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cesses, serving to support animal life and the infinitely varied modes 

 of organization, which exist even in the same being, cannot fail to 

 excite an eager desire, to obtain still further knowledge, respecting 

 those astonishing operations, in which, although the effects are so 

 'obvious and even palpable, the immediate causes demand the closest 

 investigation for their discovery. In consequence of this, although 

 the mind obtains a considerable fund of pleasing and positive in- 

 struction, it is so far from experiencing the torpor of satiety ; that it 

 looks forward, with increased ardour, to the extention of its acqui- 

 sitions. 



The science, into the study of which I propose to lead you, also 

 possesses these advantages, in a very eminent degree. You will be 

 taught, clearly, by it, that the formative and preservative powers, ap- 

 pointed by the Almighty, are momentarily exerted on the smallest 

 particles of matter : that nature, by which I mean the personification 

 of these powers, is constantly employed also on the largest, and ap- 

 parently most inert masses of matter, in accomplishing the several 

 processes, necessary for the support and continuance of the earth, and 

 its inhabitants. You will behold her, incessantly labouring in the 

 deep recesses of the earth ; as in the laboratory of the universe, re- 

 ducing to form and beauty, the mutilated wrecks of former ages. 



Nor can the mind be much more pleasingly exercised, in the re- 

 gions of conjecture, than by the curious inquires to which the con- 

 templations of objects, so interesting, must necessarily lead. Many 

 of the curiously figured stones, which will offer themselves to your 

 observation, you will be pleased in finding, on a close observation, 

 were once, as I have already remarked, beings endowed with the 

 powers and faculties of vegetable or animal life. You will, by care- 

 ful comparison, discover, that, of these, several species, are still to 

 be found, in a living state ; but, most commonly, in parts of the 

 world very remote from those, in which their remains are thus won- 

 derfully preserved. Other animals you will find thus astonishingly 



