66 NATURAL HISTORY. 



is no such way to effect the strange transmutations 

 of bodies, as to endeavour and urge by all means the 

 reducing of them to nothing. And herein is con 

 tained also a great secret of preservation of bodies 

 from change ; for if you can prohibit, that they 

 neither turn into air, because no air cometh to them, 

 nor go into the bodies adjacent, because they are 

 utterly heterogeneal ; nor make a round and circu 

 lation within themselves; they will never change 

 though they be in their nature never so perishable 

 or mutable. We see how flies, and spiders, and the 

 like, get a sepulchre in amber, more durable than 

 the monument and embalming of the body of any 

 king. And I conceive the like will be of bodies put 

 into quicksilver. But then they must be but thin, 

 as a leaf, or a piece of paper or parchment ; for if 

 they have a greater crassitude, they will alter in 

 their own body, though they spend not. But of this 

 we shall speak more when we handle the title of 

 conservation of bodies. 



