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direft road to the knowledge of what I want- 

 ed, from any the greateft author, and that 

 it was no way again to be attained by Hving 

 preceptors, tho' it might haply from fome 

 lucky and favouring inferences and deduc- 

 tions, from fomething that had the fortu- 

 nate appearance of a parallel illuftration. 



But however tardy the advances were 

 that I made, confidering what a great (hare 

 of thought m^y application had engrofled ; I 

 was thence fet fomething forward again by 

 my falling cafually into a way of thinking, 

 but, long fince made familiar to the world, 

 'oiz. That, the fap of a plant in fummer 

 more efpecially, in every part of it, both 

 within the earth and without, does afcend 

 ordinarily upward, with no unlike motion, 

 as the fpirituous fum.e does in a Jiill^ or lim- 

 beck fet to work by the force of artificial 

 fire : That (for the different intentions of 

 nature) the moll; volatile parts of the lympha 

 afcend to the upper parts of the tree — i\nd 

 the more fluid portion thereof is converted 

 into leaves — while what is thinner yet than 

 fuch, is abforbed by folar attraftion, into 

 the circumambient air — And what is not 

 quite fo fubtile, or tenuious as to be either 



way 



