STUDY IV. 163 



tiifugal motion. Thefe pretended diforders are 

 neceflary to the harmony of all the parts of the 

 Earth. Let us fuppofe, for example, that ihe 

 Straits of Gibraltar were clofed, as it has been faid 

 was formerly the cafe, and that the Mediterranean 

 exifted no longer. What would become of fo 

 many rivers of Europe, Afia, and Africa, whicii 

 are kept flowing by the vapours which afcend 

 out of that Sea, and bring back their waters to it, 

 in a wonderful exa6tnefs of proportion, as the cal- 

 culations of many ingenious men have demon- 

 ftrated .'* The North winds, which conftantly re- 

 frefh Egypt in Summer, and which convey the 

 emanations of the Mediterranean as far as the 

 mountains of Ethiopia, to fupply the fources of the 

 Nile, blowing, in this cafe, over a fpace deflitute 

 of water, would carry drought and barrennefs over 

 all the northern regions of Africa, and even into 

 the interior of that Continent. 



The fouthern parts of Europe would fare flill 

 worfe ; for the hot and parching winds of Africa, 

 which load themfelves with fo many rainy cloud-, 

 as they crofs the Mediterranean, now blowing over 

 the dry bed of that Sea, without tempering the 

 hear by humidity of any kind, v/ould blafl, with 

 fcorching fterility, all that vaft region of Europe, 

 which extends from the Straits of Gibraltar to the 

 Euxine Sea, and utterly dry up all the countries 



M 2 though 



