der me from diftinguishing directly. Notwithstanding this amazing multitude of images, which man does not always fee, but which he keeps in referve, to make ufe of occafionally; he has table-books befides, wherein he now and then perufes the broken materials of his numerous readings; and confults pieces that are lefs connected, and more difficult to preferve, fuch as the terms, idioms, phrafes, and peculiar delicacies of three or four different languages. It is his memory that fupplies him feasonably with the discoveries of the greateft genius's of every age; with the ravishing ftrokes of the greateft orators and poets; with the reflections of men, whom a long experience has rendered perfect; in short, with whatever he has been able to learn in confequence of his own remarks, or by means of the works of others.

When he is arrived at the know ledge of certain truths by reafon, and has made himfelf fure of the acquifition of them by experience, he depends upon his memory for the keeping them. It is anfwerable for them to him. It lays them before him in proper time, not with every particular proof of them, but in a compendious manner, and by way of conclufion, One fingle maxim, or even a fingle word, which it recals to his mind feafonably, fpares him much ftudy and needlefs repetitions. He finds there, at any time, the edict, or the table of the law, which is to be the rule of his conduct in every inftant of his life.

How is it poffible that one fingle head fhould range in order this amazing multitude of ideas, fo very wide from each other, and not the leaft trifle be mislaid in that magazine, provided it is only reviewed now and then? There, as well as every-where elfe, it is the eye of the mafter that keeps every thing in proper order.

But he experiences, in his memory, a kind of conveniency, never met with in common magazines. It is a general custom in the latter, fometimes

to difplace and remove a great many things, in order to find what is looked for. You must at least read the labels, to know what you are to fix upon; whereas it is the reverfe in our memory. If man is defirous of making ufe of what he has feen or tried, that has a relation to the object that fills his mind; this fingle intention of his does the business at once: for inftead of being then obliged to run over and peruse the table-books, in order to find his ideas there, it is the ideas themselves, that come and offer to him of their own accord. The others, at the fame time, keep at a diftance. That which immediately concerns him, after it has ferved him, difappears in its turn, though ftill ready to fhew itself again upon every new command. What corner of the brain can serve them for a retreat? Nay, what relation is there between ideas and a brain? What vessels, or what ftreams of fpirits, can poffibly affift these ebbings and flowings of thought? What is it can awake them from a long fleep, and immediately lull them into it again? What can animate all those fervices with so much variety and expedition? How can the brain contribute to operations of fo fine and fubtile a nature? Are these things then only in the mind, in the pureft intelligence? Can ye let us into that fecret, ye great philofophers, who have studied and fifted man to the bottom? Here you fcorn to dwell upon the goodnefs of the gift, or the intention of the benefactor; for you think that no philofophy. Of all the faculties that help our thoughts, memory is, in your opinion, the groffeft and moft material. It is effentially no more than a matter apt to receive a variety of impreffions. What produces memory, is only a ftream of animal fpirits, which imprint their own ftamp more or lefs deeply in that matter, according as they are more or lefs abounding. They form a picture there; and when new fpirits run into the fame engraved ftrokes, the fame images offer themfelves again to

the

the mind. Nothing can be more plain or natural.

From this pofitive manner in which you explain yourselves, one would be apt to think that you have at your difpofal these animal fpirits, the very channels through which they run, and all the veffels that convey them. As if you could diffect memory. But, it is all illufion. When I talk of the fuperiority which memory gives to the human understanding over all the animals; I fpeak, it is true, like one whofe knowledge is but very narrow, fince I only fay what I know, and what every body may very easily know of the matter; but this obfer. vation is at least connected with realities, and may work upon the mind by filling it with gratitude: whereas, when you materialize memory, and learnedly articulate the effence and operations of it, you talk with confidence of a thing, which you have no certain idea of; and by that means leffen the esteem we might otherwife have for your differtations.

:

You know that the rays of light, being reflected from the furface of objects, paint the image of the latter on the Retina, or bottom of the eye. We will allow you to fay (though you know nothing of it) that another ulterior image of them is immediate ly formed in the brain but, were you fure of that, as you are uncertain of it, there would be an analogy, we fuppofe, between this laft image and the ocular one; and as the picture drawn by the extremities of the rays, at the bottom of the eye, lafts no longer than the picture of the optic nerve, it will be the fame with the picture, which is faid to be drawn in the brain. As foon as the latter fhall cease to be shaken, the pretended por

trait, which the pretended animal fpirits had engraved on it, will vanish. What picture can then remain in the brain?

