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tendency to corruption is increafed 

 by the increafe of heat. 



Though we are too much accuf- 

 tomed to look upon the moft obvi- 

 ous operations of nature with a kind 

 of unconcern and indifference, fuch 

 as, for inflance, the vegetation of 

 plants ; yet we cannot look with fo 

 much indifference upon the final 

 caufes of thofe every where obvious 

 fcenes when we difcover them ; for 

 they do not fo much affect the or- 

 gans of our fight and other external 

 fenfes, as they do our understand- 

 ing, our reafon, our judgment ; by 

 which only we are fuperior to all 

 other living animals. The consi- 

 deration of final caufes gives us to 

 underfland that this great univerfe 

 is not the offspring of chance, not 

 coeval with the beginning of time, 

 or of an eternal origin ; but that it 



has 



