THE APPLICATION OF NATURAL KNOWLEDGE. 9 



coal, or upon the very animal fat formerly itself burnt to obtain 

 light ; and distributed, (by a combination of the pressure of 

 water with that of the atmosphere,) from the places of its ma- 

 nufacture to those required to be supplied, with greater per- 

 fection and certainty, than that, even, with which water is dis- 

 tributed by the water-works of our most populous cities. 



In the Healing Art we find that the chemist has extracted 

 from some of the most important medicines, the distinct prin- 

 ciples from which they derive their curative activity. In the 

 discovery and use of Quinine, the essential active constituent 

 of Peruvian Bark, we witness an improvement in the admi- 

 nistration of medicines, which is probably the precursor of 

 many others, that will supply the means of diminishing the 

 amount of human suffering, from disease, to an indefinite ex- 

 tent ; from the energy with which such essences (as we may 

 without empiricism call them) of powerful medicines will act 

 upon the constitution, when separated from the inert sub- 

 stances, with which, as they occur in nature, they are invested. 

 A volume might be written in review of similar instances of 

 the present application of scientific knowledge, to the increase 

 of enjoyment, or the alleviation of misfortune. 



If we consider the present aspect of society, with reference, 

 specifically, to the cultivation and extension of Natural 

 Knowledge, we shall discover a scene of equal activity and 

 equal interest. The laws which govern the insensible motions 

 of the particles of matter which regulate the action of the 

 gases composing the air we breathe, and the water which is 

 almost equally essential to our existence, upon each other, and 

 upon other bodies ; laws, which, when developed, teach us 

 how to extract the metals from bodies in appearance entirely 

 dissimilar from them, and to procure from the waters of the 

 ocean a condiment for our food I allude of course to those 

 which it is the province of Chemistry to investigate these 

 now form the basis of an extensive department of literature, 

 and have become an almost indispensable branch of polite 

 knowledge. The science of Geology, examining the arrange- 

 ment and composition of the masses and strata of rock, of 

 stone, and of earthy matter, which constitute the mountains and 

 the plains, and all the solid crust of the earth, together with 

 the remains of animals and plants which they include, whether 

 of extinct or still existing species, has also produced a litera- 

 ture of its own, and become an almost necessary branch of 

 general information. And, while 1 am yet speaking, a con- 

 troversy just commenced, is proceeding in this science, which, 

 probably for many years forward, will continue to engage the 

 attention of the intellectual world in general ; to a greater de- 



