architevt. This is the life, and ſoul of action, and reaction, in the univerſe. Thus has the great author provided againſt the native ſluggiſhneſs of matter! light, or fire in animals, is what we call the animal ſpirits; and is the author of life, and motion. But we know not the immediate mode of muſcular motion; any more than how, in inanimate matter, it cauſes the vibrations of an earthquake.
Of this fire, the excellent Manilius thus writes, who liv’d in the time of Auguſtus.
Aſtronom. I.
Sunt autem cunctis permiſti partibus ignes;
Qui gravidas habitant fabricantes fulmina nubes:
Et penetrant terras, Ætnamq; imitantur Olympo:
Et calidas reddunt ipſis in fontibus unbdas.
As ſilice in duro, viridiq; in cortice ſedem
Inveniunt; cum ſilva ſibi colliſa crematur.
Ignibus uſq; adeo natura eſt omnis abundans!
Which may thus be engliſh’d.
Fire univerſal nature traverſes.
It makes the thunderbolt in tumid clouds:
In dire Vulcano’s penetrates the earth:
And ſends the boiling water from its ſprings.
In hardeſt flint, and ſofteſt wood it dwells:
Which by colliſion ſhows itſelf in flame.
With fire ſo pregnant is all nature found!
13ly, The great queſtion then with us, is how the ſurface of the earth is put into that
vibratory
