed of all plants, some may be preserved to continue the species.

The mosses which adorn the most barren places, preserve the smaller plants, when they begin to shoot, from cold and drought. They also hinder the ferment. ing earth from forcing the roots of plants upward in the spring, as we see happen annually to trunks of trees. Hence few

mosses grow in southern climates, not being necessary there to these ends.

Sea-matweed will bear no soil but pure sand. Sand is often blown by violent winds, so as to deluge as it were meadows and fields. But where this grows, it fixes the sand, and gathers it into hillocks. Thus other lands are formed, the ground increased, and the sea repelled, by this wonderful disposition of nature.

How careful is nature to preserve that useful plant, grass! The more its leaves are eaten, the more they increase. For the Author of nature intended, that vegetables which have slender stalks and erect leaves should be copious and thick set, and thus afford food for so vast a quantity of grazing animals. But what increases our wonder is, that although grass is the principal food of such animals, yet they touch not the flower and seed-bearing stems, that so the seeds may ripen and be sown.

The caterpillar of the moth, which feeds upon grass to the great destruction thereof, seems to be formed in order to keep a due proportion between this and other plants. For grass when left to grow freely, increases to that degree as to exclude all other plants, which would consequently be extirpated, unless the insect sometimes prepared a place for them. And hence it is, that more species of plants appear, when this caterpillar has laid waste the pasture the preceding year, than at any other time.

But all plants, sooner or later, must submit to death. They spring up, they grow, they flourish, they bear fruit, and having finished their course, return to the dust again. Almost all the black mould which covers the earth, is owing to dead vegetables. Indeed, after the leaves and stems are gone, the roots of plants remain: but those too at last rot and change into mould. And the earth thus prepared, restores to plants what it has received from them. For when seeds are committed to the earth, they draw and accommodate to their own nature the more subtile parts of this mould: so that the tallest tree is in reality nothing but mould wonderfully compounded with air and water. And from these plants when they die just the same kind of mould is formed as gave them birth. By this means fertility remains continually uninterrupted: whereas the earth could not make good its annual consumption, were it not constantly recruited.

In many cases the crustaceous liverworts are the first foundation of vegetation. Therefore, however despised, they are of the utmost consequence, in the economy of nature. When rocks first emerge out of the sea, they are so polished by the force of the waves, that hardly any herb is able to fix its habitation upon them. But the minute crustaceous liverworts soon begin to cover these dry rocks, though they have no nourishment but the little mould and imperceptible particles which the rain and air bring thither. These liverworts dying turn into fine earth, in which a larger kind of liverworts strike their roots. These also die and turn to mould and then the various kinds of mosses find nourishment. Lastly, these dying yield such plenty of mould, that herbs and shrubs easily take root and live upon it.

That trees, when dry or cut down, may not remain useless to the world, and lie melancholy spectacles, nature hastens on their destruction in a singular manner. First the liverworts begin to strike root in them afterwards the moisture is drawn out of them, whence putrefaction follows. Then the mushroom-kind find a fit place to grow on, and corrupt them still more. A particular sort of beetle next makes himself a way between the bark and the wood. Then a sort of caterpillar, and several other sorts of beetles, bore numberless holes through the trunk. Lastly, the woodpeckers come, and while they are seeking for insects, shatter the tree, already corrupted, and exceedingly hasten its return to the earth from whence it came. But how shall the trunk of a tree, which is immersed in water, ever return to earth? A particular kind of worm performs this work, as seafaring men well know.

But why is so inconsiderable a plant as thistles, so armed and guarded by nature? Because it is one of the most useful plants that grows. Observe an heap of clay, on which for many years no plant has sprung up: let but the seeds of a thistle fix there, and other plants will quickly come thither, and soon cover the ground: for the thistles by their leaves attract moisture from the air, and by their roots send it into the clay, and by that means not only thrive themselves, but provide a shelter for other plants.

Indeed, there is such a variety of wisdom and profusion of goodness, displayed in every object of nature, even in those that

seem useless or insignificant, and what is more, in many of those which to an ignorant and superficial observer, appear noxious, that it is past doubt to the true philosopher, nothing has been made in vain. That is a fine as well as pious observation of Sir John Pringle, founded on the experiments of Dr. Priestley, that no vegetable grows in vain, but that from the oak of the forest to the grass of the field, every individual plant is serviceable to mankind: if not always distinguished by some private virtue, yet making a part of the whole, which cleanses and purifies our atmo sphere. In this the fragrant rose and deadly night-shade co-operate; nor is the herbage, nor the woods that flourish in the most remote and unpeopled regions, unprofitable to us, nor we to them; considering how constantly the winds convey to them our vitiated air, for our relief, and their nourishment. And if ever these salutary gales rise to storms and hurricanes, let us still trace and revere the ways of a beneficent Being; who not fortuitously but with design, not in wrath but in mercy, thus shakes the waters and the air together, to bury in the deep those putrid and pestilential effluvia, which the vegetables upon the face of the earth had been insufficient

to consume.

