this latent fire may be firft excited, and its appearances, though unobferved, be those we term electrical. A wind-mill, when it works under the break (as the millers term it when no iron is concerned) foon catches fire (the mill-ftones, when no corn is between them, produce the fame effect, though the motion be the fame in both cafes) and many a mill hath been confumed by this means. The method used by the Indians, of producing fire by the friction of two pieces of wood against each other is well known; and in all these cafes may not the first effects of the latent fire, thus roufed into action, be the production of thofe very appearances we call electrical?

"This thought, I confefs, remained fo ftrongly impreffed upon my mind, that I requested fome of my friends, who had a better opportu nity than myself, to make the trial. For this purpose fome pieces of wood were baked in an oven, in order to expel the moisture, and prepare them for the experiment. When they were cooled, a friction was begun, which, as I expected, foon produced electricity; one piece of the wood being excited pofitively, the other negatively, as I have fince myself feveral times experienced. Had the friction been continued, the production of actual fire might perhaps have been the confequence. May not, therefore, the production of actual fire be the ultimum of electricity? or, in other words, electricity the first effect of latent fire thus roufed into action; actual fire, the fecond; and inflammation and diffolution, its third and greatest effort? like fermentation, producing firft, wine; fecondly, vinegar; laftly, putrefaction. To give fome countenance to this fuppofition, let fome of the effects of electricity and fire be placed in a comparative view. First, a small iron wire, held in the flame of a candle till it acquires a white heat, will frequently burst into little balls, flying off in all directions. The fame effect is produced by a flint and fteel; and in a fuperior manner, by a strong charge of electricity, or a flash of lightning paffing through fuch a small wire; the balls then appearing, on examination, to be little more than the feorie of the metal. The effect of electricity, lightning, and fire, in deftroying the power of the artificial or natural magnets, is a circumftance that hath been often remarked, and repeatedly published. The effects of electricity, in common with fire, on proof-fpirit, gun-powder, phosphorus, dry lint, and many other fubstances, muft occur to every gentleman converfant in thefe experiments; indeed the parallel might be continued much further. But it may be asked, if this be really the fact, fhould not metals become electrical by friction? I anfwer, they are readily excited, provided they be first properly infulated (but if metal be rubbed against metal, the phlogifton or latent fire, if I may be allowed the expreffion, is fo nearly proportioned in the two metals, that the equilibrium is restored as foon as destroyed, from the very nature of the base, which is the most perfect conductor we are acquainted with): to illustrate this, let it be remembered, that though the hydroftatic paradox may be readily explained, yet the fluid muft be confined in a proper veffel; and though the weight, the fpring, and the compreffibility of the air, be eafily demonftrable, a fuitable apparatus mult neceffarily be employed for each purpofe. It is a question by no means decided, how the clouds become electrified? But if we suppose the electric matter to be

a pure, ethereal, elementary fire, refident in all bodies; that the great procefs of vegetation is carried on by means of this fubtile, active, volatile, and pervading element; that it is continually exhaling from all the vegetable tribe; that as evaporation is a remarkable agent in the cooling of heated fubftances, that is, a good conductor of their fire, as I am well affured it is of electricity; may we not conclude, that this is one great cause of the clouds becoming at times furcharged with this fluid? The great effect of electricity in promoting vegetation, hath been fully proved by Dr. De Maimbray, the Abbé Nollet, Mr. Jallabert, and other gentlemen, and was very remarkable in that year when the fatal earthquake happened at Lisbon. Dr. Stukeley's obfervations on the frequent appearances of fire-balls, corufcations, and aurora boreales, at this time (which I well remember) deferve to be particularly noticed; and it is generally remarked, that thunder-ftorms are, preceded by a continuance of hot weather, and that a moderate temperature immediately fucceeds the ftorm. The remarks and obfervations of the worthy Dr. Hales on this fubject feem alfo to merit peculiar attention. Further, as the rays of the fun, concentrated by a powerful burning mirror, will produce a fufion of metals, and inftantly reduce a number of substances prefented to the focus to a calx, as the fame effect is in many cafes produced by a stroke of lightning; and as the colours of the electric and folar light are equally divifible by the prifm; may not these alfo bear fome kind of relation to each other? Upon the whole, is there not an high degree of probability in the fuppofition, that light, fire, phlogifton, and electricity, are only different modifications of one and the fame principle? A fimilarity in feveral of the phenomena of electricity and magnetifm hath been long fince pointed out by Dr. Price, from M. pinas; and the effect of heat on both admirably difplayed by Mr. Canton. Of all the fubftances I have yet examined, the most difficult to excite, I observed to be a fine, smooth, unarmed load-ftone, and a piece of black lead; these seemed to bid defiance to all my rubbers: at length, however, with a piece of new flannel they were both excited, in a very fmall degree, negatively. In short, I have not yet met with a fingle article (on which the experiment could be tried) that I could not, with one or other of my rubbers, make in fome degree electrical. The laws by which all these fluids are governed, and what conítitutes the precife difference between them, may yet, perhaps, by fome fortunate philofopher, by a train of juft reflexion, and a fet of happily contrived and well-conducted experiments, be much farther elucidated. Lastly, I do not speak of these things as facts of which I am abfolutely convinced; but earnestly with to recommend them to the ferious confideration of future enquirers. From what hath been faid, however, I apprehend it will fcarcely be doubted, that electricity, whatever it be (as I have often remarked) is one of the greatest and most important agents in the operations of Nature; that the effects of lightning, therefore, are but as difcords in her harmony; and, though fingly confidered, they may appear unpleafing notes, yet perhaps may be neceffary to fill up and compleat her grand and general chorus."

