LESSON XXX. 



FOUNTAINS OR SPRINGS. 



Tell by what paths, what subterranean ways, 

 Back to the fountain's head the sea conveys 

 The r,efluent rivei's, and the land repays : 

 Tell what superior, what controuling cause, 

 Makes waters, in contempt of Nature's law#, 

 Climb up, and gain the aspiring mountain's height, 

 Swift and forgetful of their native weight. 



BLACKMORE. 



1 KE conjectures of philosophers, concerning the 

 origin of Fountains, have been various : and though 

 the subject has been discussed frequently for more 

 than two thousand years, it is to be lamented that 

 it is yet attended with considerable difficulty. 



Aristotle, whose thoughts on the matter have 

 reached us, was of opinion, that the air contained 

 in the caverns of the earth, being condensed by 

 cold near its surface, was thereby changed into 

 water, and, making its way through, formed foun- 

 tains or springs. Most of the ancient philosophers 

 after him, embraced this opinion j- but the mo- 

 derns have entirely rejected it, as they have no ex- 

 perience of any such transmutation of air into water. 

 Among the hypotheses which have lately been 

 proposed to account for the formation of Springs, 

 K 5 I 



