3 B thoughts on Configurations and Cryfiah. 
floating in a heated Fluid, may be fuppofed 
to. have a confiderable Liberty of exerting 
their attractive and repulfiye Properties, as 
they approach each other in their Fits of Re¬ 
pul flon or Attraction ; or according to the 
fortuitous Apportion or Approach of their 
attractive or repuliive Points to each other ^ 
whence a Commotion mtift neediarily arife, 
fome attracting and others repelling, till fuch 
time as- the Particles can difpofe them™ 
felves in the Order and Figure that mud 
pepeifarijy re-full:-from their original Forms 
and Properties : which Forms and Proper¬ 
ties being fupppfed unalterable, how often 
foever they are dilTolved or feparated, they 
will conitantly unite again in the very fame 
Manner*. And accordingly, in many of the 
following Solutions innumerable little Maf- 
fes may be dffcpvered, hurrying about mod 
violently,, and in all Directions, before there 
appears the leaf!: Tendency towards Shooting 
into regular Figures, 
The Solution being more fhallow, and 
the Attraction greater, about the Edges of 
the Drop, than near its Middle, the floating 
Particles of Salt tend towards the Edges 
great Abundance, and begin there, mod 
* Should the Particles wear away, or break in Pieces, the 
Nature of Things depending op them would be changed. 
Water and Earth compofed of old worn Particles and Frag¬ 
ments of particles, would not be of the fame Nature and 
Text ure new, with Water and Earth competed of intire 
Particles in the Beginning. Newtons Oppcks, p, 376, 
- 6 com- 