Delighted as we are with the chemical difcoveries of the prefent age, and fenfible of the ingenuity of the discoverers,

we

we cannot help lamenting the neglect of the mechanical philofophy of the last century; which feems to be in great danger of being banished from phyfical enquiries. Our prefent race of reafoners, however, fhould recollect that although Bacon, as a naturalift, firft recommended experimental philofophy, its establishment was owing to a Newton, whofe reafoning was in general ftrictly mathematical and mechanical. They fhould reflect, alfo, that if natural phenomena are not accounted for mathematically and mechanically, they are in fact not accounted for at all. The having recourfe to chemical principles, however fatisfactory among chemifts, appears to the ge nerality of readers as little better than the having recourse to occult qualities; whofe effects we may admit, but of whole modus operandi we are totally ignorant.-Not that, were these effects and their admitted caufes properly defined and afcertained, the affair would be very important, if it did not tend to divert the ingenious enquirer from purfuing the genuine track of phyfical inveftigation. Some gentlemen," fays Mr. Henly, have supposed that the electric matter is the cause of the cohesion of the particles of bodies." A fuppofition, which if the electric matter be, as he fufpects, his experiments, he fays, feem to prove.-Again, he obferves, after Dr. Priestley, that it is probable, "electric light comes from the electric matter itfelf: that this being a modification of phlogifton, it is probable that all light is a modification of phlogifton alfo: and that prior to his deductions from electrical phenomena, it was pretty evident that light and phlogifon are the fame thing in different forms or ftates."-What wretched jargon is all this, for philofophers! Is it poffible that Dr. Priestley or Mr. Henly can be ignorant that, with refpect to the phenomena of the material univerfe, different forms frequently conftitute different things?-Do they doubt, when they talk of materiał principles, that all matter is homogeneous? Or that the moft permanent of chemical principles differ otherwife than as different modifications of the fame matter?-Can any thing be more abfurd than their pertinaciously infifting that almost every phenomenon in nature is a body or fubftance fui generis; when we every moment fee them appear, difappear, and their materials become reciprocally convertible. Would any body but a modern philofopher, indeed, have patience to hear of light's exifting in darkness, fire in ice, &c. being told at the fame time that light and fire are material fubftances?

This writer might well be at a lofs to answer the question "What is electricity?" if it were neceffary to declare it à body like air or water, Electricity he confiders as a fluid, and

properly

properly characterized by the terms electricity, electric fluid, or electric matter. What a ftrange mode of characterizing a phenomenon by giving it merely a name!-Is the electric light, the electric fire, the electric fhock, the electric wind, the electric attraction, the electric repulfion, &c. &c.-are, we fay, all the electric phenomena the fame material fluid? Would it not be abfurd to call the air, soUND, and yet without the air there would be no fuch phenomenon as found.-Has modern chemistry totally deftroyed the ancient difference between fubflance and accident, matter and motion?-Mr. Henly talks of the electric fluid being the cause of the cohesion of particles of bodies. In what manner can he poffibly conceive this caufe to produce fuch an effect?—It is really a pity that gentlemen, who appear defirous of drawing philofophical conclufions from phyfical experiments, do not attend more to mechanics and mathematics than is at present the fashion. A little more logic, alfo, to enable them to diftinguish more nicely and to abide more closely by their diftinctions, would be of no differvice to them.-We are forry to fee that, for want of this, many of our practical experimentalifts, and those who ftand high in the rank of science, make frequently a poor figure in drawing theoretical conclufions.

