CALORIC. 



BOOK I. 



PRELIMINARY CHAPTER. 



" O that those who have both time and intellect at command 

 adequate to the investigation, might in perfect tranquillity, search 

 into nature, until they ascertain what quantities of heat are re- 

 quired to produce every action of matter ; that mankind might 

 then not only become masters of every kind of knowledge, but 

 of every kind of power." TELESIUS. 



THAT the reader may perceive at once the 

 general scope and object of the present work, I 

 shall commence with a brief outline of the lead- 

 ing facts, which connect the various operations 

 of nature with the fundamental laws of caloric. 

 But as men of science are still undecided whether 

 caloric be a material agent, or the mere effect of 

 motion among the particles of ponderable matter, 

 it becomes necessary to examine the evidence on 

 which these opposite views have been founded. 



Among the most enlightened nations of anti- 

 quity, elementary fire was regarded not only as 

 the most refined and spiritual of all the elements, 

 but as a universal and self active principle, 

 which they considered as identical with exist- 



B 



