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cal writers of the prefent age (taking the term philofophy in its true sense, and not as the Shibboleth of a fect or party), is expofed by the Abbé de Para to the contempt he so justly deserves; but a few words being fufficient for fuch an illiterate and uninftructed rhetorician, our Author employs much more of his time and pains in the refutation of Telliamed; his refutation is learned, ingenious, and fatisfactory; and feems to us the most mafterly piece of polemics contained in this volume.

The human foul, and the fouls of brutes, are the important fubjects that occupy the refearches and logic of our Author, in the third volume; in which the mixture of excellent, good, bad, and indifferent reafoning, is the moft palpable, and, indeed, is in fome inftances deplorable.The Theory of the Human Soul is here divided into two fections. In the firft, our Author analyzing (as he himself expreffes it) the human foul into its most intimate effence,' proves with the highest degree of evidence, that its nature is entirely diftinct from all material substance; that there is nothing in it, or without it, that can naturally occafion or require its deftruction;-that it is not under the conftraint of neceffity in its moral acts;-in a word, that it is fpiritual, free, and immortal. In the fecond, he examines the powers of intelligence, feeling, and activity in the mind, which leads him to an extenfive theory of the human understanding, confidered in its various dependences, in its connections with the affections of the heart, the firft principle of motion, occafronal caufes, the nervous fluid, and other circumstances that are known to have a confiderable influence both on the affections and operations of the human mind.

That thought is the exertion or act of an intelligent power, is not to be doubted;-but at the fame time, certain philofophers have pretended that matter, under certain forms and combinations, is endowed with the faculty of thinking. Have they ever proved this? Why does not our Abbe call upon them to prove it? We have been long in poffeffion of a belief, that thought, defire, confciousness, deliberation, and judgment, are not refolvable into, nor to be accounted for by, any principles, powers, or qualities, which we know to be poffeffed by wood, ftone, metal, mineral, vegetable, flesh, fish, mufcle, nerve, fibre, or even any modification or degree of motion added to thefe or any other portions of matter. If then this belief is to be difcarded-we should be glad to know why? If we are told, that there MAY BE qualities in matter, as yet unknown to us, which are capable of producing thought, confciousness, delibera tion, and judgment, all we are obliged to answer is, that when thefe qualities are produced, we will take them into confideration, and examine their titles; but until that time comes, we fee not why e fhould fwallow down the incoherent paradoxes of every cloud

cloud-capt metaphyfician, who comes forth with an air of fuf-. ficiency to put off his noftrums, who brings difficulties instead of arguments, and pulls down, without even attempting to build. Poor Maupertuis, many years ago, who was a very honeft, good fort of a man, drew upon himself the laughter of Europe, by his propofal to make experiments on the foul by the means of opium; and we fit and read, or hear, with a grave countenance, nay, fometimes, with a foolish face of praife, that the parts of matter may be annihilated by divifion, that matter has no exiftence but in the phenomenon of cohefion, which confequently is an aggregate of nothings, and confequently, again, that (fpirit being a mere phantom) this aggregate of nothings, this cohefion of matter (which is no matter), is the only feat and principle of intelligence. Hey day! where are we got! this is driving at fuch a rate, that it makes one dizzy.

This digreffion, which the time and occafion may juftify, has made us lofe fight of our Author, who, with a complaifance and condefcenfion that could not have beeen ftrictly required of him, undertakes to prove (and proves in effect) that matter is not capable of thought, neither in itself, nor in confequence of any modification known to us, nor of any degree of velocity or motion that may be imparted to it.-This part of our Author's work is clear, convincing, and masterly: we shall not, however, enlarge upon it here: the hypothefis of materialifm, which, in good hands (if fuch will take it up), is of no bad confequence, either to religion or morality, is nevertheleís fuch palpable nonfenfe in philofophy, that we have little inclination to follow thofe that refute it, though, now and then, we have curiofity enough to beftow a moment of leifure on the fophiftical tricks of thofe who maintain it. We are, indeed, perfuaded, that these tricks, trifling as they are in themselves, may be employed, in bad hands, to very unhappy purposes, and that they may be made ufe of to give, in the eyes of the ignorant and unwary, a certain fpecious colouring to the very worft of caufes-Ha nuga feria ducunt in mala; they are, however, but vapours of falfe fcience, which will float for a while in the metaphyfical atmosphere, and then difperfe of themselves:

HOR.

