THE ELEMENTS. 211 



quantity and direction we please, without knowing what 

 water is." The observation of this excellent writer has 

 more propriety in it now, than it had at the time it was 

 made: for the constitution, and the constituent parts of 

 water, appear in some measure to have been lately discov- 

 ered ; yet it does not, I think, appear, that we can make 

 any better or greater use of water since the discovery, than 

 we did before it. 



We can never think of the elements without reflecting 

 upon the number of distinct uses which are consolidated 

 in the same substance. The air supplies the lungs, sup- 

 ports fire, conveys sound, reflects light, diffuses smells, 

 gives rain, wafts ships, bears up birds. 'E| v^xro? rcc Trccvrx; 

 toater, beside maintaining its own inhabitants, is the uni- 

 versal nourisher of plants, and through them of terrestrial 

 animals, is the basis of their juices and fluids: dilutes 

 their food, quenches tlieir thirst, floats their burdens. 

 jpfVe warms, dissolves, enlightens; is the great promoter 

 of vegetation and life, if not necessary to the support of 

 both. 



We might enlarge, to almost any length we pleased, up- 

 on each of these uses; but it appears to, me almost suffi- 

 cient to state them. The few remarks which I judge it 

 necessary to add, are as follow. 



I. Air is essentially diff*erent from earth. There ap- 

 pears to be no necessity for an atmosphere's investing our 

 globe: yet it does invest it; and we see how many, 

 how various, and how important are the purposes 

 which it answers to every order of animated, not to say 

 of organized, beings, which are placed upon the terres- 

 trial surface, I think that every one of these uses will 

 be understood upon the first mention of them, except it 

 be that of reflecting light, which may be explained thus. 

 If I had the power of seeing only by means of rays com- 

 ing directly from the sun, whenever I turned my back up- 

 on the luminary, I should find myself in darkness. If I had 

 the power of seeing by reflected light, yet by means only 

 of light reflected from solid masses, these masses would 

 shine, indeed, and glisten, but it would be in the dark. 

 The hemisphere, the sky, the world, could only be illnmi' 

 7iated, as it is illuminated, by the light of the sun being 

 from all sides, and in every direction, reflected to the eye, 

 by particles, as numerous, as thickly scattered, and as 

 widely diffused, as are those of the air, 



