awake from their dreams, whether of dotage or frenzy, with respect to the language or text of the Old Teftament, is alfo to wait for ever. The taste of the age for found logic, found criticism, and found philofophy, has acquired fufficient itrength to triumph over their oppofers,'

Having anfwered all the ordinary objections to a revifal of the common verfion, the learned prelate brings forwards, in chap. iv. fome fubftantial arguments to fhew that a revifal is expedient. These are,

1. The flux nature of living languages; and the great change which our tongue has undergone fince the year 1611, when the prefent verfion firft appeared.

2. Since that period, the biblical apparatus has been much enriched by the publication of Polyglotts, of the Samaritan Pentateuch, of improved lexicons, of books of Eastern travels, &c. Many Hebrew and Samaritan MSS. have been collated, the Oriental dialects more induftriously cultivated, Rabbinical prejudices exploded, and facred criticifm carried to a degree of perfection which it had not attained in the last century.

With fuch an acceffion of helps, (fays our author,) with light poured in from every part of the literary world, with fuch important principles, and with the advancement of critical skill to apply them, it is natural to conclude that many mistakes and obfcurities may be removed from the prefent verfion, and that the precision, beauty, and emphafis of the original may be communicated to it in various places.'

The fifth and laft chapter contains the Bishop's RULES for conducting an improved verfion of the Bible. There were prefixed to his tranflation of the Minor Prophets *, but are now greatly enlarged, and illuftrated by a number of quotations from various works that have appeared fince that publication. Then follows a lift of the various editions of the Bible, or parts of the Bible, in English, from 1526 to 1776.-There is one more complete, as far as it goes, prefixed to Bishop Wilfon's Bible.

We now take our leave of the venerable author, refpectfully and fincerely wifhing him long life and health to enable him to pursue his Biblical ftudies, and foon to give us another opportunity of applauding his labours. Ged.

Ey

ART. II. Difertations on different Subjects in Natural Philophy. By James Hutton, M. D. 40. pp. 740. 11. 1s. Boards. Cadell, jun. and Davies. 1792.

HIS weighty quarto contains different fets of differtations, They are indeed fo diffimilar, that we wish they had been published feparately. Many readers will be indifferent to all

See our Review, vol. lxxvi. p. 43.

but

but the first part; and to fome, perhaps, only the general fpeculations will be interefting.

The first part commences with thofe ingenious papers on rain, which appeared in the Edinburgh Tranfactions. They are here reinforced by a third differtation, in which farther illuftrations are given, and the controverfy with M. de Luc is continued. A fourth differtation treats of our vernal and autumnal winds.

At the end of the volume is an appendix with a table, in which the author confirms his theory of rain from obfervations on the weather in Bengal. We do not think that the new dif fertation on this fubject, at the prefent period, calls for our particular notice any more than the two re-published differtations. If there be any of our philofophical readers whom they have escaped, we may with propriety take this opportunity of recommending them to their perufal, as being fome of the most ingenious and profound papers that have lately appeared in meteorology. We only regret that Dr. Hutton's manner of unfolding his principle of condenfation of atmofpherical moisture is not equal to the fagacity with which it was investigated: but it is his misfortune, in general, not to appear to fo much advantage in the character of a writer as in that of a philofopher. By labouring to attain great precifion and perfpicuity, he fometimes becomes tedious and obfcure. The reader of thefe papers and of his ingenious theory of the earth must be very good tempered, if he bears patiently the dull formality of being fold over and over again what the author is going to prove, and how he is going about it: or what propofed to be fhewn ;' what not propofed to be fhewn;' and how we are to con fider the fubject.'