(To be Continued.)

K.

Archaeologia: or Mifcellaneous Tracts relating to Antiquity, publifhed by the Society of Antiquaries of London. 4to. Vol. IV. 11. 1s. in Sheets.

(Continued from Vol. V. Page 434.)

That individuals fhould impofe on their contemporaries, and obtain an unmerited reputation for erudition or science, is not to be wondered at; but that a whole nation fhould, for ages, poffefs the fame of pre-eminence, in knowledge and wisdom, without its being juftly founded, is fomewhat extraordinary. Yet fuch feems to have been the cafe with the ancient Egyptians; whofe fuperiority in the arts and fciences is denied, and their real pretenfions investigated, in the nineteenth article of the volume before us. It has been already observed that a hint, to this purpofe, was given in a pofthumous work of the late very ingenious Robert Wood, Efq. The fubject appears, however, to have been long fince treated at large, by that celebrated naturalift Dr. John Woodward, in the difcourfe now first-published.

"Egypt, fays our author, is a country affuredly very happy, fending forth all things ufeful to human life in great plenty and perfection; and

this too without much labour or culture, the Nile, in its yearly inundations, depofing a flime upon it that renders it fruitful beyond measure; fo that the inhabitants have scarcely any thing more to do than only to, fcatter a little grain upon the land, and, without further trouble, they have a return in great abundance. It is hardly credible what vaft numbers of people have been fupported in this country in great plenty and luxury, and it was inhabited very early. The Egyptians, indeed, were here much in the fame state, that mankind were before the universal deluge. Their country was vaitly productive, and with little or no labour or toil. In truth, the confequences and effects in both cafes were much the fame; and the Egyptians were not perhaps inferior in vice and immorality to the unhappy people of the ages before that difinal cataftrophe. But this fruitfulness of their country allowed them time and leifure for thought and ftudy, for improvement of fcience and arts. While their neighbours, on every fide, were at great pains upon their much more barren foils, and their time taken up in making provifion for the fupport of life, the Egyptians had little or nothing of that fort to do. This gave them a mighty advantage over the countries all round; and it is not to be wondered that they had the start of them as to science, and had very anciently a great reputation for their fuperiority in learning. But we shall have a truer and more certain idea of the learning of thofe times, when we know of what fize this was, that was so much admired by all the neighbour nations. For I cannot affent to the common opinion that there was ever really any confiderable learning among the Egyptians. It might indeed be thought fuch by the Cyrenians, Arabians, and the inhabitants of the other barren countries round about, where the people had enough to do to procure meat and cloaths, and had little leifure to attend to study or the improvement of the mind. And the great plenty, luxury, and opulency, that strangers, the Greeks, and others, faw in Egypt, made them imagine there was fomewhat very extraordinary in the thing, and that the Egyptians were mafters of fome mighty knowledge, by means of which, they were intitled to that fuperiority and those advantages over all their neighbours; whereas in reality they were all owing wholly to the goodness of their country. Then they had a very high opinion of their own nation, and the vanity to think the rest of mankind befides very weak, illiterate, and meer children, in comparison of themfelves. They were the most oftentatious, boafting people in the universe, and every body was forward enough to imagine there could not be all that outcry without fomething at the bottom very confiderable to warrant it.

"But what most favoured the opinion of their learning were the Hieroglyphic figures that appeared on their obelisks, their pyramids, and other monuments, on every fide. They talked of wondrous matters that were couched under those representations; in which they could not be contradicted by the Greeks, who travelled into those parts, or other foreigners, who knew little or nothing of the meaning of them. They might gaze and admire, but must be much in the dark as to what they imported, the fculpture being not only rude, but done in a manner much different from that of Greece. As to the Egyptians, they only carried on a vain amusement, and aimed meerly at the aggrandizing and extolling the riches, the power, and the wifdom of their own

nation,