390 Introduction to the Study of Mineralogy, 



Minerals, for the most part being hid within the cavities 

 of the earth, only come out of it in fragments, and bear the 

 marks of the iron instruments that have been employed to 

 tear them from their beds : to the generality of mankind 

 they are only crude masses, without character and without 

 appropriate definition, and appear as if intended solely to 

 be appropriated to our wants. It has seldom been imagined 

 that a distinct science could have been reared out of the sub- 

 ject, and that the naturalist should hold a place between the 

 miner who extracts the treasures of Nature from the earth, 

 and the artist who works them. 



Those however who, without dwelling upon first ap- 

 pearances, will consider minerals more closelv, and with 

 long continued attention, will easily perceive how much is 

 to be gained by a more intimate acquaintance with their 

 properties. 



Polyhedric forms, the dimensions and angles of which 

 appear to have been regulated by a scientific hand with the 

 assistance of the compass ; the variations which these forms, 

 without ceasing to be regular, undergo in one and the same 

 gubstance ; and the advantage of being able, by the help of 

 calculation and observation, to re-discover the traces of Pro- 

 teus concealed under these metamorphoses ; ingenious ex- 

 periments concurring with indications which speak at once 

 to the eye, in order to develop the properties which escape 

 him ; the principle of Archimedes applied to the comparison 

 of weights under a given volume ; the refrangent power em- 

 ployed in tracing a limit between bodies through which the 

 image of each object appears simple, and those which pre- 

 sent two to the astonished beholder; heat substituted for 

 friction in order to produce electrical poles, in bodies the 

 crystalline form of which, by particular modifications, in- 

 dicates beforehand the positions of these poles; the mag- 

 netic needle making use of iron to disclose itself; various 

 chemical agents presenting methods of dispelling doubts 

 which other experiments had still left ; the resources fur- 

 nished by analysis for the formation of a method grounded 

 Upon the intimate knowledge of the objects which it em- 

 braces -, every thing conspires to make mineralogy a science 



worthy 



