tf B O D I E S. Chap.i4. 



And if you {hould fay they did not become on*; and yet al- 

 low them to touch immediately one another without having 

 any aire or fluide body between them; then if you fuppofc them 

 to move onwards upon thefc termcs ; th*y would be changed 

 locally, without any inninfecall change:which in the book De 

 Mundo ( as we have formerly allcdged ) is demonftrated to 

 be impoflible. 



There remaineih onely a third way for two hard furfaces to 

 come together which is, thai firft they {hould reft doping one 

 upon another, and make an angle where they meet ( as two 

 lines, that cut one another, do in their point of their imerieU- 

 on ) and fo contain as it were a wedge of aire between them, 

 which wedge they fhould leficn by little and litde, through their 

 moving towards one another at their moft diftant edges (whiles 

 the touching edges are like immoveablc centers that the others 

 turn uponjtill at length they flint oat all the airc, and ciofe to- 

 gether, like the two legs of a compafle. 



But neither is it polTlble that this way they {hould touch, fov 

 after their firft touch by one line C which neither is in efYe& a 

 touching , as we have fhewcd ) no other parts of them can 

 touch, though ftill they approch nearer ind nearer, untill their 

 whole furftces do entirely touch at once: and therefore, the airt 

 mu(t in this cafe leap out in an inftant a greater fpace.then ifthe 

 furfaces came perpendicularly to one another; for here it muft 

 flie from one extremity to the other: whereas, in the former 

 ca(> it was to go but from the middle to each fide. 



And thus it is evident that no two bodies can arrive to touch 

 one another, unleiVe one of them at the leaft have a fupcrficies 

 ply able to the fuperficies of the other ; that is, unlcffe one of 

 them be foft, which is.to be liouide in lomc drgrce. Seeing then, 

 that by touching, bodies do become one ; and that liquidity is 

 thccaufe and means whereby bodies arrive to touch; we may 

 boldly conclude that two liqnidc bodies do moft eahly and rea- 

 dily become one; and next to two fuch, a liqurde and a hard 

 body, are fooneft united : bur two hard ones molt difficultly. 



To proceed then with our reflexions upon thccompofition of 

 8. bodies, and upon what rcfulteih out of the joyning and mixture 



r.ixcAK-- o f their firft differences Rarity and Denficy; we fee, how if a 11- 



s f c named .I/.T/I i t i jti-ji-ii ^. 



general. 1 . qiiidc iliOltancc liappcncth to touch a dry body ic fticketh eafily 



there- 