5. General Reflections and Observations on Beasts, Birds, Fishes, and other inferior Parts of the Works of God.

No part of nature is destitute of inhabitants. The woods, the waters, the depths of the earth, have their respective tenants; while the yielding air, and those tracts where man can never, but with much art and danger, ascend, are also passed through by multitudes of the most beautiful beings of the creation.

Every order of animals is fitted for its situation in life: but none more apparent. ly than birds. Though they fall below beasts in the scale of nature, yet they hold the next rank, and far surpass fishes and insects, both in the structure of their bodies, and in their sagacity.

The body of man presents the greatest variety: beasts, less perfectly formed, discover their defects in the simplicity of their conformation: the mechanism of birds is yet less complex: fishes are furnished with fewer organs still; while insects, more imperfect than all, fill up the chasm

between

between animal and vegetable nature. Of man, the most perfect animal, there are but three or four species; the kinds of beasts are more numerous; birds are more various still; fishes yet more; but insects afford an immense variety.

As to the number of animals, the species of beasts, including also serpents, are not very numerous. Such as are certainly known and clearly described, are not above an hundred and fifty. And yet probably not many that are of any consi. derable bigness, have escaped the notice of the curious.

The species of birds, known and described, are near five hundred, and the species of fishes, secluding shell-fish, as many: but if the shell-fish are taken in, above six times the number. How many of each genus remain undiscovered, we cannot very nearly conjecture. But we may suppose, the whole sum of beasts and birds to exceed by a third part, and fishes by one half, those that are known.

The insects, taking in the exsanguious, both terrestrial and aquatic, may for number vie even with plants themselves. The exsanguious alone, by what Dr. Lister has observed and delineated, we may conjecture cannot be less, if not many more, than three thousand species. Indeed this computation seems much too low for if there are a thousand species in this island and the sea near it; and if the same proportion hold between the insects natives of England, and those of the rest of the world; the species of insects on the whole globe will amount to ten thousand.

Now if the number of creatures even in this lower world, be so exceedingly great; how great, how immense must be the power and wisdom of him that formed them all! For as it argues far more skill in an artificer, to be able to frame both clocks and watches, and pumps, and many other sorts of machines, than he could display in making but one of those sorts of engines; so the Almighty declares more of his wisdom in forming such a multitude of different sorts of creatures, and all with admirable and unreproveable art, than if he had created but a few.

Again: The superiority of knowledge would be displayed, by contriving engines for the same purposes after different fashion, as the moving clocks or other engines by springs instead of weights: and the infinitely wise Creator has shewn, by

many instances, that he is not confined to one only instrument, for the working one effect, but can perform the same thing by divers means. So though most flying creatures have feathers, yet hath he enabled several to fly without them; as the bat, one sort of lizard, two sorts of fishes, and numberless sorts of insects. In like manner, although the air-bladder in fishes seems necessary for swimming; yet are many so formed as to swim without it, as first, the cartilaginous kind, which nevertheless ascend and descend at pleasure, although by what means we cannot tell: secondly, the cetaceous kind: the air which they receive into their lungs, in some measure answering the same end.

Yet again: Though God has tempered the blood and bodies of most fishes to their cold element, yet, to shew he can preserve a creature as hot as beasts themselves in the coldest water, he has placed a variety of these cetaceous fishes in the northernmost seas. And the copious fat wherewith their bodies is inclosed, by reflecting the internal heat, and keeping off the external cold, keeps them warm even in the neighbourhood of the pole. Another proof that God can by different means produce the same effect, is the various ways of extracting the nutricious juice out of the aliment in various creatures.

In man and beasts the food, first chew. ed, is received into the stomach, where it is concocted and reduced into chyle, and so evacuated into the intestines, where being mixed with the choler and pancreate juice, it is farther subtilized, and rendered so fluid, that its finer parts easily enter the mouth of the lacteal veins. In birds there is no chewing; but in such as are not carnivorous, it is immediately swallowed into the crop, or anti-stomach (which is observed in many,, especially piscivorous birds) where it is moistened by some pro per juice, and then transferred to the giz zard, by the working of whose muscles, assisted by small pebbles, which they swallow for that purpose, it is ground small, and so transmitted to the intestines.

In oviparous reptiles, and all kind of serpents, there is neither chewing nor comminution in the stomach, but as they swallow animals whole, so they void the skins unbroken, having extracted the nutritious juices. Here, by the bye, we may observe the wonderful dilatibility of the throats and gullets of serpents. Two en