INTRODUCTION. 3 



with which the fiat of the Almighty endowed the ele- 

 ments, when it was his pleasure to speak the whole 

 into existence. 



Over the whole of this extensive, fair, and varied 

 creation, dominion was, by its Almighty and All-boun- 

 tiful Creator, given to man. When our first parents 

 were formed, and ere yet Eden had been prepared for 

 their abode, " God blessed them, and said, ' Replenish 

 the earth, and subdue it ; and have dominion over the 

 fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over 

 every living thing that moveth upon the earth. And 

 behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed 

 which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree 

 upon which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed.' " Thus 

 the commandment is ample, and it is circumstantial. 

 There is the dominion to man, as a rational and an 

 intelligent creature the study and knowledge, as an 

 exercise and improvement of the mind ; and the use, 

 for the support and comfort of the body, as the proper 

 consequence and reward of the study and knowledge. 



It is this " knowledge" of the productions of nature, 

 their habits, and the laws of their being, which, in the 

 emphatic language of Lord Bacon, "is POWER;" and, 

 abundant as are the works, possessions, and comforts, 

 of civilized man extensive as is his learning, numer- 

 ous as are his arts and his sciences, and disposed as he 

 too often is to neglect nature for art, or even for indo- 

 lence, the study of the nature and properties of those 

 objects and substances around him, in the production 

 of which he had originally no concern, is the source 

 and fountain of them all. 



It is true that the dominion given to man is not an 

 B 2 



