NOTE 18, p, 46.-And be restored to the favour of their God and their own land. Some Divines have thought that there will be no restoration of the Jews to their own land; but as it is evident, from what St. Paul says, that they will at a period fixed in the Divine counsels be converted to the faith of Christ,' so it appears equally clear, from what is foretold in the concluding chapters of Ezekiel and by other prophets, that they shal! also again inhabit Judea and Jerusalem. Some interpreters are also of opinion that the pouring out of the vial of the sixth angel upon the river Euphrates and the drying up of its waters,3 signify the dissolution of the empire of the Turks; that, by the Kings of the East therein mentioned, are meant the Jews; and that their return to their own land is indicated, by their way being prepared. Bishop Horsley supposes, likewise, that the eighteenth of Isaiah foretells this event, and that the great commercial nation of the day will be instrumental in bringing it about. St. Paul's conversion is thought to have been a type of the conversion of the Jewish nation in the latter days, and as his zeal and success seem to have exceeded that of the other apostles, and he was the great instrument of the conversion of the gentile world to the faith of Christ, so it has been supposed that the Jews when converted, will be the main instruments of the conversion of the then heathen world. NOTE 19, p. 48.-Unless some means can be devised at home, by which the pressure may be lightened, and the suffering classes be enabled to procure the necessaries of life. There are two mighty nations on our globe in which a system has long been acted upon, enabling them to support a population, never diminished by foreign wars, greatly exceeding that of any other country, whose numbers have only been diminished occasionally by famine, by devastating inundations and unfavourable seasons, from which nothing can altogether insure a people. The nations I allude to are China and Japan. We are informed, in the account of Lord Macartney's Embassy, that in the former of these countries, " Every square mile contains upon an average one third more inhabitants, being upwards of three hundred, than are found upon an equal quantity of land, also upon an average, in the most populous country in Europe." The population of the latter is also stated to be prodigious. The encouragement of Agriculture appears to be the sole mean which enables these countries to maintain so vast a mass of population. In China, it is stated, that the whole surface of country is dedicated to the production of food for man alone, that even the steepest mountains are brought into cultivation; they are cut into terraces, and the water that runs at their feet is raised by chain-pumps, worked each by two men, from terrace to terrace, to irrigate them; and steep and barren places are not suffered to run waste, but are planted with pines and larches. A similar account is given of the state of agriculture in Japan, where attention to it is enjoined by the laws as one of the most essential duties; and if any one leave his land uncultivated his more active neighbour may take possession of it. In both these countries no article that can possibly be used as manure is wasted, so that the soil and crops have every possible attention of this kind. Malte-Brun has given a very interesting account of the honours paid by the Emperor of China and his court to agriculture: who annually in the beginning of March, after adoring the God of Heaven, and invoking his Blessing on his labour and on that of his whole people, himself, laying aside his imperial robes, holding a plough opens several furrows, and is succeeded by his chief mandarins, who in succession, follow the example of the prince. Some allowance probably must be made for too warm colouring in these statements, as most of them must have been derived from the report of the natives, yet there seems no doubt with respect to their general accuracy. What an example is here set by nations. which we are accustomed to consider as far behind ourselves in every art of life: how vast a portion of our own home empire is suffered to lie waste, while all the time hundreds of thousands of our agricultural population are languishing for want of employment, and compelled to live upon a pittance, which, unless they add to it by theft or fraud, is scarcely sufficient to keep body and soul together; and in the meanwhile the morals of our peasantry are gradually corrupted; they grow daily less industrious; they will often congregate at the beer-shops, and get inveterate habits of intemperance; they lose all respect for 1 Macartney Embassy by Sir G. Staunton, iii. 388. 5 Malte-Brun, 561. their superiors, and the bonds of union betwixt the upper and lower classes are gradually dissolving; and unless some remedy for this fearful evil is soon discovered, who can say what the consequences may be? When a man once loses his self-esteem, and is degraded from his natural dependence upon himself, under God, and the labour of his hands, for the support of himself and family, being no longer of use to himself or others, he becomes careless of his actions; and being, as it were rejected by society, becomes the enemy of those above him, and the ready associate of evil men, in evil works. NOTE 20, p. 84.-Those that are loricated and covered with some kind of shell. The varied means by which a provident and beneficent Creator has provided animals with different mcans of defence ought not to be overlooked. When we see even these invisible atoms as it were provided with armour, to defend them probably from the attack of animals of their own class, we feel confident that he will not neglect us. This distinction of animals into loricated and naked may be traced through most of their Classes; thus the Coleoptera stand in contrast with most of the other Orders of insects; the fishes and reptiles that are covered with scales with those that are covered with skin. In birds, however, this distinction does not appear to obtain at all: in quadrupeds the giant Megatherium, the Armadillo, the Chlamyphorus, and the Manis, are distinguished from the other Mammalians by the armour that protects them. NOTE 21, p. 87.