In Diff. the 4th, the difagreeable and unpleasant effects of the Eaft wind in fpring are imputed, with much probability, to its coldness which at one time may be more fenfibly felt from its extreme moisture, and at another from its extreme dryness. The latter quality is eftablished in a very pleafing manner:

I never had a hygrometer; but I used to amufe myself in walking in the fields, by obferving the temperature of the air with the thermometer; and trying its dryness, by the evaporation of water. The method I pursued was this: I had a thermometer included within a glafs tube, hermetically fealed; this I held in a proper fituation until it acquired the temperature of the atmosphere; and then I dipped it into a little water, alfo cooled to the fame temperature. I then expofed my thermometer, with its glats-cafe thus wetted, to the evaporation of the atmosphere, by holding the ball of the thermometer, or end of the tube in which the ball was inclofed, towards the current of air; and I examined how much the evaporation from that glass tube cooled the ball of the thermometer which was included.

<During the summer season, in the driest weather that I could find, I never funk the thermometer, in that manner, to the best of my remembrance, above two, three, or four degrees. But, in a cold.cast wind in the fpring, I once funk it between nine and ten degrees. It was I believe about the month of March or April the fky was cloudy above, and no funshine; and the wind was cold to the feeling fteady blowing, but not ftrong.'

Dr. H. thus ingenioufly accounts for the fog which appears on the east coast of our inland, during the prevalence of the eaft wind:

The fog, which we are now confidering, does not appear until the fun has heated the furface of the fea. At that time, therefore, there is a great evaporation from the surface of the fea. To condense this vapour, there is required a mixture of atmosphere, fufficiently cold, and fufficiently faturated with humidity. But our east wind, when flowing gently, affords thefe proper conditions. It is first fufficiently faturated with humidity, in flowing along the German ocean; and then it is mixed with the warm vapours of the fea upon our coaft. In this manner the furface of the fea, which before emitted transparent vapour, may be made to fmoke, and be covered with a vifible mift. This is a phenomenon which often naturally occurs to us upon our stagnant waters, and which can eafily be exhibited experimentally at our pleasure.'

6

Part II. confifts of a chemical differtation concerning phlogifton, or the principle of fire. Dr. Hutton here defigns to thew that fome important facts or effential phenomena in the burning of bodies are not explained by the antiphlogiftic theory; and that, until these be explained, it is neceffary to retain the term phlogifton, which expreffes fomething material in the knowledge of nature, or generalizes certain phenomena, which the new theory does not explain.'

The fingle experiment of the formation of water and generation of luminous heat, by the burning of oxygene or hydrogene airs, forms the bafis of this paper. It is fully admitted that the quantity of water produced is equal to the weight of the airs employed; and that water confifts of elements contained in these airs :-but it is contended that they alfo contain other matter, of a kind which does not gravitate, and that this matter is decompounded by the conflagration. The argument may be stated thus: 1. hydrogene and oxygene airs do not unite, when fimply mixed. 2. They are not prevented from uniting by calorique, or latent heat. 3. They are combined with other fubftances, in fome particular ftate, by which the natural union of thofe conftituent parts or elements of water is prevented. 4. The heat and light, that appear at the time of the combuftion of the airs, are not from the latent heat which they contain, but from a modification of the folar fubftance or light,

