ARCHITECTURE AND MECHANICAL SCIENCpS. 465 



were made on limestone, some of which were vitrified, hut all of 

 which were agglutinated ; it is, however, suspected that some ex- 

 traneous substance must have been intermixed. A globule pro- 

 duced from one of the specimens, on bring put into the mouth, 

 flew into a thousand pieces, occasioned, it is presumed, by the 

 moisture. 



[Pantologia. 



CHAP. V. 



GEKERAL ARCHITECTURE AND MECHANICAL SCIENCES. 



SECTION 1. 

 Architecture and Mechanical Sciences of the Ancients. 



ARCHIMEDES alone would afford sufficient matter for a volume, 

 in giving a detail of the marvellous discoveries of a genius so 

 profound, and fertile in invention. We have seen in the" pre- 

 ceding chapters, that some of his discoveries appeared so much 

 above the reach of men, that many of the learned of our days 

 found it more easy to call them in doubt, than even to imagine the 

 means whereby he had acquired them. We are again going to 

 produce proofs of the fecundity of genius belonging to this cele- 

 brated man ; and in how high a degree of excellence he possessed 

 this inventive faculty, may easily be judged of by the greatness of 

 those events which were effected by it. Leibnitz, who was one of 

 the greatest mathematicians of his age, did justice to the genius 

 of Archimedes when he said, that if we were better acquainted 

 with the admirable productions of that great man, we would throw 

 away much less of our applause on the discoveries of eminent 

 moderus. 



Wallis also, in speaking of Archimedes, calls him a man 

 of admirable sagacity, who laid the foundation of almost all those 

 inventions, which our age glories in having brought to perfection. 

 In reality, what a glorious light hath he diffused over the mathe. 

 matics, in his attempt to square the circle ; and in discovering the 

 square of the parabola, the properties of spiral lines, the propor. 



TOL. VI. 2 If 