-The first plants and the first animals are scarcely more than animated molecules, and appear analogues of each other; and those above them in each kingdom represent jointed fibrils. A discovery may here be noticed of one of the most scientific botanists of the present age, and whose keen eye and philosophic spirit have penetrated into depths and mysteries before unexplored, belonging to the science of which he is so great an ornament. In the investigation of some of these, he discovered that not only vegetable, but even mineral molecules, when placed in a fluid medium, would move about in various directions, but by what cause these motions were generated he offers no conjecture. He very kindly showed me this singular phenomenon, if my memory does not deceive me, with respect to some mineral substances. Mr. Brown has observed that the motions in question, he was satisfied, arose neither 1 In some fishes the scales are invisible, so that they may be almost reckoned naked. See above, p. 351. from currents in the fluid, nor from its gradual evaporation, but belonging to the particle itself;1 and of the spherical molecules mixed with the other oblong particles obtained from Clarckia pulchella, that they were in rapid oscillatory motion ; in both mineral, vegetable, and animal substances, along with the molecules, he found other corpuscles, like short fibres somewhat moniliform, or having transverse contractions, corresponding in number, as he conjectured, with that of the molecules composing them: and these fibrils, when not consisting of a greater number than four or five molecules, exhibited motion resembling that of the mineral fibrils, while longer ones of the same apparent diameter were at rest. It does not appear clearly from the words of the learned author, whether the motion of the mineral molecules was similar to that of the vegetable ones, which he describes as oscillatory. The motions of the mineral fibrils, when not composed of more than two or three molecules, were at least as vivid as those of the simple molecule, and which from the fibril often changing its position in the fluid, and from its occasional bending, might be said to be somewhat vermicular; now vermicular movement is a kind of progressive oscillation, the anterior extremity going from side to side and being followed by the body. In other mineral bodies, as in white arsenic, which did not exhibit the fibrils, he found oval particles about the size of two molecules, which he conjectures to be primary combinations of them: their motion, which was more vivid than that of the simple molecule, consisted usually in turning on their longer axis, and then often appearing to be flattened. The revolution of a body upon its axis, it may be observed, implies the action upon it of two equal conflicting forces, by the counteraction of which the revolution is produced and maintained: the same action on the longer fibrils would keep them at rest. My motive for introducing a topic, which, at the first blush, seems to have a very slight connexion with the subject now before me, was a suspicion that sometimes Mr. Brown's molecules may have been mistaken for Infusory Animals. Comparing the oscillatory motion he observed in them, and Carus's observation that the motions of Infusories occasionally present the appearance of attraction and repulsion,10 this suspicion seems to merit attention, and to call for more close examination; and it may be observed that the action of these two powers seems 1 Brief Account of Miscroscopical Observations, &c. 4. 2 Ibid. 5, 6. 6 Ibid. comp. 10, 11. 9 Ibid, 11. 3 Ibid. 10. 4 Ibid. 11. 7 Ind. 10. 5 Ibid. Ubi Supra, 10 Introd. to Comp. Anat. E. Tr. i. 45. § 57. sufficiently to account for the oscillatory motions of the molecules, and takes away all idea of any spontaneity. With regard to the Infusories this has been most satisfactorily established in a former part of this chapter,1 and this clearly proves their animal nature, as do their modes of motion, &c. but when we recollect that they abound in vegetable infusions, and that the more vegetables are macerated, and as it were decomposed, the more numerous are the animalcula that they appear to give out when infused, it would be nothing extraordinary either that they should be mistaken for moving molecules, or moving molecules for them. Farther we may observe a kind of analogy between the spherical Infusories and the Molecules, and between the filiform ones transversely annulated with a vermicular motion, and the fibrils of Mr. Brown. Another law of nature seems to result from the experiments of this acute naturalist-that all bodies whether organized or inorganized, are formed, as fibrin is in the animal kingdom, by spherical molecules made, as it were, into necklaces, and then adhering in bundles, and that these are the substratum of all substance. In fluids the spherules are not united, and so have free motion inter se. NOTE 22, p. 106.-Several of them, for it is not common to them all, when touched cause a sensation similar to that produced by the sting of a nettle. Aristotle mentions a marine animal, under the name of Acalephe, and another, if it be not the same. under that of Cnide, both of which words, according to the Greek lexicographers, are used to designate the same plant, the stinging-nettle; but it seems not quite certain that, in either case, he had the stinging Gelatines or sea-nettles in his eye. Describing his Acalephe, he says, "It adheres to the rocks, as do some of the shell-fish, but sometimes it roves at large. It has no shell, but the whole body is fleshy. If the hand is moved to it, it perceives, seizes, and adheres to it, like the Polype, by means of its tentacles," so that the flesh swells. It has its mouth in the middle, and the rock seems to serve it for a shell: if it meets with any of the small fishes, it detains them in the same way that it does the hand. Thus whatever edible thing it meets with, it devours. One kind of them is at large, and devours whatever sea-urchins, or cockles, it meets 1 See above, p. 81. 2 Ibid. 82. 3 Gr. Axanon, Aulus Gellius (Noct. Att. 1. iv. c. 11.) writes it Aza 4 Gr. Κνιδη. 5 Heschius explains Ακαληφαι by Κείδαι. 8 Gr. XT25« 6 Gr. πλεκταται. 7 Εχινοι, |