Cum ventum ad verum eft, fenfus morefque repugnant. Our Author has taken, neverthelefs, great pains on the fubject: he has not only built the immateriality of the foul on pofitive and strong foundations, but he anfwers all the objections of the materialifts with patience, fagacity, and perfpicuity.

The fixth treatife, contains a Theory of the Soul that animates the brute creation, and is divided into two festions. In the first, the ABBE DE PARA, in a long analysis of this foul or

I i4

animating

animating principle, endeavours to prove, that it is a fubstance effentially different both from matter and spirit-that, having neither the properties of the one nor of the other, and being a substance endowed with feeling, and void of intelligence, it forms an intermediate fpecies between the two.-In the fecond fection, we have a farther analyfis of this invifible principle, the refult of which is, in the deductions of our Author, that it poffeffes no faculty which extends farther than fenfations and fenfible objects, which can form or comprehend abftract ideas, moral qualities, or objects merely intellectual-that it is governed and directed merely by the attraction of physical pleasure, or by the apprehenfion of phyfical pain, without any notion or concern about pleasures or pains of a moral or intellectual kind-and that there is, in this foul of the brute creation, an internal principle of motion, which produces or occafions movements, contrary to, or independent on, the general laws of fimple material mechanifm. This part of our Author's investigation is curious and interefting; his refutation of the Cartefian hypothefis is complete-but, however fpecious and ingenious his arguments are to prove, that the brutes, though not mere machines, are yet confined to direct sensation from objects present, and are totally void of all intelligence, and reafoning powers, yet we cannot entirely acquiefce in them.-We feel a propenfity to claim an exception for Pope's half-reafoning elephant, and to look upon that epithet as not unphilosophical.

There is a third fection added to the two preceding, in which our Author confiders the laws of nature, that are relative to the growth and decline of the animal body.

The laft treatife exhibits the Metaphyfical Theory of Matter, or that part of the fcience of bodies, which is independent on experiments and obfervations, and belongs entirely to the province of intellectual fpeculation, Matter, confidered as the object of our external fenfes (the only afpect, fay we, under which we can form any just nations of it), is amply treated of by our Author, in his courfe of natural Philofophy, which, as we obferved above, was published fome time ago, under the title of Theorie des Etres Senfibles. But in the treatise now before us, he mounts into the clouds on a metaphyfical bobby-horse, and groping for the effence, fenfible quality, existence, and action, of matter, he recites opinions, calls out, Myftery! and lays hold of this opportunity of palming upon dupes, an idea of the poffibility of the monftrous doctrine of tranfubftantiation, by huffing in this abfurdity among the manifold and myfterious notions of the effence of matter, fuch as its triple dimenfions indeterminate and invariable-its infinity of extended and indivifible elements-its fpecific effence, and its generic effences-and so on,

and

and fo on to accumulated inftances of abfurdity.-This is, indeed, the fhameful part of the work before us, of which we may fay in the words of Horace :

turpiter atrum

Definit in pifcem mulier formosa superne.