which is a conftituent part of the hydrogene air, and may with the utmost propriety be termed a phlogistic fubftance. It is neither our inclination, nor would it appear decent in us, to reprobate attempts to invalidate the anti-phlogistic fyftem wholly or in part but we muft obferve that the confiderations urged by Dr. H., in favour of his 2d pofition, are by no means convincing to us. This propofition, however, though it would furnish an irrefragable argument against M. Lavoifier, is not neceffary to Dr. H.'s theory. It is only incumbent on him to establish that which we have numbered as the fourth. Of this it may be remarked that, were there no other instance but in the deflagration of the two airs of heat and light produced by inflammable fubftances, and bodies containing oxygene, we fhould find little difficulty in admitting this part of the French theory. Nor do we fee any improbability in fuppofing the quantity of latent heat, neceffary to maintain elastic fluidity in the two airs, to be greater than the fteam which they generate on deflagration can contain :-but there are many experiments in which it is utterly impoffible to allow that the fame arifes from latent heat becoming fenfible. These cafes had been pointed out by former writers; by whom, as well as by Dr. Hutton, M. Lavoifier had been, in our opinion, juftly charged with unwarrantably assuming a great quantity of concrete calorique in nitre and nitrous acid, in order to account for the heat and light produced, when thefe fubftances are deflagrated with fulphur, charcoal, or oils. The action of oxygene, therefore, being allowed according to the modern doctrine, thefe phænomena are ftill not thoroughly explained. Philofophers will decide whether the hypothefis, defended by Dr. H., in this paper, will apply to the unexplained circumstances in a fatisfactory manner. It is certainly not any thing abfurd in its enunciation, nor contrary to authentic experiments, which has occafioned it to. be neglected, as it feems to have been, but rather the inexpert manner in which it is ftated. We with our reprefentation may obtain for it a fair hearing, and an impartial examination. The hypothefis-to ftate it more diftinctly-is-that when bodies emit light, in confequence of the decompofition of their phlogistic fubftance, the luminous matter is not derived from any fpecies of heat, but that it is a luminous emanation, proper to the decompofition of phlogistic fubftance, and is the fenfible effect and proof of that operation. In p. 249. this hypothens is ftated more intelligibly, thus: in combustion, 1. there is an oxygene combination of vital air with the gravitating matter of the inflammable fubftance; and, fecondly, there is a luminous feparation of the folar fubftance, which had

been

been united with the hydrogenous matter of the inflammable body.'

The following paffage is extracted as the most important in the differtation. It contains Dr. H.'s arguments in behalf of his hypothefis :

The way I propofe to make out this propofition, is, by first fhowing that, when inflammable bodies in the ftate of vapour are kindled, it is not the vapour heated to incandefcence that emits the light; but that it is the intenfe illumination which gives the heat. Secondly, by fhowing that bodies, which have no more than the common temperature of the atmosphere, may emit light by the decompofition of phlogiftic fubftance.

With regard to the firft, let us turn our attention to the flame of a candle. Whether are we to confider that flame as an claftic fluid heated to incandefcence, or as an intenfely luminous body heating the fluid which is in contact with it? If calorique is to be fuppofed as heating the elastic fluid, fo as to make it emit light, this fuppofition fhould be founded upon fome known fact of a fimilar nature; before concluding in that cafe, it were abfolutely neceffary that we should have fome experience of an elaftic fluid, under the ordinary preffure of the atmosphere, and at liberty to expand under that preffure, being actually heated fo as to emit light. Now this is an example which, it is apprehended, is not to be found; confequently the fuppofition, thus deftitute of any reafon or analogy, must be rejected. On the other hand, in fuppofing the emiffion of light as heating the elaftic fluid which is in contact with the luminous body, we fhould expect to find a ftream of intenfely heated air or vapour afcending along the flame of the candle, without having the power to emit light. Now this is actually the cafe; and it is proved in the following manner:

Let a fmall bit of clay, like a grain of corn, be fufpended by a flender wire above the flame of a candle, and let a fcreen be placed near the candle, fo as to hide the flame from the obferver He will then perceive that the ftream of heated air, which has no power of lumination, will heat the little body to incandefcence, at a confiderable distance above the flame. The blow-pipe gives a fimilar experiment, although one which is not fo eafily comprehended.

We now proceed to the fecond part of the propofition, which is to fhow that light may be emitted in the decompofition of phlogistic fubftance, not only without fufficient intenfity of heat to form incandefcence in any body, but without any perceptible increase in the heat of the body which is to emit the light.

Examples of this may be taken in living animals, which have a power of emitting light; we fee it alfo in the dead bodies of certain animals and vegetables, which are in a wafling ftate, or going into decay. It will not be difputed that phlogiflic fubftance is concerned in this operation, and that the inflammable principle is here confumed, in like manner as by burning, only with a flower progrefs. But, left any doubt fhould arife upon this fubject, we fhall now take cur illuftration from a well known chymical fubftance, by which the two operations in queflion will be certainly homologated. • Να

8.