670 PHILOSOPHICAL TKANSACTI0H9. [anNO I694. 



about the oils. That the spirit of wine does not take fire, seems to proceed 

 from the same impediment which hinders light oils from rising up to an accen- 

 sion, because they are so suddenly thrown off; and there seems to be a great 

 analogy between ethereal oils and the spirit of wine, both as to specific gravity, 

 and other properties: spirit of wine seems to be a more thin and diluted essen- 

 tial oil, that contains some water and more air in its pores; they seem to own 

 the same material cause; for if you distil an essential oil out of any seed, you 

 shall not then be able to produce any spirit ; and, vice versa, if you distil oflf 

 the spirit first, no oil will follow. There is also a great affinity in texture ; for 

 the spirit and oil easily unite and mix together, especilly if the spirit be highly 

 rectified, and have less of water or other heterogeneous matter in it, as any 

 one may find if he will take the pains to shake a true essential oil with spirit of 

 wine, a good proportion of the former will incorporate with the latter. 



Postscript. — The pyrites being the mother of our oil of vitriol, which is the 

 principal ingredient in our active fiery meteor, or compound spirit ; I will here 

 notice an account I received from an unphilosophical friend, who complained of 

 his great loss, which he attributed as a punishment for his covetousness. He 

 was master of a copperas work at Whitstable in Kent, and engrossed all the 

 pyrites or copperas stone to himself, in order to the breaking of a neighbour's 

 work, so that he had laid up 1 or 300 tun in a heap, and built a shed over it, 

 to keep off the rain : but in the space of 6 or 7 months it first smooked, and then 

 took fire, and burned for a week ; it burned down the shed ; some of it looked 

 like melted metal, and other parts like red-hot stones : and it discharged so 

 fetid, sulphureous, and stinking exhalations that the people in the neighbour- 

 hood were miserably afflicted, and forced to use all their endeavours to ex- 

 tinguish it. 



How far this communication will serve the hypotheses of thoss that derive 

 lightning and thunder and earthquakes from the matter of the pyrites, or will 

 account for the rise or continuance of volcanoes, or even the great conflagra- 

 tion of the world, I leave to their consideration. 



Extract of a Letter from the Rev. Mr. Thomas Dent, to Sir Edmund King, 

 Kt. M.D.et S.R.S. Concerning a Sort of Worms found in the Tongue, 

 and other Parts of the Body, &c. N° 213, p. 219. 



This will in a great measure satisfy you about that distemper on my tongue, 

 for which I have so lately had your advice ; the chief cause of those rising 

 tumours fixed on my tongue, proceeds from the disease of worms, as you will 

 perceive from the following account. In reading M. de la Cross's Memoirs for 



