_ Reflections on some Mineralogical Systems. 123 
fortunate rage for machines, so necessary to their flourishing 
manufactories, is there generally predominant. In all the 
workshops of this country we see the most ingenious appli- 
cations of the principles of mechanics, and in no other 
part do we find so many machines, and so well executed. 
At different periods esteemed works on machines and me- 
chanics have appeared; but the one in which, for the time 
it was written, that philosophy which is the appendage of 
science most prevails; that to which the finest inventions 
of the buman mind, the differential and integral calculus, 
have contributed, is by Leonard Euler. The analytical 
mechanics of La Grange, still more profound, and raised to 
the highest possible degree of generalization, has extended 
this philosophical: spirit; and, while machines are multi- 
plied in England, and contributing to the ereat object of 
private interest and national grandeur, a citizen of Basle, 
and another of Piedmont, without machines or without 
having under their eye the art of mechanics, but imbued 
with their philosophy, conceived profound speculations on 
the science. 
The chemical code in its actual form has been established 
in France near 30 years; and it is among philosophers that 
it has begun te take root. The observations which founded 
it were not made by artisans, but by men of learning; and 
protected against local errors and popular prejudices, it was 
not obscured in its origin. The work*of Lavoisier has no 
equal in its kind. The chemical statics of Berthollet con- 
tain the excellent philosophy of phenomena, without 
which there is no chemistry. The idea of a chemical philo- 
sophy is also French, and we owe to that nation the greatest 
part of what this branch of our knowledge possesses truly 
philosophical *. be 
In England, theproducts of the arts and chemical manu- 
factures, as well as the greatest part of all others, have Leen 
carried to a marvellous degree of perfection. In contem- 
plating the operations which daily take place, they are en- 
_* It may be necessary to remind the English reader that the above sen- , 
tences were written in France, where the language of courtesy has long su- 
perseded that of simple truth: under such circumstances it would be un- 
candid to the ingenious and learned author to submit these expressions to 
his own rigid principles of the legic of science. He has only adopted, as a 
matier of common civility, the sentiments familiar among a great number 
of lettered Frenclimen, who are quiie as zealous for the glory of their coun- 
try as for truth. Some of the most distinguished Parisian philosophers, 
however, are conscious of their obligations to other countries; and one of 
these observed, with as much truth as politeness, that ‘la plus belle découverte 
de mies compatriotes, e'¢st-@ éludier bien les guurages des vrais philosophes An- 
glais.”—Trans. 
abled 
