PART I. 



GENERAL HISTORY 



INFUSOIUAL ANIMALCULES. 



Among the arguments deducible from the natural world, 

 in support of the existence and superintending Providence 

 of an Almighty Intelligence, none can carry a stronger 

 conviction home to a reasoning and philosophic mind, 

 than those which are drawn from that portion of it which 

 falls under consideration in the present treatise. Inter- 

 spersed throughout this world of nature, designed and 

 formed by a gracious ^nd All-wise Creator — if, with no 

 other intention, still, with that of yielding evidence indis- 

 putable of His own Omnipotence — exists a world within 

 a world, of beings so diminitive, as to have provoked man's 

 utmost ingenuity to bring them within the range of his 

 perceptive powers, 



1 



