350 STUDIES OF KATURE, 



this advantage, that, by convincing us of the weak- 

 nefs of our own underflanding, they imprefs us 

 with a deep fenfe of the wifdom of Nature. Let 

 us recoiled the Socratic method of ratiocination. 

 Do not let us wafte our time in overturning fyf- 

 tems which prefent to us plans different from ihofe 

 we fee. Let us only deduce confequences from 

 them : to admit them is complete refutation. 



I could farther demonftrate, that mod iilands 

 themfelves conlifl: of double parts, as the Conti- 

 nents, of which, as I have elfewhere faid, they are 

 abridgments, from their peaks, their mountains, 

 their lakes, and their rivers, proportioned to their 

 extent. Many of thofe which are fituated in the 

 Indian Ocean, have, if I may fo exprefs myfelf, 

 two Hemifpheres, the one oriental, the other occi- 

 dental, divided by mountains which go from North 

 to South, fo that when it is Winter on one fide. 

 Summer reigns on the other, and reciprocally j 

 fuch are the iflands of Java, Sumatra, Borneo, and 

 mofl of the Philippines and Moluccas; fo that 

 they are evidently conflrufted for the two Mon- 

 foons of the Ocean in which they ar£ placed. 



Did time permit, the varieties of their conftruc- 

 tion, would furnifh me with many curious re- 

 marks, tending to confirm, in particular, what I 

 have faid, in general, refpeclingthe confonancies of 



the 



