6 



can we reasonably deny that a spirit is able to move 

 matter, although the manner of its doing this we cannot 

 comprehend. 



6. All the laws of motion may be reduced ,to 

 three: 1. Every .moving body is moved by another. 

 5. Every moving body communicates its motion to 

 any body it meets. 3. Every moving body continues 

 in motion till it communicates that motion to another. 

 While these laws remain in force, and concur iu pro- 

 ducing various effects, those effects are termed na- 

 tural. When awy of these laws are suspended, this is 

 properly a miracle. 



7. As the elements or first stamina of bodies are 

 too small to be discerned by any of our senses, we 

 can only form conjectures concerning them. The 

 most probable conjectures are these : Empedocles, 

 and Aristotle, from him, supposed there are four 

 elements, fire, air, water and earth : and, indeed, 

 this division seems to be grounded on the nature of 

 things; for there is no doubt but at the creation of 

 this globe the confused mass was separated into four 

 parts, the heaviest of which constituted the earth, the 

 particles next in weight the water, the third, lighter 

 still, air, and the lightest of all, fire, otherwise termed 

 ether. And it is manifest, all bodies known to us are 

 reducible to one or more of these. Every thing cor- 

 poreal is either earth, air, water or fire, or compounded 

 of them. So that after all the disquisitions of two or 

 three thousand years, this easy, plain, natural account of 

 the elements, is not likely to be amended : it being a 

 certain fact that of these do all bodies consist. 



8. The chymists have taken another way, endea- 

 vouring to trace the principle of bodies, not by the 

 ordinary use of their senses, nor by reasoning, but from 

 experiments made by fire: and by this means they 

 make five elements ; for whatever is distilled first emits 

 a sapid and spiritous vapour, which is by cold con- 



