BOOK OF NATURE LAID OPEN, 119 



It surrounds nations with the most secure barrier of 

 defence; its salubrious breezes refresh and cool the 

 air. Used as a bath, it invigorates and strengthens 

 the invalid; taken internally as a medicine, its qua- 

 lities are of the most potent nature ; and although it 

 serves as a sink for corruption and all manner of 

 filthinc^s, such are its purifying and renovating pow- 

 ers, that it not only remains clean, wholesome, and 

 uncontaminated itself, but furnishes us with a large 

 proportion of an useful ingredient to preserve our 

 food from putrefaction! 



The bottom of the sea also abounds with a variety 

 of vegetable productions, while its waters are stock- 

 ed with creatures innumerable, both small and 

 great; a consideration of these, however, we must 

 defer for succeeding chapters, and will conclude the 

 present in the words of Bishop Home : " The last 

 use I shall mention which we are to make of the 

 sea, is, that which the Holy Spirit himself hath so 

 frequently made of it in the Scriptures, viz. to con- 

 sider it as an emblem of the world, and of what is 

 passing therein. Under a smiling, deceitful surface, 

 both conceal dangerous rocks and quicksands, on 

 which the unskilful mariner will strike and be lost. 

 Both abound with creatures pursuing and devouring 

 one another; the small and the weak becoming a 

 prey to the great and powerful ; while in both there 

 is a grand destroyer, a leviathan, taking his pastime,, 

 and seeking the perdition of all. 



" In the voyage of life we may set out with a still 

 sea and fair sky; but ere long, cares and sorrows. 