Befides; What can the image of a favour be? What the length and breadth of a found? Could the pencil of a Titian, or a Raphael, reprefent the fmell of a jeffamin, or diftinguish it from that of a rofe? Has a colour any out-lines that can be dilineated? According to what direction muft the fpirits ftream in the brain, to draw there the purple, rather than the grain-colour? There is no image but what has its dimenfions. But the major part of our fenfations having no lineaments or dimenfions whatever; What can the image of it be? And when the fhaking of the organs is perfectly over, how can there remain in us any character or figure of them caft in a mould ?

We will not fay, however, that there remain in us no foot-steps of what we have felt or thought; let people even affirm, if they pleafe, that there remain in us tracks and images of all the things we have experienced in the world. These are loose words, that found indeed very learnedly; but which teach us nothing in this, any more than in a great many other matters. They are tolerated, because they are employed by way of metaphors, and cannot lead us into any dangerous mistakes. But let us frankly own that our memory, as well as our imagination, our intelligence, and all things within us, is a marvellous inftrument, which we employ without knowing any thing about it; an inftrument the more useful, as it performs wonders, without our being troubled, in the leaft, with the care of the execution.

TH

HE furface of the celeftial globe, of which the principal figure before us is a true delineation, reprefents the convex furface of the fphere of the heaven, such as it would appear to us, if we were placed without, at an immense distance from it. Whence it is eafy to conceive, that if the eye, be fuppofed to be placed in the center of the globe, and holes made in the center of each ftar, the eye, if properly. pofited, would view, through each of these holes, the very ftars in the heavens represented by them.

But as it would be impoffible to have any diftinct ideas of the stars, with regard to their number, magni tude, order, distance, &c. without reducing them to proper claffes, and arranging them into certain forms; the ancients divided them into several confellations, or afterifms: a conftellation is a collection of stars, which in the heaven appear near to one another, and may be imagined to reprefent the figure of fome real or imaginary animal, or of fome other known vifible thing, as a ram, a lion, a centaur, an harp, a crown, &c. The number of the ancient conftellations is forty-eight, but the number on our prefent globes is about feventy. By the ancient conftellations, we mean thofe which were received from the Greeks, and particularly from Ptolemy. We find fome of thele occafionally mentioned by Homer and Hefiod, but Aratus treats professedly of them all, except two or three which were invented after his time, in the following method: Firt, He fhews how each conftellation is fituated, with frespect to those which are near it. Secondly, What pofition it is in, with regard to the principal circles of the fphere; and Thirdly, what conftellations rife or fet with it. This falis, however, far fhort of the accuracyro Hipparchus the Rhodian, and of Ptolemy, with regard to the places of the

ftars; but was fufficient for the use of, failors, and the purposes of husbandry, which were the ends chiefly proposed by this author, who lived above twohundred and seventy years before the birth of our Saviour, and is the poet cited by St. Paul, Acts xvii. 28. Hipparchus, the Bythinian, has fhewn by; feveral paffages quoted from them both, that he followed the defcriptions of Eudoxus, who flourished about onehundred years before him; and it is very probable, that the Greek astronomers who fucceeded him, continued to use the fame figures of the conftellations down to Ptolemy, though with some variations and additions.

Ancient tradition has handed down to us the ingenious method, which the firft men made ufe of, to know exactly, the line which the fun describes, now called the ecliptic, which may be seen in Macrob. in fomn. Scip. Lib. i. c. 21. and Sext. Empiric. Lib. v. adverfus Mathemat. The former of thefe authors attributes it to the Egyptians; the latter, and more juftly, to the first inhabitants of Chaldea, who were the fathers of aftronomy, as well as of all mankind.

This circle they diftinguished in the heavens, by twelve conftellations, whofe names were taken from the most important events, which happen either in the heavens, or on the earth, as the fun fucceffively takes his place under every one of them.

By a particular care of providence, the dams of the flocks commonly happen to be pregnant, about the end of Autumn. They bring forth during the winter, and in the beginning of the fpring. Whence it happens, that the young ones are kept warm under the mother during the cold, and afterwards eafily thrive, and grow active, at the return of heat. The lambs come the firft, the calves follow them, and the kids fall the laft. By this means the

lambs,