54 



traversing the uneven bottom of the deep from shore to shore. 

 Again the waves retire, the sand is wet, the sun compels rom it a 

 contribution, and it is dry; these changes regular, flux nnd reflux, 

 marking periods, and obedient to some other power. What other 

 power? The moon, they say; but this is perhaps a fable, coinci- 

 dence is not causation; still by some power governed in this regu- 

 lar work; again connecting the great sea with unknown things, 

 an 'iidieKs series of relations. 



5f>. But our parent earth supplies to us more varied interests : 

 our native soil is quite familiar, and we are told of worlds abroad, 

 desolate or rich, where animation fails for want of means; or 

 where nature, prodigal, spontaneous, yields more goods than can 

 be enjoyed. 



57. Africa, scorched by the sun which should but warm, 

 presents varieties of her own. Here woods* water, fruits, men, 

 beasts; there, oceans of sand, which mingle with the wind, and 

 bear rapidly distress and ruin: but here the inanimate causes sport 

 mostly for their own amusement ; while the wind howls in the 

 desert, and the sand flies in columns, sometimes upwards, then in 

 vast clouds onwards borne, the tiger crouches, unconscious, in 

 watch for his prey, and the savage is asleep in his hut ; each, each, 

 and all, governed by existence, forcing existence, by causes. 



58. Asia, wide separated, is yet joined to Europe by inter- 

 mediate causes and relations. Man, adventurous for he knows not 

 what, brings from this soil materials of luxury and corruption. 

 Here the earth teems with new varieties: here the elephant, 

 nourished and developed by the productions of the land, is 

 domesticated by man, and rendered by this connection more mis- 

 chievous than nature would have made him ; he, by this new as- 

 sociation learns to fight battles not his own, and is taught a 

 treachery to his species, which should belong alone to man. 



59. America too has her phenomena. In all these quarters 

 of the globe myriads of inanimate processes, of the peculiar kind, 

 take place, all governed by their proper causes. The animate 

 creation is also wonderfully variegated, and nature seems to have 

 et apart districts and countries for the reign of animals, all things 

 concurring to their wants, as in the more civilized parts she, 

 suffering the dominion of man, appears to have niade every thing 

 subservient to his purposes. 



60. Europe presents a more familiar scene. Here nature and 

 man work more conspicuously together: the former prepares ma- 

 terials, the latter works them into forms ; their operations some- 

 times mixed, sometimes exclusive. The trees in the forest bend as 

 the wind impels, or their leaves are made wet by the storm ; they 

 shoot forth their branches and grow rich in foliage, and they stand 

 erect in their majesty ; their present causes yield to others, the 

 green twig withers, and the strong arm becomes sapless, their leaves 

 are no longer sustained, and they return to the earth; or their 



