



XX11 INTRODUCTION. 



from the Weight to the Smell. It would certainly have been 

 more natural and rational to have joined the Lustre with the 

 Colour, and the Weight with the Hardness. His idea of the 

 successive use of the senses, in the examination of any mine- 

 ral, is quite imaginary j as before an examination with a lens, 

 it may be weighed in the hand, or its hardness tried with a 

 knife, &c. j and it would be ridiculous to build a science 

 upon simple exertions of the will. Independently of this new 

 kind of pedantry, derived from German metaphysics, it is 

 not the consideration what senses are first impressed, that 

 should regulate the succession of characteristics ; but, on the 

 contrary, their own intrinsic importance. Hence the TEX- 

 TURE is here placed in the first rank, though totally omitted 

 by Werner, or confounded with the fracture, with which 

 indeed it is intimately allied : but two other celebrated mi- 

 neralogists, Wiedenman and Estner, have justly introduced 

 the texture as a characteristic of the most radical importance. 

 In many cases it may be judged by the eye, but. in most 

 requires a lens. The hardness, which follows, may be tried 

 by the knife or file ; instruments indispensable to the mine- 

 ralogist. The weight may, after some experience, be esti- 

 mated by the hand; but some of the disciples of Werner 

 have confounded this external character with the specific 

 gravity, which belongs to the chemical class of characters. 



Mr. Kirwan has justly observed the inaccuracy of Werner 

 and his disciples, who have confounded the texture with the 

 fracture. The most minute account of the former, is that 

 by Dr. Townson above mentioned. 



Townsonon " The Texture, Textura, 



the texture. 



" Is the internal structure or disposition of the matter of 

 which a mineral is composed*. 







* " Mr. Werner says nothing on the texture of minerals; but, under the 

 article of fracture, gives many characters which belong not to the fracture but to 

 the texture ; so that the characters of texture and fracture, though very different, 

 are united under one head and confounded together. But in the works of 



