14G PHEXOMENA OK THE UNIVERSE. 



degree of heat does not fall upon the ratio of eightyfold, 

 the consequence is immaterial. For I suppose that there 

 are none so ignorant as to imagine that pneumatic and 

 volatile vapours, which fly off from heavy bodies, lie hid in 

 the pores of the same bodies, and are not of the same matter 

 with the ponderous body, but are separated from the pon 

 derous part when the water is, as it were, entirely consumed, 

 and evaporates into nothing. A live coal, if placed in 

 the scale of a balance and left till it becomes a cinder, will 

 be found to be much lighter. Metals themselves are 

 changed in a wonderful degree in weight by the evola- 

 tions of their smoke. The same matter, therefore, is tan 

 gible and has weight, and is yet pneumatic, and can be 

 divested of weight. 



HISTORY. 



The mode of the process of oil is this. If oil be poured 

 into a common glass phial and placed upon the fire, it will 

 boil much more slowly, and will require a greater heat than 

 water. And at first some drops and small grains appear 

 scattered through the body of the oil, ascending with a 

 creaking sound : the bubbles in the mean time do not play 

 on the surface, as is the case with water, nor does the body 

 rise whole, and in general no steam flies off, but a little 

 afterward the whole body is inflated and dilated in a 

 remarkable proportion, as if rising in a twofold degree. 

 Then, indeed, a very copious and dense steam arises : if a 

 fire be applied to the steam, even a good way above the 

 mouth of the phial, the steam forthwith produces a flame, 

 and descends immediately to the mouth of the phial, and 

 there fixes itself and continues burning. But if the oil is 

 heated to a greater degree, the steam burning to the last, 

 out of the phial, without any flame or ignited body being- 

 applied, completely inflames itself, and takes the expansion 

 of the flame. 



CAUTION. 



See that the mouth of the phial is rather narrow, that the 

 phial may confine the fumes, lest by their largely and im 

 mediately mixing with the air, they lose their inflammable 

 nature. 



HISTORY. 



The method of process of spirit of wine is this : it is ex 

 cited by much less heat, and brings itself to expand sooner 

 and more than water. It boils up with great bubbles without 

 froth, and even with the raising of its whole body, but the 