Is it not, in effect, moft deplorable and disgusting, to fee above an hundred and twenty pages of the most hideous nonfense about tranfubftantiation, at the conclufion of a book, in which we find order, method, an agreeable manner of treating abstract and speculative fubjects, warmth of style and expreffion, and a very confiderable acquaintance with ancient and modern philofophy? No mortal would think, that the concluding fection of this treatife on matter, which confiders the connexion between metaphyfical Science and natural philosophy, could come from the fame pen, that was defiling the philofophic page, fome moments before, with the filthy jargon of fcholaftic theology. This laft fection would be a very proper introduction to a courfe of natural philofophy; it is fhort, judicious, and steers a middle way between the vicious method of interpreting nature by hypothetical fpeculation, and the equally defective one, interrogating her by infulated and unconnected experiments, that neither lead us to the knowledge of her plan, her Author, nor her end.

ART. III.

Hiftoire de l'Academie Royale des Sciences, c-i. e. The Hiftory and Memoirs of the Royal Academy of Sciences at Paris for the Year 1773. 4to. 1777.

GENERAL PHYSICS.

Memoir. On the Variations of the Magnet in the Years 1772 and 1773. By M. LE MONNIER.

WE

E find, in this Memoir, an account of the methods employed by M. LE MONNIER to diminish the error oc cafioned by friction, in the experiments on the direction of the magnetic needle, more efpecially in variation-compaffes. In what manner foever a needle is fufpended, the refiftance of the friction prevents its taking exactly the direction which it would have followed, had it played at liberty. This refiftance increases in proportion to the weight of the needle, as does alfo the magnetic power, according to the obfervation of our academician; and from hence he concludes, that the most perfect needle is not that which is attended with the smallest degree of friction, but that in which the refiftance, arifing from friction, will be in the leaft proportion with the directing power. He thinks, it would be proper to augment the magnetic power of the needle by increafing its weight; even though this might render the resistance of the friction proportionably greater; be

caufe

caufe it might be poffible to correct the error arifing from hence, or at least, to make a proper estimate of it. The error might be corrected by following the mean between two observations that would yield, the one a direction tending too much towards the east, and the other, a direction too much to the weft; and it might be eftimated by experiments well calculated, and repeated for each dimenfion, and each degree of weight which it might be thought proper to give to the needle.

The difference, which is obferved between the directions, indicated by the compaffes, in places that are little diftant from each other, while at greater diftances the directions are the fame, form, in the judgment of M. LE MONNIER, a strong proof of the neceffity of perfecting ftill farther the conftruction of the compafs, and of fixing exactly the true magnetic meridian.

M. MONNIER, after feveral judicious obfervations on the improvement of this ufeful inftrument, gives an account of the experiments he made with two different compaffes, carefully placed, one at the Temple, and the other on the terrafs of the Thuilleries. To avoid all error proceeding from diurnal variations, he made his obfervations every day at the fame. hour. The magnetic needle pointed to Paris, on the fide of the east, in the beginning of the laft century; it continued to return toward the north until the year 1666, and after that period, it paffed over to the fide of the weft. It remained afterwards ftationary for fome years, and M. LE MONNIER thinks, he may venture to affirm, that it was fo ftill, in 1773. Obfervations on the Tides at Madagascar, in the Torrid Zone. By M. LE GENTIL.

Memoir. Concerning the Form of the Bar or Metallic Canductors, defigned to preferve Buildings from the Effects of Lightning, by conveying it into the Earth. By M. LE ROY.

One of the most extraordinary things we meet with in this memoir, is the obftinacy with which the French have rejected the use of metallic conductors, notwithstanding the experimental demonftrations, fo often repeated, of their falutary effects. M. LE Roy laments it as a juft reproach caft upon his nation, "that it adopts with eagerness the frivolous modes of its neighbours," (he meant, we fuppofe, invents frivolous modes for itself, which its neighbours are foolish enough to imitate)" while useful dif coveries, whofe advantages are afcertained by reason and experience, are scarcely ever employed by his countrymen, before they have been adopted by all the rest of Europe."

The fubject of this memoir is the form which ought to be given to metallic conductors. This point was controverted in England a few years ago. Some gave the preference to those conductors which rife but a little above the building on which they are fixed, and whofe extremity is blunt and obtufe: others,

following

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